Double-spacing after a period

[nunuu]

I'm so old school. When I type, I STILL hit the spacebar twice after a period. :P This is what happens when you learned keyboarding on electronic typewriters back in the 80's.

Anyone else do the same thing?

[Deuce]

I do. It's pointless in HTML, of course, but it's still proper form.

[Sgt Phantomizer]

Unless it's an unconsious mistake, no, i don't...i've never even used a typewriter.

[WoottWinds]

I do. Typing with only one space after a period just feels incredibly wrong to my fingers.

[Chelli]

I used to type that way because that's how they taught it in school, but eventually I stopped. Now I only put one space after periods.

[Deuce]

eventually I stopped.

I'm old, and set in my ways! I will never stop!

[Peytral]

Wait, what? People put two spaces after punctuation? o.o

[Ryos]

I do. It's pointless in HTML, of course, but it's still proper form.

Newer English guides state one space is proper now, but I will never succumb to this defiance of English standards! If nothing else, I think sentences flow better with two spaces.

[Sgt Phantomizer]

Wait, what? People put two spaces after punctuation? o.o

LOL, i'm right there with ya o.O

[NorseFTX]

I have a habit of putting two spaces after sentences. =P
The old versions of Microsoft Word used to call a single space after a period a spelling error, and would correct it to two spaces, so I've gotten used to putting two spaces after my periods. It actually came from back in the day of typewriters and monospaced fonts, where the fact that a period took the same amount of space as all the rest of the letters made it difficult to see where sentences ended in a huge paragraph. Putting an extra space helped delineate where the sentences began and ended.
Now that we've got proportional fonts, though, the double space is kinda obsolete. However, it just doesn't feel right if I don't jab the space bar twice!

EDIT: Huh...! Funnily enough, this message board edits double spaces out of posts anyway.

[Ryos]

Huh...! Funnily enough, this message board edits double spaces out of posts anyway.

That's because vBulletin renders posts in HTML, which as Deuce mentioned prevents you from having more than one space - other than when you use the pre HTML tag.

[brightsuzaku]

I'm young, so I have no idea what you guys are talking about. And mind you, I have a typewriter in my basement, but gosh... I never learned proper typewriter typing; I'm too young! And that's that. It's nothing more than a bizarre concept to me.

[Suzaku]

I double-spaced after periods until a couple years ago. Now I just single-space. I still use an Oxford comma, though! And spell dialogue with that -ue at the end.

[Dark Schneider]

Yeah, I can't stand not spacing after a period or whatever... reading or typing.

[nunuu]

Wait, what? People put two spaces after punctuation? o.o
Yeah, man! You young'uns!! Aren't you excited to be learning about history from us geezers???

Anyway, periods and colons are supposed to have double-spaces way back when but nowadays, the extra space isn't necessary. I think it originally had to do monospaced fonts or something?

Here's someone ranting about the double-spacing: http://www.slate.com/id/2281146/

And here's a quote from it about why double-spacing existed:


"The problem with typewriters was that they used monospaced type—that is, every character occupied an equal amount of horizontal space. This bucked a long tradition of proportional typesetting, in which skinny characters (like I or 1) were given less space than fat ones (like W or M). Monospaced type gives you text that looks "loose" and uneven; there's a lot of white space between characters and words, so it's more difficult to spot the spaces between sentences immediately. Hence the adoption of the two-space rule—on a typewriter, an extra space after a sentence makes text easier to read. Here's the thing, though: Monospaced fonts went out in the 1970s. First electric typewriters and then computers began to offer people ways to create text using proportional fonts. Today nearly every font on your PC is proportional. (Courier is the one major exception.) Because we've all switched to modern fonts, adding two spaces after a period no longer enhances readability, typographers say. It diminishes it."

[brightsuzaku]

And spell dialogue with that -ue at the end.

Ok, I give, who here spells "dialogue" without a "-ue" at the end?! Just saying. I've seen "dialog" plenty of times, but it just feels wrong.

And what about spacing before there was printed type? Oh, wait, that was pretty much before the printing press! Never mind! And back then, conventions were basically nonexistent... Ha! XD

I think I will save my anoyed rant about the English language for later. *cough* In short, it's a mess. It's the language I speak, but hoo boy, is it a mess! Maybe that's its "charm". Riiight.

[Deuce]

The language, itself, is perfectly fine. It is simply diminished by the idiocy and laziness of most of its speakers.

[NorseFTX]

The language, itself, is perfectly fine. It is simply diminished by the idiocy and laziness of most of its speakers.

Doesn't English break, like, half of its own rules? Or all its rules have a whole list of exceptions, like--
Remember, I always comes before E, except after C!
And also except when you have the "ay" sound, like neighbor and weigh.
...Oh, right, also for the long "I" sound, like height.
And the long "E" sound, such as seize.
Wait! Even after C, I sometimes does come before E, like in society.
Okay, forget what I just said.

[brightsuzaku]

I have two words for you all: silent letters. Bwaaaah, the agony.

That, and the many attempts of people to try to "fix" English haven't helped its case. American-speak also its own a plague, but I'm stuck defending it every now and then because... I'm American. And, I don't see the point of a "u" in "colour", but I do understand the point of an "s" in "maths"... Since it's short for, you know, "mathematics".

Whenever I see the word "colour" I keep thinking, "col-eeuur" or "co-lure" like it was French or some poor word attempting to be French. That "u" is just somewhat perplexing, that's all.

"Aluminium" is just a prettier word than "aluminum", so I'll stick with that. Aluminium! Ah! I could say that all day.

(Aluminium, aluminium, aluminium....)

[Suzaku]

And dang it, it's grey, not gray. :P

[Blue Star Princess]

I know we're supposed (at least that's what I've always been told). However sometimes I'm just lazy and don't space. Or I just do one space like I just did. : D

[dunno001]

I've heard of it, but I never really did. And I never got yelled at in class for it, either. I guess the silliness in me just prefers the single space, since it's one less byte of data to transfer. Of course, in today's days, nobody notices 1 byte, and the way I ramble on in posts kinda negates it... (Though I am still a stickler for mostly proper English...)