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I expect that, as usual, Microsoft has left hands and right hands that
do not know what they might be doing.
HOWEVER, there may be a good reason for this difference that is not
adequately covered in their Manual of Style.
All caps is difficult to read, especially when you are in a hurry (as
on an interface menu). On that menu, the meaning is non-ambiguous.
In documentation, all caps can signify clearly and at a glance that
you are referring to a key combination.
I remember what a total pain it was on several projects long ago when
the "powers that were" decided that in the printed docs, the keys to
be pressed were to be expressed in a Keycaps font. The mixed fonts
were a total pain--especially anywhere that a style was applied to the
mixed-font material.
David
On Mon, 20 Dec 2004 14:26:36 -0700, Brian Jennings
<brianjennings -at- cougarmtn -dot- com> wrote:
However, even though everything I
> can find shows the standard to be to have the keys in all caps (CTRL+V),
> all my office programs have the shortcut with initial caps and then
> lower case on the menus in the software. If you are using Microsoft
> Outlook, for example, the File menu has shows the Print command shortcut
> as Ctrl+P instead of CTRL+P.
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