Wikipedia:Simplified Manual of Style: Difference between revisions
Darkfrog24 (talk | contribs) Smoother wording and internal consistency |
Wavelength (talk | contribs) revising guideline about "circa" so that it agrees with WP:MOS#Abbreviations |
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Don't capitalize names of plants and animals. Special cases include scientific names ("''Felis catus''"), birds, and [[proper nouns]]. |
Don't capitalize names of plants and animals. Special cases include scientific names ("''Felis catus''"), birds, and [[proper nouns]]. |
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To indicate ''approximately'', the unitalicised abbreviation {{xt|c.}} (followed by a space) is preferred over ''circa'', ''ca.'', or ''approx.'' |
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Circa [''I don't know what to write here; the word is often used but our guidelines conflict.''] |
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Write "US" or "U.S.", but not "USA". |
Write "US" or "U.S.", but not "USA". |
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Revision as of 19:06, 24 July 2012
This Simplified Manual of Style lists some of the most often-used grammar, punctuation and style guidelines from the Wikipedia:Manual of Style and its subpages. When more than one option is allowed, pick one and use it consistently throughout the whole article. The main page and its subpages take precedence in all discrepancies.
Article titles and section titles should be in sentence case. "Rules and regulations", not "Rules and Regulations".
The English Wikipedia prefers no major national variety of the language over any other. These varieties (e.g. U.S. English, British English) differ in vocabulary (soccer vs. football), spelling (center vs. centre), and occasionally grammar.
Capitalize names of scriptures like "Bible" and "Qur'an", but not "biblical". Capitalize "God" when it means YHWH.
Don't capitalize summer, winter, spring, fall, and autumn.
Don't capitalize names of plants and animals. Special cases include scientific names ("Felis catus"), birds, and proper nouns.
To indicate approximately, the unitalicised abbreviation c. (followed by a space) is preferred over circa, ca., or approx.
Write "US" or "U.S.", but not "USA".
Don't use the & sign, except in titles like AT&T.
Italicize names of books, films, TV series, music albums, paintings, and ships, but not songs; songs should be in quote marks.
Use or {{nowrap}} to prevent a line from ending in the middle of expressions like 17 kg, AD 565, 2:50 pm, £11 billion, 129 million, July 2024, 5° 24′ 21.12″ N, Boeing 747, after the number in 123 Fake Street and before Roman numerals in World War II and Pope Benedict XVI. Use in the same way inside a wikilink.
Use straight quote marks and apostrophes that you probably find next to your keyboard's Enter key, that is, " and ', not the slightly different-looking “, ”, ‘, ’, etc.
On Wikipedia, place periods and commas inside or outside the quotation marks depending on whether they are part of the quoted material or not: The word "carefree" means "happy". but She said, "I'm feeling carefree." This differs from standard U.S. rules.
An ellipsis should be written as three separate dots ... not the one character … and not the spaced-apart . . .
Serial commas, like the second comma in "ham, chips, and eggs", are optional, so don't edit-war over them.
Avoid comma splices.
A hyphen is not used after a standard -ly adverb (a newly available home).
A hyphen shouldn't be between two spaces (when visible). Instead, use and en dash – with an before and a space after, or use an em dash — without the spaces. See Wikipedia:How to make dashes. Don't use two hyphens -- to make a dash. And don't use a hyphen for a minus sign.
Use an en dash, not a hyphen, between numbers like "pp. 14–21".
Write "No. 1" or "number 1", but not "#1". Comic books are an exception.
It doesn't matter how many spaces come after a period, because extra spaces won't show.
Either 10 June 1921 or June 10, 1921, is correct. Either 400 AD or 400 CE is correct. Either 400 BC or 400 BCE is correct. Please, no edit wars.
Write one, two, three, ... eight, nine, not 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 (although there are many exceptions).
Write 12,000 for twelve thousand, not 12.000.
Either "James' house" or "James's house" is correct.
Usually avoid words like "I", "we", and "you", except in quotations and titles. Similarly avoid phrases like "note that", "remember that", "of course", "obviously" etc.
Picture captions should start with a capital letter. They shouldn't end in a period unless they are complete sentences.
Use wikilinks for the phrases most likely or most helpful to be clicked, and only those. Make sure each link goes to an article on the intended subject, and not to a disambiguation page.