[Blindtlk] a question of spacing

[Dan Hicks]

Stuff like this fascinates me.

When I leaned to type, back when typewriters were manual and about as heavy 
as engine-blocks, we were taught to type two spaces after a period. A long 
time ago I notices that most typeset stuff does not have two spaces after a 
period, but I dutifully continued to type two spaces after each period.

Then I read a couple of good grammar books that address this issue. One of 
them, I believe is "The Elephants Of Style: A Trunkload Of Tips On The Big 
Issues And Gray Areas Of Contemporary American English" by Bill Walsh (DB- 
or RC-59150). This book explains that the reason for double-spacing after a 
sentence has to do with the old-fashioned way typesetting used to be done. 
It took me about a week to break that lifelong habit of double-spacing, and 
now I don't do it at all.  Well, almost never.

About the tab going in all those spaces -- you may be using a very small 
font, or you have something set a bit strangely. That would be my take on 
that.

Dan Hicks

"If you are going to walk on thin ice,
 you might as well dance."
                        - Inuit Proverb
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Ray Foret jr" <rforetjr at comcast.net>
To: "Blind Talk Mailing List" <blindtlk at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Friday, June 19, 2009 5:20 PM
Subject: [Blindtlk] a question of spacing


> Okay.
>
> Here's the observation.  I cannot help but notice that when I read an 
> e-mail
> from a sighted person, there is only one space following a sentence ending
> period.  However, when I read most blind people's e-mails, (the ones I 
> come
> in to contact with anyhow) I cannot help but observe that there are two
> spaces following a sentence ending period.  With some blind people's
> e-mails, there is only one space following a sentence ending period.  Back
> when I took typing in highschool, we were taught that when you end a
> sentence with a period, you MUST space twice.  Also, paragraphs were to be
> indented by spacing five times in from the left margin.  Nowadays, though,
> it would appear that those rules are changed.  Are paragraphs still to be
> indented five spaces in from the left margin?  And what about spacing 
> after
> sentence ending periods?  As for the five spaces, I rather suspect that 
> this
> was done so as to put the first letter of the first line of the paragraph
> one half inch from the left margin; using pyka type.  With Microsoft word,
> the number of spaces needed to put the insertion point one half inch from
> the left margin appears to be twelve.  Thoughts?  Am I missing something
> somewhere?
>
> Sincerely,
> The Constantly BAREFOOTED Ray
>
> "Old friend, what are you looking for?  After those many years abroad you
> come With images you tended Under foreign skies Far away from your own 
> land"
> George Seferis
>
> Phone or Fax::
> +1 (985) 360-3614
> Cell:
> +1 (985) 791-2938
> e-mail:
> rforetjratcomcastdotnet
> Skype Name:
> barefootedray
>
>
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