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Subject:Spaces After Full Stop--Technical Thought From:Matthew J Long <mjl100z -at- MAIL -dot- ODU -dot- EDU> Date:Wed, 17 Sep 1997 10:22:08 -0400
I promise this post is not an argument for or against two spaces after a
full stop. I learned something new the other day that seemed relevant to
the topic. So let me know what ya'll know!!
I have been learning to program in C on the Macintosh lately (it's pretty
fun and cool) when I ran into a couple of text related functions
(routines) in the Macintosh toolbox called SpaceExtra(); and CharExtra();.
The description that came with these two function calls says that you can
add width to a space or a character with those two functions respectively.
Someone had said that they thought that the macintosh automatically
adjusts the width of a space after a period for you. Then I remembered
sombody's rebuttal post that said something like "the Macintosh cannot
tell when you come to the end of a sentence to know whether or not the
space between a period and the next character should be wider."
I'm not trying to correct that person because, honestly, I don't know what
this function call from the Macintosh toolbox really does. But is seems to
me that with a function, that can add width to a space, could do so
conditionally (i.e. after a period is read) in the code.
If this is true, then it would support the argument that the spaces
between a period and the character that follows the space could be wider
making it unnecessary to place two spaces after the full stop (At least on
Macs--dunno about PCs-- haven't been programming for Windows).
Anybody know anything about this?
Just curious!!
I accept any and all rebukes if this post is "off-topic". Seemed relevant
to me!!
////////////////////////////**************************************
Matthew J. Long
Technical Writer
mjl100z -at- mail -dot- odu -dot- edu
matt -dot- long -at- justice -dot- usdoj -dot- gov
-When you can't be eloquent, choose brevity!
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