Template talk:list:punctuation/en

Language bias in msg::punctuation
The msg::punctuation text (see, for example, colon) has an American English bias. # is marked as "pound", but the pound sign was originally "£" and still is in the UK; "hash" might be a better neutral term. Similarly, [ and ] are marked as "bracket", but the UK, "bracket" refers to a parenthesis while [ and ] are called "square brackets". Square bracket might be a better neutral term here. "Period" is also American; the UK uses "full stop" - perhaps, in the absence of a neutral term, both could be included here. What are others' thoughts? And how would I go about editing this myself?

Furthermore, having looked more closely at this list, - is not a minus sign, it is a hyphen. The plus, minus and equals signs are not punctuation marks - they are mathematical symbols. I think this list should be restricted strictly to punctuation marks, namely those marks used to make sentences more readable (comma, colon, semicolon, question mark, etc), not a list of miscellaneous symbols (percent, dollar, etc) - these belong in a different list.

Semicolon is one word, not two. The dash needs to be added.


 * This is the reply I wrote before the above was updated:
 * It's worse than that. # should be labelled as pound/hash/sharp though in Australia it's usual name is "hash". I've always thought that brackets was the generic term but also the "official" term for what is colloquially known as "squre brackets" as opposed to parentheses (round brackets) and braces (curly brackets). Anyway the "worse" part I was referring to is the fact that most of the symbols in this section are not punctuation at all! They are merely symbols. Punctuations are that subset which are used to punctuate a sentence. Under this definition I would not include ampersand, minus, equals, underline, dollar sign, percent, backslash, greater than, plus, less than, pound. Or just change the text to "symbols", "signs" etc. Hippietrail 13:26, 4 Mar 2004 (UTC)


 * Quite, and then move it out of "colon" et al - maybe make it a separate page that can be linked to, rather than a msg::. Who wrote this?  How can the general user edit it?


 * By the way, I was the author of the first three paragraphs on this topic. I forgot to sign them. -- Paul G 18:29, 4 Mar 2004 (UTC)


 * Resuscitating an old discussion, I have edited this template to remove the symbols that are not puncutation marks, and have added a fe that were missing. I believe this template is now complete. &mdash; Paul G 10:24, 5 Sep 2004 (UTC)


 * Since this seems to be resolved to everyone's satisfaction, shouldn't this be moved to Template talk:punctuation and deleted from the clogged Wiktionary namespace? --Connel MacKenzie 20:12, 14 July 2005 (UTC)


 * Trivial issue performed. &mdash; Vildricianus 18:44, 5 March 2006 (UTC)


 * Strike out, since fixed (so others don’t have to waste time reading this). H. (talk) 10:53, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

space taken
I would prefer that this be placed in a different location and that it be much more compact. In a nice box with shading, it would still attract enough attention. Possible locations include on right-hand side (in a vertical layout) or at the bottom of the entry or the first language section (Translingual or English). This is part of my general campaign to densify our entries (especially the first screen). DCDuring TALK 19:12, 11 November 2008 (UTC)


 * See Requests_for_cleanup for an initial discussion. is probably what you have in mind. After playing with both this one and that one to try to standardized the articles, I found the float-right template unattractive for several reasons.
 * Since it's on the right-hand side, it messes with other objects there (TOCs, wikipedia boxes, pictures).
 * Since it's floating, on some of our shorter Translingual sections the box is too tall and juts out the bottom (into other sections sometimes).
 * Since it's floating, and shaded, it attracts too much attention. (We should be drawing attention to the definitions if anything.) It's just a list of similar items, so it should go under the appropriate subheading ("See also" or "Related Terms") like all other entries.
 * I'm all for making the template more compact and stream-lined. I've made this one nicer than it was before (and just made it 3 columns to make it more compact on your suggestion). Please feel free to do more of this, but I don't think we should make it like the wikipedia boxes. --Bequw → ¢ • τ 09:08, 12 November 2008 (UTC)


 * I took a stab at a 5-column layout. Feel free to revert or improve. The obvious problem is that the punctuation marks themselves should not be "small". Some of the distinctions lapse into invisibility. OTOH, the labels could perhaps be smaller yet. DCDuring TALK 10:50, 12 November 2008 (UTC)
 * created and used to orphan . --Bequw → ¢ • τ 18:12, 22 March 2009 (UTC)