How do you say "12 o' clock" in a manual?

Subject: How do you say "12 o' clock" in a manual?
From: "Hart, Geoff" <Geoff-H -at- MTL -dot- FERIC -dot- CA>
To: "TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com>
Date: Wed, 10 Jan 2001 09:49:56 -0500

Archimede Ziviello wonders <<What's the best way to say 12 o'clock in a
manual?>>

Depends. Who's your audience? If they're European (and particularly French),
using the 24-hour clock would be a perfectly appropriate choice. If you're
uncertain about your audience (other than that they're English), "noon" or
"midnight" is your best choice: 12 AM could be either noon or midnight,
depending on how you look at these things--and discussions on the
copyediting-l list have proven to my satisfaction that there's considerable
difference in the point of view.


--Geoff Hart, FERIC, Pointe-Claire, Quebec
geoff-h -at- mtl -dot- feric -dot- ca
"User's advocate" online monthly at
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"Technical writing... requires understanding the audience, understanding
what activities the user wants to accomplish, and translating the often
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