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Unfortunately, the second deletion discussion occurred during my increased preoccupation by several things outside Wikipedia, and I did not examine the text of the Register as thoroughly as I should have. While I am grateful to Darkfrog24 for (his or her) help in adding discussion links to the Register, I am disappointed that questionable material has possibly been added (perhaps in good faith). The more that I examine the Register, the more that I find that the possibly bad content is entangled with the good content. The situation is similar, in some aspects, to the one described at Matthew 13 24–30. I wish that I had acted more effectively to save the Register in its original namespace, perhaps by removing some good material along with possibly bad material. Perhaps I will undertake the task of removing the questionable material at some time in the future. I do not endorse the present version.
—Wavelength (talk) 23:21, 7 February 2016 (UTC) and 23:32, 7 February 2016 (UTC) and 01:24, 13 February 2016 (UTC)

This page is a work in progress, a working draft of a supplement to the Wikipedia:Manual of Style. Its purpose is to record decisions made in discussions at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style. For more details, please see the January 2010 discussion archived at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Archive 113#Recording consensus.

This document is meant as a reference of consensus decisions on the Wikipedia Manual of Style and, when available, the reasoning behind each consensus. It is not itself a collection of guidelines, rules, or laws. Just the fact that a consensus has been recorded on this page does not mean that that consensus is a permanent and unchangeable part of Wikipedia. This register is meant only to give editors better understanding of the current state of things, which is useful both to those considering proposing changes and to those seeking to better implement the MoS as it exists.


Article titles, headings, and sections[edit]

Article titles[edit]

Section organization[edit]

Section headings[edit]

National varieties of English[edit]

(subsections re-ordered)

Opportunities for commonality[edit]

Consistency within articles[edit]

Strong national ties to a topic[edit]

Retaining the existing variety[edit]

Capital letters[edit]

Do not use capitals for emphasis[edit]

(new subsection)

Capitalization of "The"[edit]

Titles of works[edit]

(new subsection)

Titles of people[edit]

Religions, deities, philosophies, doctrines[edit]

Calendar items[edit]

Animals, plants, and other organisms[edit]

Celestial bodies[edit]

Compass points[edit]

Thread retitled from "Directions and regions".

Institutions[edit]

Ligatures[edit]

(new section)

Abbreviations[edit]

Write out both the full version and the abbreviation at first occurrence[edit]

(new subsection)

Plural and possessive forms[edit]

(new subsection)

Full stops and spaces[edit]

(new subsection)

US and U.S.[edit]

(new subsection)

Circa[edit]

(new subsection)

Do not use unwarranted abbreviations[edit]

(new subsection)

Do not invent abbreviations or acronyms[edit]

(new subsection)

HTML elements[edit]

(new subsection)

Ampersand[edit]

Bold[edit]

Italics[edit]

Emphasis[edit]

(new subsection)

Titles[edit]

(new subsection)

Words as words[edit]

(new subsection)

Foreign words[edit]

(new subsection)

Scientific names[edit]

(new subsection)

Quotations in italics[edit]

(new subjection)

Italics within quotations[edit]

(new subsection)

Effect on nearby punctuation[edit]

(new subsection)

Italicized links[edit]

(new subsection)

Controlling line breaks[edit]

Thread retitled from "Non-breaking spaces".

Technical information[edit]

(subsection removed)

Use[edit]

(subsection removed)

Quotations[edit]

Original wording[edit]

Thread retitled from "Minimal change".

Point of view[edit]

(new subsection)

Typographic conformity[edit]

Thread retitled from "Allowable typographical changes".

Quotations within quotations[edit]

Attribution[edit]

Linking[edit]

Block quotations[edit]

Foreign-language quotations[edit]

Punctuation[edit]

Apostrophes[edit]

Quotation marks[edit]

Reasons to prefer straight quotation marks and apostrophes[edit]

Thread retitled from "Curly or straight".

Currently there is no consensus regarding which quotation glyphs to use. Originally the rule was introduced on 10 April 2003 in [1] without any discussion on the Talk page (see [1]). The rule stated “For uniformity and to avoid complications use straight quotation marks and apostrophes”. The debate regarding the appropriateness of this rule started in [18], [19] with the conclusion that the MoS have to be changed, yet all such changes have been reverted. Since then, the issue has been revisited many times.

The reasons currently provided for using straight quotation marks are as follows:

They are easier to type in reliably, and to edit. Mostly true, excepting that users would have to turn off the “smart quotes” function when pasting text from word processors.

Mixed use interferes with some searches, such as those using the browser’s search facility (a search for Alzheimer's disease could fail to find Alzheimer’s disease and vice versa). Apostrophes figure in this part of the debate, though it is argued that they are not relevant to the discussion of quotation glyphs. Modern browsers (such as Google Chrome) are capable of understanding that ' and ’ probably mean the same thing, so they will find both the “Alzheimer's” and “Alzheimer’s” regardless of how it is typed. I has also been argued that most people already know that the safe way of searching for “Alzheimer’s disease” is to type “Alzheimer disease”. The lack of complaints regarding other special characters such as those in “Rao–Cramér inequality”, which are even harder to search for in an older browser, has also been noted.

Furthermore, wiki markup tags (such as <ref name="xxx"/>) will not work if curly quotation marks are used. Tags are a part of computer language. They are meant for the computer, not for the people. It is an error to use curly quotation marks to delimit strings in wiki markup, HTML, CSS, JavaScript, or most other computer languages.

The arguments in favor of recommending the curly quotation glyphs are as follows:

They are typographically correct. Meaning that it is the standard of English language to use glyphs “” to denote quotations. This rule can be found in most serious manuals of styles, both for paper and electronic documents. Most Wikipedia Manuals of Styles in other languages explicitly forbid the use of straight quotation marks. See for example German, French, Russian, Italian versions.

Reasons to prefer double quotation marks to single quotation marks[edit]

Thread retitled from "Single or double".

The Wikipedia MoS prefers double quotation marks to single ones because they are more discernible visually, and there is no risk of mistaking a quotation mark for an apostrophe. This rule may have been put in place as part of a split-the-difference attempt to balance British and American English punctuation practices, in which the early MoS favored British style punctuation for periods and commas with quotation marks in exchange for preferring double quotes. This deal was made under the mistaken belief that British always requires single quotation marks.

Names and titles[edit]

(new sub-subsection)

Punctuation inside or outside[edit]

This is a partial list of major MoS discussions, as of June 2015, about quotation marks and closing punctuation (does not include passing mentions):

Brackets and parentheses[edit]

Sentences and brackets[edit]

Brackets and linking[edit]

Ellipses[edit]

Commas[edit]

Serial commas[edit]

Colons[edit]

Semicolons[edit]

Semicolon before "however"[edit]

Hyphens[edit]

Dashes[edit]

Punctuating a sentence (em or en dashes)[edit]

En dashes: other uses[edit]

Other dashes[edit]

Slashes[edit]

And/or[edit]

Number signs[edit]

Terminal punctuation[edit]

(subsection removed)

Punctuation and inline citations[edit]

Citations are always placed after punctuation when they occur together. This occurs regardless of whether the citation pertains to the entire preceding paragraph, or only the preceding sentence or clause. In placing inline citations and footnote marks after periods and commas, Wikipedia follows the overwhelming majority of reputable publications. Only one publication, Nature magazine, was found to place citations before punctuation. In addition, most of the Wikipedians involved in the discussion, even the ones supporting an allow-both policy, voiced preferences for the consistency and look of post-punctuation citations.

This issue most recently came under discussion in February 2010, when one editor found a discrepancy between WP:MoS and WP:FN. WP:MoS allowed only post-punctuation citations while WP:FN allowed both post- and pre-punctuation citations. After much discussion, WP:FN was altered to allow only post-punctuation citations.

Spaces between said punctuation and the inline citations were deemed neither sightly nor necessary, by consensus on WP:MoS.

Spacing[edit]

Spaces following terminal punctuation[edit]

Consecutive punctuation marks[edit]

Punctuation and footnotes[edit]

Punctuation after formulae[edit]

Dates and time[edit]

Time of day[edit]

Days[edit]

Choice of format[edit]

Months and seasons[edit]

(separated into "Months" and "Seasons"; see below)

Months[edit]

(new subsection)

Seasons[edit]

(new subsection)

Years and longer periods[edit]

Current[edit]

Numbers[edit]

Currencies[edit]

Units of measurement[edit]

Common mathematical symbols[edit]

Grammar and usage[edit]

Thread retitled from "Grammar".

Possessives[edit]

Singular nouns[edit]

(new sub-subsection)

Plural nouns[edit]

(new sub-subsection)

Official names[edit]

(new sub-subsection)

Pronouns[edit]

(new sub-subsection)

First-person pronouns[edit]

Second-person pronouns[edit]

Plurals[edit]

Verb tense[edit]

(new subsection)

Vocabulary[edit]

Contractions[edit]

Gender-neutral language[edit]

As of January 2010, there is no consensus either for or against the use of the singular "they" in Wikipedia. Arguments for its acceptability include its long history in English, the fact that it is common in informal speech and writing and grammatical rules that permit a plural pronoun with words such as "everyone" that do not refer to a specific subject. Arguments against its use include its informality and the grammatical impropriety of using a plural pronoun for a singular subject. Please see the articles on WP: Gender-neutral language and the singular they for more information.

The most recent discussion of the singular "they" can be found here.

Contested vocabulary[edit]

Instructional and presumptuous language[edit]

Subset terms[edit]

Identity[edit]

Use of "Arab" and "Arabic"[edit]

(new sub-section)

Gender identity[edit]

(new sub-section)

The practice of using the most recent publicly preferred pronoun and/or first name of any individual whose gender might be questioned, such as trans men and trans women, has been challenged and revisited more than once. There are many levels of opinion on this issue. Some believe in using the most recent preferred pronoun to refer to the subject throughout his or her life (current policy). Some believe in using the pronoun corresponding to the subject's gender of rearing when writing about periods before the subject's gender transition and then the preferred pronoun only when writing about periods after the subject's gender transition. Some believe that only the pronoun corresponding to the gender of rearing should be used. Still others believe that the context, such as whether the person is more notable as a man or a woman, should decide the matter. Below is a partial list of discussions of this issue as it pertains to the Wikipedia Manual of Style. Be advised that conversations from a few years ago may use now-outdated terminology.

The MoS's instructions regarding transgender individuals who are mentioned in passing in other articles (as opposed to in articles of which they are the principal subject) date to a single RfC in late 2015. The RfC was inspired by a conflict in the article space: whether to name "Bruce Jenner" or "Caitlyn Jenner" on a list of Olympic athletes. Not all of the RfC's results were clear, but the majority of participants agreed that context should play the largest role in determining whether to use one name or both and which one. The idea of requiring that the previous name be used alone in all cases was specifically rejected.

Below is a partial list of discussions pertaining to other parts of MOS:IDENTITY.

Foreign terms[edit]

Technical language[edit]

Geographical items[edit]

Images[edit]

Avoid entering textual information as images[edit]

Captions[edit]

(previously a section)

Formatting of captions[edit]

(previously a subsection of "Captions")

Bulleted and numbered lists[edit]

Links[edit]

Wikilinks[edit]

External links[edit]

(previously a subsection of "Links")

Miscellaneous[edit]

Keep markup simple[edit]

Formatting issues[edit]

Color coding[edit]

Scrolling lists and collapsible content[edit]

Invisible comments[edit]

Pronunciation[edit]

See also[edit]

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