| Electronics > Beginners |
| Why writing style and grammar matters in posts |
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| TimFox:
An interesting feature of the posts to this thread so far is that none of them suffers from a common problem with badly-written posts. Too many posts to this forum are in solid blocks of text, with little or no punctuation, run together with no carriage returns. Regardless of content, such posts are very difficult to read, and remind one of "full of sound and fury, signifying nothing" from Macbeth. |
| golden_labels:
Abbreviations are symbols like any other. You may know them or not. We don’t explain every word we use, so why would it be different with abbreviations? Of course I mean those, which are words: most notably they are intelligible to more than one person. Fora aren’t textbooks. There is no assumption about the reader being a novice to the subject. If we may reasonably expect a misunderstanding, there is nothing wrong in providing an explanation of some form (see unseenninja’s post). But can you imagine doing this in each post you say “BJT”, “MOSFET”, “P-N junction”, “LED”, “LCD”, “TVS”, or “CRT”? C’mon! Human communication has better means to deal with such things. Don’t bring back problems solved a few dozen thousand years ago. :D If in doubt, you likely have that orifice on your face some call “mouth”. Or fingertips, since we’re using keyboards. Use them. There is nothing wrong in talking to people and just asking. In the 20s there are also technological aids like search engines, Wiktionary, or smortnets. |
| Nominal Animal:
--- Quote from: golden_labels on November 08, 2024, 10:45:56 pm ---But can you imagine doing this in each post you say “BJT”, “MOSFET”, “P-N junction”, “LED”, “LCD”, “TVS”, or “CRT”? C’mon! Human communication has better means to deal with such things. Don’t bring back problems solved a few dozen thousand years ago. :D --- End quote --- Obviously. Similarly for math notation, especially as Mathjax works here using \$...\$ for inline, and $$...$$ for full equations. Similarly for images, especially using [CENTER][IMG width=xsize height=ysize]URL[/IMG][/CENTER], which creates a centered preview image (xsize pixels wide, 300-400 is nice, ysize pixels tall, calculated from ysize=xsize·height/width) that when clicked, scales to the full width of the text area, and shrinks back if clicked again. Things you should either know or care enough to look up yourself, when discussing things, instead of inventing some easier-for-you hack. The point is to spend just a second when using the abbreviation or name or term for the first time in a thread, to consider whether it is known enough (or requires expanding for the first use) in the context or not. It is not a big thing if you err, but any such effort will show up positively in your post, and make you easier to interact with, giving you a higher chance of getting useful and helpful responses. I myself expands abbreviations too often, as part of my verbosity affliction, but I'm working on it. |
| fzabkar:
--- Quote from: Mechatrommer on April 21, 2024, 03:34:33 pm ---and you quoted wrongly. you put your words into HobGoblyn's mouth and HobGoblyn's words into Nominal Animal's. be carefull with opening and closing quote's tag (missing opening or closing bracket is not as bad) this can be seen as irresponsible act. preview your post before posting. cheers ymmv. --- End quote --- This is the kind of stuff that annoys me. Normally when I see it, I ignore it and move on to the next post. Just in case you don't understand what I mean, sentences should start with UPPERCASE. Can you explain why you choose to defy this standard rule? Is that how you were taught in school? |
| coreykelley:
Thank you for this insightful, and detailed post! I completely share your views on the significance of clarity, grammar, and effort in forum communication, particularly in a community where many members are non-native English speakers. |
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