Going back to shortened words, New Hart's Rules (OUP), states that an abbreviation (trailing letters removed) is followed by a period, eg Prof. whereas a contraction (other letters removed) is not, eg Mrs
Maybe UK English only... Denis On Tue, 21 Nov 2017 13:55:05 +1100 (AEDT) Damian McGuckin <dami...@esi.com.au> wrote: > On Mon, 20 Nov 2017, G. Branden Robinson wrote: > > > At 2017-11-20T11:35:13+0000, Ralph Corderoy wrote: > >> Hi Branden, > >> > >>> Are you familiar with the U.K. practice[3] that says an > >>> abbreviation doesn't get a period if the abbreviation ends with > >>> the final letter of the abbreviated word? > >> > >> Nothing has been brought to a stop, unlike, say, Prof. Moriarty. > >> > >>> [3] en_GB: practise > >> > >> We English use practice for the noun, and practise for the verb. > >> Just like advice and advise. > > > > Curioser and curiouser! I have seen practise used in practise as a > > noun many times. Here's a prestigious example: > > > > https://www.springer.com/us/book/9783642391644 > > > In this case I am taking prestige as proportional to price tag. ;-) > > Sadly it is US variant. Look at the URL. > > English as spoken by most of the world has lots of examples where > 'ice' is for the noun and 'ise' is the verb. Like licence/license. > > Noah Webster pushed for spelling reform after he published his 1828 > American Dictionary of the English Language. Those reforms only > really took off in the US. I could say the rest of the world was > smart enough to largely ignore Webster's efforts but English has so > many irregularities cause by its roots in Latin and Greek, that his > ideas are not without merit. > > Also, when spelling programs came out, Webster's digital copy of > their words was $100 and the British Oxford was over $5000. It does > not take a genius to figure out which one dominates a lot of software > tools. The rules used by these tools to create British spelling from > an American English database often leave a lot to be desired. > > When in doubt, check the Oxford dictionary or better still, there is > also Fowler's Modern English Usage. > > Regards - Damian > > Pacific Engineering Systems International, 277-279 Broadway, Glebe > NSW 2037 Ph:+61-2-8571-0847 .. Fx:+61-2-9692-9623 | unsolicited email > not wanted here Views & opinions here are mine and not those of any > past or present employer > --
