- From: Orion Adrian <orion.adrian@gmail.com>
- Date: Thu, 29 Dec 2005 12:06:04 -0500
- To: Elliotte Harold <elharo@metalab.unc.edu>
- Cc: www-style@w3.org
On 12/29/05, Elliotte Harold <elharo@metalab.unc.edu> wrote: > > Adam Kuehn wrote: > > > Although most authorities agree that the commas after "HTML" and "XML" > > are optional, including them is grammatically correct and in this case > > is probably the better practice. On first encountering this sentence, a > > reader may well interpret "in HTML element names" as a complete phrase > > and only re-think that construction upon reaching the word "and". Using > > the comma following each brief introductory phrase prevents this from > > happening. (Incidentally, your proposed alternative is probably > > incorrect, as well. The semicolon should be a comma in your proposed > > phrasing, according to most style guides. One would use a semicolon > > only if the conjunction were removed.) > > You can argue about the commas. The semicolon I'm sure of though, at > least for U.S. English. When either of the two independent clauses > joined by a conjunction contains a comma, a semicolon must be used > before the coordinate conjunction. This is also my understanding as well. > -- > Elliotte Rusty Harold elharo@metalab.unc.edu > XML in a Nutshell 3rd Edition Just Published! > http://www.cafeconleche.org/books/xian3/ > http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=0596007647/cafeaulaitA/ref=nosim > > -- Orion Adrian
Received on Thursday, 29 December 2005 17:06:25 UTC