Capitalization, Pluralization and Spelling Establish a style for capitalization. Older style indexes often capitalize the first letter of each main entry. In technical documentation, it s wise to follow the capitalization used in the text because capitalization can affect the meaning of specific terms or may be incorrect if changed. Be careful about American, Canadian and British spellings. Employ the spelling used in the main document.
Many rules apply to personal names.
Generally, you enter the surname followed by forename or initials. Freud, Sigmund Special rules apply to handling prefixes in French, German and other European names. Different rules may apply to names of Asian origin as well. Beethoven, Ludwig van Cheng Shifa Du Guesclin, Bertrand Las Heras, Manuel Antonio Mya Sein Suharto Names of geographic features that begin with the type of feature, such as Mt. or Lake, are inverted when entered in the index. On the other hand, you do not invert proper place names that begin with a type of feature.