Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Archive 15

message: One thing that I've noticed in a number of articles is the inconsistent use of terms even when there are no overriding contextual reasons to do so.  For example, take the abbreviation for World War II - a number of articles use the abbreviation WWII , and others use the abbreviation WW2 .  For the Nanking Massacre, some articles use that term , and others use "Rape of Nanking" .  It seems to me that there should be a MoS policy stating that barring any contextual, technical, or dialect issues, articles should use the same terminology as the primary article article.  This has the added benefit of centralizing debates regarding terminology in the relevant articles; people that lose an argument on how to name article XYZ would not be able to fight their fight on the articles that link to XYZ.  Comments? --Bletch 23:58, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes. Are you crazy? The last thing a big free-flowing project like this needs is a rule to stifle creativity.  While it may be possible to come up with one way of saying World War II that is the best way for so doing, to remove the ability for anyone to write it as WW II because they "lost" some argument somewhere misses a whole bunch of the philosophy behind Wikipedia. Highlighted links are not meant to be "titles" which may have all sorts of constraints (including disambiguations and the fact that articles frequently encompass multiple related terms) and words in text should not be straight-jacketed into article titles either.  A link is just a link, a way for the reader to explore a subject further. By holding the pointer on the link you can see the article to which that link will lead. The person writing the article (and others who modify it) may have all sorts of reasons to express things the way they do without stilting things by making links exactly match titles and vice versa. In fact, Wikipedia options for setting up links are the way they are just for the reason that good writing, scholarship, and multiple backgrounds of contributors make plasticity in this aspect of writing/editing absolutely necessary. I think your idea could have merit in only a limited number of cases at best - Marshman 01:41, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Well much of those disambiguation justifications fall under what I previously said about contextual reasons.  For obvious reasons, an article on Brazil would link to its national sport by using football, whereas an article on the New England Revolution may use soccer, because of the differing context.  But there are many cases where inconsistency exists without any reason.  --Bletch 21:53, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)

text: Simply because consistency within an article is a virtue (it aids the reader, the only recommendation a virtue requires), that doesn't mean that lack of consistency among articles is a sin.  --Wetman 22:39, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Policy on terminology consistency? 

message: Some footnote calls come before the punctuation[1]; others, after.[2] Some even get preceding spaces. [3] What's the rule? Is there one? Personal preference? All depends? (And, on a related note, why do we let the footnote template mess up line spacing to such an extent?) –Hajor 30 June 2005 23:49 (UTC)
:No? Nobody? –Hajor 7 July 2005 05:07 (UTC)
I don't use footnotes, but I wonder the same thing about inline links. 
Either: 
(a) We're discussing how to punctuate. 
or
(b) We're discussing how to punctuate .
I do the former. If it were a question: "Are we discussing how to punctuate?" we wouldn't write:
(c) Are we discussing how to punctuate ?
SlimVirgin (talk) July 7, 2005 05:22 (UTC)
::The former.  The punctuation is part of the statement that is being referenced. Mark1 7 July 2005 05:28 (UTC)
I think it's a question of taste. Generally, in my experience as an editor, footnotes follow punctuation without an intervening space. I don't have the energy or inclination to go look it up but I'd say this is general practice and would be surprised if there was much dissent in the style guides. It is definitely so in Hart's Rules and I think so too in CMS. This makes sense particularly with a period because the alternative is rather ugly and the period does "belong" to the sentence that is being footnoted. After a comma is more tricky because the comma can be said to "belong" to both clauses that it separates. If you put it before though, it looks as though the note is only on the word that it follows.
Unless anyone has a source they feel can rival Hart's Rules or CMS, I'd go with them if we must choose. -- Grace Note
:OK, thanks. And my apologies for confusing footnote calls with inline links. What CMS (14th) says is: "the superior numerals used for note reference should follow any punctuation marks except the dash (...) Whenever possible, a note number should come at the end of a sentence, or at least at end of a clause." And it prints them without an intervening space. But from a strictly aesthetic point of view, our (non-superscripted) inline links look better with a separating space, per SlimVirgin, above. Which is what I think I'll continue to do (while not tyranically imposing my preferences on other editors in the absence of a MoS guideline, of course). –Hajor 21:27, 13 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Footnotes

message: It is my understanding that court cases are to be rendered in italics and with versus abbreviated as v., e.g., Roe v. Wade. Assuming I am correct, and assuming that it isn't already buried in this style guide somewhere, perhaps we should this as a rule.  (I would do it myself, except that I'm not sure if perhaps there is a more specific legal manual where such an addition would be more appropriate [than in the main style manual])
Theshibboleth
:OK with me. Maurreen 2 July 2005 14:21 (UTC)
:My two cents: Italics don't seem necessary. In the case Roe v. Wade, blah blah blah. In Sullivan v. New York Times, the court held that...
:The less italic text, the better. -- DavidH 2 July 2005 14:34 (UTC)
::My fourpenn'orth: I think italics are appropriate here, though I wouldn't worry about adding the dot after the v. Certainly wherever I refer to a case in my professional life, I will always use italics, jguk 2 July 2005 16:08 (UTC)
:::OK, just one more pence from me: Those aren't really titles at all. They're shorthand for the actual captions on the cases, as I understand it. I'm fundamentally wary about font changes. The context in most articles would make references to cases clear. 
:::Not a huge deal for sure. Anybody writing about court cases is competent to format as they see fit, without a specific guideline. -- DavidH
Italics are the standard style. See Court citation for more details, and Template:Citation HCA and Template:Citation CLR for providing the proper form, and linking to online text, for Austrialian cases. If there aren't similar tempaltes for US cases, there probably should be. See also Wikipedia:WikiProject U.S. Supreme Court cases.  DES 5 July 2005 17:36 (UTC)
:Actually the official GPO Style Manual calls for the v. to not be italicized.  Thus the "correct" version is Roe v. Wade, not Roe v. Wade
:: 11.8. The names of legal cases are italicized, except for the v. When requested, the names of such cases may be set in roman with an italic v. In matter set in italic, legal cases are set in roman with the v. being set roman.  (See the GPO Style Manual for specific examples.)
:Obviously this need only apply for U.S. court cases and I certainly wouldn't lose sleep over it, but if templates are developed for U.S. cases they should follow it. -- Caerwine 00:28, 31 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Court Cases