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Use of Proper Spelling and Grammar

Thanks I figure that, but with some people *cough* trolls *cough* its always safer than sorry. Also I just feel that its appropriate that if you specify proper spelling that you should also specify which or that either is allowed. And there can be some people who genuinely understand that there are differences between American and British English but not that it extends to spellings. I know myself that the whole ground floor in British is actually first floor in American STILL trips me up when reading.
 
Thanks I figure that, but with some people *cough* trolls *cough* its always safer than sorry. Also I just feel that its appropriate that if you specify proper spelling that you should also specify which or that either is allowed. And there can be some people who genuinely understand that there are differences between American and British English but not that it extends to spellings. I know myself that the whole ground floor in British is actually first floor in American STILL trips me up when reading.

...we call the ground floor the ground floor too... Or are you saying that the first floor is the SECOND floor?!!! o_O
 
I think so. I just know that if they say second floor in America we say first floor. We go, ground up to first up to second, etc. I thought American goes first up to second up to third, etc.
 

Devor

Fiery Keeper of the Hat
Moderator
...we call the ground floor the ground floor too... Or are you saying that the first floor is the SECOND floor?!!! o_O

In an elevator, in America, the buttons read 1, 2, 3. In Europe the same floors read G, 1, 2. In NYC you tend to see G, 2, 3 to avoid confusion.
 
In every elevator I've ever been in it's G, 2, 3 where it is understood the ground floor is the first floor.

So in Europe a one story house doesn't have a first floor? I am incredulous.
 

Butterfly

Auror
A one storey house? Never heard of such a thing, or are you referring to a bungalow where everything is on the ground floor?
 
I never liked the term "first floor," because as a programmer, I see the floors in the building as an ordered list. Here's an example of the floors in my office building, by name:

{ 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 }

The first floor in that list -- "1" -- is the first floor. But some buildings are { G, 1, 2, 3 ... } and others are { G, 2, 3, 4 ... } Which means that "first floor" can be interpreted to mean "the first floor in the list of floors" or "the floor labeled '1'". All buildings have a floor-that-comes-first, but only some have a floor-labeled-'1'.

So we're better off referring to floors by name. "Floor 1", "Floor G", "Floor 5", etc. Of course, this doesn't flow quite as easily verbally. :)

"Ground floor" has its own problems, because if that term means "the floor from which you can exit the building safely" (that is, without falling or digging through dirt), there are buildings with multiple ground floors. Boelter Hall at UCLA has nine floors, and you can exit the building from five of them.
 
A one storey house? Never heard of such a thing, or are you referring to a bungalow where everything is on the ground floor?

Why are you emphasizing the British spelling of story?

...or is this a joke saying you only understand British?

...if not, then not just bungalows only have one floor.

..................................................This thread has convinced me that British people cannot count. I am concerned.
 
We can count fine, but correct grammer is often illogical. (also love the debate on British vs American I have inadvertently started) For example you go up to a capital city even if your are travelling south which is geographically down. So why not other areas. Like the American first floor possibly trying to get logic to the British Ground floor. I think the British comes from ground floor, the lowest floor that is still on the ground rather than under it, and the first floor is the first floor above ground floor and the second the second. Wheras the American could come from the first floor is the first floor that is still on ground rather than under and you see, and the second floor is the second floor you see.
 

Chilari

Staff
Moderator
My office is worse. We have ground, then mezzanine, then first floor. The mezz used to be a proper mezz, with just a few rooms and then balcony overlooking the ground, but then it got filled in with no renumbering. So I climb two flights every morning to get to my first floor desk.

But I've got to say, the American spelling of storey confuses me. The extra e is there to tell you it's a level in a building not a work of fiction. And because I work for a construction company, I'm always correcting engineers who have spelled it wrong in the text they send me about what they're working on. There aren't nine stories about this building, it has nine storeys. Gah!
 

Steerpike

Felis amatus
Moderator
There are a lot of words that have multiple meaning without changing spelling, however. Context should help in that regard. If someone says "hand me that bat," the context will hopefully let you know whether he is referring to a long wooden object or the animal :)
 

Holland

Dreamer
Ok so WAY back in 2008 or so, I wrote fanon on one of those fanon wiki sites. I would write and edit all of my posts in Microsoft Office Word, spell check and grammar check everything and then reread everything so it didn't have incorrect words and other stuff that Word cant auto check for. Needless to say a guy on the site still hassled me about my stuff to the point that I stopped all together.

I am here on this site to hopefully get critical feed back on some of my world building project so I can bring more life into my illustrations.

So since i am not here you post chapters of my novel or anything, will be trolled just because I don't conform to one or more persons grammar and or writing style?
 
I guess your last point "please avoid excessive use of abbreviations, and always finish your sentences with a period."
is very important to all of users.

Thanks for your informative tips.
 
We can count fine, but correct grammer is often illogical. (also love the debate on British vs American I have inadvertently started) For example you go up to a capital city even if your are travelling south which is geographically down. So why not other areas. Like the American first floor possibly trying to get logic to the British Ground floor. I think the British comes from ground floor, the lowest floor that is still on the ground rather than under it, and the first floor is the first floor above ground floor and the second the second. Wheras the American could come from the first floor is the first floor that is still on ground rather than under and you see, and the second floor is the second floor you see.

Then there is the hospital I work at. It's an American hospital with what should be an "American first floor," but is listed as the ground floor.
 

JadedSidhe

Minstrel
Their, there, they're and your and you're are pet peeves I hate seeing in posts. So many times these simple words are used the wrong way.
 

Sherman

Scribe
I have horrid typing--I will construct the story in a word processor before I paste it on the board to minimize errors.
 

Ravana

Istar
I have horrid typing--I will construct the story in a word processor before I paste it on the board to minimize errors.

Just remember: never trust your spell-checker. Always check its suggestions before you accept them. (And know the difference between "accept" and "except," too.… :p )

Really, though, that's a good way to proceed, especially with longer posts. I don't have as much of a problem with bad typing–and I always review what I've typed before I hit "Submit"; my problem is that too often I've been knocked off-line in the middle of a long post, and lose the whole thing. Doing it off-line helps avoid that.
 
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Really, though, that's a good way to proceed, especially with longer posts. I don't have as much of a problem with bad typing—and I always review what I've typed before I hit "Submit"; my problem is that too often I've been knocked off-line in the middle of a long post, and lose the whole thing. Doing it off-line helps avoid that.

I always recommend to my online students to write their work up offline and copy/paste to the forum. This way they have a record of the post as well. I would recommend this with anything approaching a blog-length post in any environment.
 

Harmonytoo

Acolyte
I have participated on other fora where even some of the moderators did not proof read their posts. It was hard for me to read sometimes. I'm glad to see this site is careful about writing.
 
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