My series of periods is being reduced to a single period!

Love the parking lot analogy. 3 couples went on vacation together (we were one) and continued to give the driver conflicting instructions. As we all chattered and chattered realized we were in a parking lot going in circles. hahahahaha Have never forgotten how that broke things up and we had such a great time. Didn't stop the directions though.

LouC

I have still got a problem with it removing spaces. Four spaces before this sentance. If we are speaking of correct punctuation, then two spaces (four before) are needed after the end of a sentance and the beginning of the next one.

Also, why are commas changing to periods?? Two spaces after the ?? I think we may have a glitch with the new way. Just my thoughts.

Sugar ..,.. I love ya girl!! I would never speak so harshly about you. LOL.
That is a joke, all. Two spaces. Just keeping in the spirit of the thread.

Editted to correct sentances after complaining on correct punctuation. lol.

Lost all of my spaces, but they are here in the edit. How do you edit, if you don't see the correct view of the post?

This message was edited Oct 29, 2007 2:07 PM

This is why I quit posting more is I have such a quirky sense of humor that I laugh sincerly and hardy when most pout. I am at all times smiling.
Just bigger on the days I can find my partial.
;)

Me too, dear. But I guess you knew that already. Many times people take what I write out of context, but then again, they don't know me, so how can I expect them to understand it ... ... ... especially without PUNCTUATION!! HAHAHAHA

sugarweed, if ya can't find your partial check with Dave, maybe it is in storage with all the missing punctuation marks...

Ah Ha!
Dave, whispering Have you seen my partial?
LOL
;)

LOL Zany.

Sugar, if you can't find yours, you can borrow mine, it's been
bothering me lately.

;-)

I apologize for not replying earlier, I just saw this thread for the first time this morning, and I've been busy since then. I admit I have not read all the replies here, either.

When I was much younger, I would dial in to a BBS (a sort of precursor to the web) and we would chat in their message forums. I and several others of my age were all typing in all CAPS and ignoring basic grammar rules.

One of the older members wrote us a public note, explaining that in order for us to be considerate of the wide audience of people who were reading our posts, we should do our best to write using, to the best of our ability, correct grammar and punctuation.

Once we all got over our bruised egos, we realized that we had indeed been inconsiderate of the other people on the forum, and we all decided to change our ways. I was 13 years old at the time and that older man had a huge impact on all of us with his one corrective post.

That is what is brought to my mind on this issue. I think we should all be considerate of the people in these forums. Many of them don't speak english as a first language, and many have difficulty following posts that are poorly structured. I believe that we should speak clearly and correctly IF we have the ability. There are some who simply don't have the ability and that's perfectly understandable. For the rest of us, we bear a responsibility to be courteous to those other people who will be reading what we're writing.

Dave

Oh, Dave, I applaud your post!

But by not reading the entire thread, you sure
missed out on a good taste of silliness. ;-)
Just kidding.

Many thanks for popping in.

KM

Thanks, Dave.
;)

Oops! cheese it folks ...it's the "The Man"

Thanks Dave :)

Wow, I hate to be repetitious, but here goes, what about the proper spacing and the changing comma's to periods at mystery times?

Your always inquisitive friend who hates to make waves but loves answers,
Pupil

This is the only code I have:

while (strstr($body,'....')) {
$body = str_replace('....','...',$body);
}

Which means that it will replace a long line of periods with three periods. Nothing else.

Dave

Hmm... it's odd then that people are seeing long lines of periods replaced with single periods.

I wonder if it's a browser thing?

I'm using Firefox at the moment, so I'll do a quick test and then log back on using IE.

String of five periods .....

String of three periods ...

OK, now I am logged on using IE

testing

String of five periods .....

String of three periods ...

Well, I couldn't get the problem people described above to repeat itself in either FF or IE. I haven't personally noticed the glitches with commas or spaces either... I'm not saying the glitches aren't happening, just that I can't help shed any light on them. Sorry.

I had never even thought of people on DG who don't use English as their primary language. No wonder Dave would like for each of us to be more considerate with our choice of words and punctuation. Even stubborn me gets this point easily.

I confess ...I am one of the serial dotters!
After this thread ...I am seriously dottie

Dave,

If you are going to have the system correct the humble period, could you set it to do the same with the other overused punctuation marks as well?

Is there any way to allow a traditional three space indentation for a paragraph? Or eliminate more that a single line break between paragraphs?





like this ?

three space indent as taught in school to start a new paragraph and some extra words for the auto wrapping to take over from there on the next lines.
three space indent to indicate a new paragraph and.... four dots to indicate a thought as well as a second...typical three dot set up.

Extra space or line break to separate for a paragraph without indentations so that this will not be one huge block of text that is hard to read and follow. (With no indentations for paragraphs a single line of white space becomes mandatory)


but...

I agree that it is necessary to use punctuation and spacing so that the posts are easier to read and less confusing. I would just as soon see !!!!!!!!!! changed to a single ! and multiple line return white spaces reduced to single blank lines and a normal 3 space indent allowed.

A simple period, comma, question mark or exclamation point does wonders to keep our posts clear. Repeated charaters for emphasis can be over used ( and annoying at times) but to eliminate the possibility entirely removes the ability for the person posting to practice self restraint or to deliberately overuse for emphasis.

What we have now is the unneeded ability to create large blocks of white space using line returns but not the ability to indent a simple paragraph.

We can get totally carried away with exclamation points, question marks etc. but can not use more than three periods or dots in a row.

If you are going to have the system correct the humble period, could you set it to do the same with the other overused punctuation marks as well?

Maybe Dave would consider doing the same thing with other punctuation marks, setting it so there's a maximum of three. Thus, "!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" could be changed to "!!!" -- that might still be excessive, LOL, but it's not as extreme.

Just picking one thing from your post, as I'm afraid dinner is
burning as I type, LOL, isn't the three space rule applicable
for old time typewritten material?

Now now, Zanymuse. (LOL) I thought this all funny to you. You have been entertaining us for two days and now you are getting serious about this not having 2 lines to start a new paragraph.

Wow, Dave, Didn't know you spoke martian!

I'd rather the empty line between paragraphs myself, makes it easier to read, but then, I'm Canadian, we still use u's----lol

Popping back in, dinner still has a few more minutes.

Honestly, folks, the ellipsis was used in excess, so Dave
fixed the program to urge everyone to punctuate properly.
It seems a gentle hint for all to at least try doing so. Surely
all of us remembered basic punctuation from school, no matter
how long ago. :-)

Umpteen punctuation marks are not appropriate unless
you just won the lottery and are willing to share with all of us.

Heh heh.

LOL It is always funny to me to see other peoples pet peeves and compare them to my own!

Two lines to start a new paragraph is fine with me but when you start seeing posts that have 5-10 white lines it becomes a big empty white space and I don't have any way to project any movies onto that blank screen.
(I don't know why my posts end with the last period while others continue on with several lines of space.)

I just found it odd to single out the lowly repeated period and not the more obvious punctuation mark repetitions. Or to indicate it is nicer to use proper structure when it is not possible to even include a simple indentation to the start of a paragraph.

I admit to the "asleep at the keyboard" syndrome at times and have run across old posts of mine and cringed at the silliness I displayed with punctuation.

LouC, it was so nice getting to meet you. I just adored your dress. Yes, the maternity look is back in again and it is so comfy. You really turned that dress into a work of art.

I am really enjoying all of the memories of the RU. I wish I could just remember all of the names. Yours was easy to remember as you have the personality type that just sticks with people. It is a very pleasant one to be around.

Mamajack, you are quite the character and I can certainly not forget you either. I can still see you going around passing out plants and having the time of your life. I really enjoyed meeting Evie and Jack. They are precious kids. Are they your only two?

Now, I wish I could have the two of you for neighbors. When I am looking for a quiet peaceful visit over coffee, I would go over to LouC's house. She just has that nurturing type of personality.

When I was bored to tears, I would go over to see Mamajack.
She is so enthusiastic about life that you can't be bored around her.

What a silly thread this has been for me to read.

I say PEOPLE! Don't sweat the small stuff! LOL
Charlene

I've just noticed something. Zany mentioned the excessive
white lines on posts. While I rarely see what she has referenced,
I did notice something.

Look at Charlene's post. It ends on the last line.
Zany's leaves a one line space, while my post, as well as
the last few posts by gessie, pupil and 3gardeners have extra
blanks at the end.

Even Critter's post did it, but right above that, Zany's post ended
on the last line again. When I'm finished, I don't hit enter, enter, enter,
so where do the extra spaces come in?

P.S. As I type this sentence, it is on the last line, no spaces left. Testing.

Ah, just figured it out. It depends on how much information
is at the left in one's information box.


This message was edited Oct 29, 2007 6:30 PM

Gosh, Gee Whiz, Charlene, I most certainly enjoyed meeting you as well. Didn't know I came across that way but am certainly pleased that I do. I have always, always loved people and can't get enough of a visit. You are most certainly welcome at my home any time you feel like it. I don't cook anymore but Mike does and we would so happy to prepare something for you. Have been trying to sort out my goodies from yesterday. Let's see, I have a white flower, and a blue flower, and a yellow flower. hahahahah.

Sure gonna miss those periods.

LouC

charlene, thank you for the nice words. i did so enjoy meeting all of you and can't wait to see you again. and i, too, liked louC's dress. lol.

now wuvie.......what do you mean "it depends on how much information is at the left"?

Thanks Mama, Didn't want to look stupid, so I didn't ask. lol.

When you look at a post, there is the box of poster's information at the left, and the text of the post itself at the right. If the text of a post is shorter than the poster's information, there will be lots of "white space" under the text. If the text of a post is longer than the poster's information, the end of the post box will come right after the last line of text.

For example, compare LouC's most recent post (longer post, no white space) to Mamajack's most recent post (shorter post, lots of white space).

At least, I think that's what Wuvie means!

Ah Ha, and also, on the posts I see, I have to option to edit, which makes mine look longer, but others, I am sure, don't see this. So Sherlock sticks the nose back to the ground to sniff out more clues to find out where the two spaces are after the period.

My 2 cents-

I had never even noticed the periods issue. What gets me is the addition of extra letters to a word to indicate emphasis. IMHO, this is frequently gratuitous as in "Nooooooooooooooo, how are youuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu".
This shows up on several forums I frequent and drives me crazy. More so because the person is clearly knowledgeable, articulate, interesting, and very kind but the posts are annoying to read.
Sugar- when do you want to go to Hassels'? You can have mine, I don't need/want them;-)

Regards,

Maggie

Maggie, I'm with you on that one, too. I do use extra letters occasionally, but I'm fairly restrained about it. I'll use "ooOOOHhh" as a response to a gorgeous bloom, or I'll comment that something was "waay over the top," but I don't think half a line of extra letters is necessary to get inflection across. Maybe the "rule of 3" applies here, also, in a less formal way?

Critter,

I agree, the rule of three would be useful here. Occasional emphasis when excited makes sense to me. Excessive emphasis in nearly all of a person's posts, simply makes it hard to read.

Maggie

Wuvie, when that happens, it's because you have extra lines beneath your text. It may be that when you were typing, you inserted some extra lines when formatting paragraphs, or inserting something into the already-typed text.

On longer posts, you can prevent that from happening by going to the end of your post's text, and hit your "delete" button until the "elevator" bar to the right disappears - a signal that your post doesn't have any stray lines or forgotten text at the bottom ;o)

No breakfast here, but I'm trying out a new recipe (split pea, barley and ham soup) for dinner tonight!

Ah, thanks, Terry!

And I believe I will have some of that soup.
Are we having a bread with it? :-)

KM (who pushed the delete button 22 times after this sentence, LOL)