atw: Re: Quick grammar question [SEC=UNCLASSIFIED]

Just to let you know that in my context it's OK to say
district-specific and global. I've made a note in the doc
that global is non-district-specific (hyphens, no en
dashes) and that's the one and only time that term will be
used.

Love the discussion! Thanks guys.

Now you can put away your style guides and start getting
festive ;-)

Sonja

_____________________________________
Sonja McShane
Written Communications Specialist
Active Documents and Designs
phone:   +61 3 9571 7114
mobile:  0413 769 548
email:    sonja_mcshane@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx


-----Original Message-----
From: austechwriter-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:austechwriter-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of
Peter G Martin
Sent: Tuesday, 20 December 2005 6:10 PM
To: Silcock, Howard DR
Subject: atw: Re: Quick grammar question [SEC=UNCLASSIFIED]


Onya, Howard!  

"non-district specific" grates with me, too. 

Sounds like it might mean "state-specific",
"region-specific", "territory-specific"    OR  just not
specific at all . .. OR whatever..

And some of these rules that assume readers pick the
difference between a hyphen and an em or en rule don't look
very realistic at all, and don't much help if you have
ASCII text.   ....     

Hands up all those who teach or were taught the use of the
em rule, the en rule and the hyphen and the distinctions
between them  at school ? 

Yep, all the alternatives are much better.      And pause
to consider:  how would a reader convey the en rule on
radio ?   Smaller between-word pauses or longer
between-word pauses?   Or would between-word pauses not be
relevant, while non-between word pauses would be ?  

--Peter M


Silcock, Howard DR:
On Tue, 20 Dec 2005 16:53:20 +1100,  you wrote:
> I thought this was all agreed. But now that an element of
dissent has 
> appeared, I must jump in and support those preferring 
> 'non-district-specific' to 'non-district specific'. The
latter looks 
> ridiculous to me - it's natural to read the hyphen as
linking only the 
> words it's directly attached to, so it looks as if it
means 'specific 
> to non-districts'. And using 'non-district specific'
alongside 
> 'district-specific' would be even more ridiculous - if
you put a 
> hyphen between 'district' and 'specific' in one you
should certainly 
> be consistent and do so in the other.
>
> More generally, I'd say there's a problem with attaching
prefixes like 
> 'non-' to multi-word phrases that don't already have
hyphens. For 
> instance, if you refer to 'Department of Defence
personnel', then it 
> might seem you could also reasonably refer to
'non-Department of 
> Defence personnel'. But to me that looks as ridiculous as

> 'non-district specific' and for the same reason: it looks
as if you're 
> talking about personnel from a non-Department dedicated
to Defence 
> matters, or maybe just Defence personnel from a
non-Department
> (whatever that is). In cases like this, I think the only
> solution is to rephrase the whole thing.
>
> Some people put 'non' in without any hyphen at all, but
to me that 
> looks even worse, because 'non' isn't a word in its own
right any more 
> than 'pre' or 'anti' are.
>
> And what about 'global'? That would be the best solution,
I agree, as 
> long as it makes sense in the context.
>
> Maybe we should all just forget about this and look
forward to our 
> holidays...
>
> Howard
>
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: austechwriter-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
>> [mailto:austechwriter-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of
Jill 
>> Nicholson
>> Sent: Tuesday, 20 December 2005 14:17
>> To: austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
>> Subject: atw: Re: Quick grammar question
>>
>>
>> No, only 2, it is non-district specific.
>> In haste
>> Happy Holidays/Xmas/Whatever Jill Nicholson
>>
>> N&H Communications
>> 2 Park Ave
>> ROSEVILLE,  NSW 2069
>> 61+2+94174302
>> jpnicho@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>> www.nhcommunications.com.au everyone
>> Jill
>>
>>> ----- Original Message -----
>>> From: Sonja McShane
>>> To: austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
>>> Sent: Tuesday, December 20, 2005 8:58 AM
>>> Subject: atw: Quick grammar question
>>>
>>>
>>> A quick question for the grammarish types. When there
are two 
>>> categories of information, district-specific and non- 
>>> district-specific, do I put the two hyphens in the
second one? I'm 
>>> pretty sure I do, but not 100%. (It's one of those 
>>> very-slow-to-get-the-brain-in-gear mornings!)
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>> Sonja
>>>
>>> ___________________
>>> Sonja McShane
>>> Panviva Pty Ltd
>>> bh: (03) 9822 0555
>>> mb:  0413 769 548


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