LET'S COMMUNICATE
Agriculture Communication Newsletter
February 2005, No. 110

Contents

• Write the Right Word
• News Releases Come in Video, Too
• Fonts for Web Pages
• The Core Rules of Netiquette

Write the Right Word

To take the confusion out of when to abbreviate months, remember these rules: If you use both a month and date, abbreviate the month, as in Feb. 14 or Feb. 14, 2005. However, if the month stands alone or you add just the year, don't abbreviate. For example: "February is the shortest month," or "She took her trip to Europe in February 2002." Here's a related rule: Never abbreviate March, April, May, June or July.

While we're on dates, if you need to specify both a day of the week and date, you must separate day and date with commas. For instance, "The workshop will be Wednesday, Feb. 9, and Thursday, Feb. 10."

If you add times to those dates, note a.m. or p.m., as in, "The seminar will run from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m." If the time span is a.m. or p.m. only, you just need to mention it once. For instance, "The meeting is scheduled to last from 8 to 10 a.m.," or "The concert is scheduled from 7 to 9 p.m."

Note that when you use "from," you also must use "to" instead of a hyphen to separate the times. And, since 12 can mean two different times, substitute noon or midnight, such as, "Lunch will be at noon,"or "We will be home by midnight."

Singular or plural: Nouns that denote a single unit, such as class, committee, group, team or company, take singular verbs and pronouns. Here are some examples: "The XYZ Co. will hold its annual meeting Monday." "The team won its third championship." "A herd of cattle was sold."

Ellen Crawford, 231-5391,ecrawfor@ndsuext.nodak.edu

News Releases Come in Video, Too

The Ag Communication video unit produces two-minute video news releases for television and is always looking for visual stories.  Video stories can also be used to jazz up your Web site. If you have news or a visual story to tell, contact Randy Wald at 231-7086 or rwald@ndsuext.nodak.edu

Fonts for Web Pages

Fonts come in two types: serif fonts that have cross-lines on the tips of the letter, for example, Times New Roman M, and sans serif fonts that are blocked with no cross-lined tips, for example, Arial M.

Many readability studies have determined the best type of font for each medium. In general, serif fonts are best for printed media, and sans serif fonts are best for on-screen reading.

Every computer has a set of fonts stored on its hard disk drive. Many computer programs, especially word processors and desktop publishing programs, have several fonts available. Obviously, the software on your computer can use the fonts stored on your computer. When you create a Web page, however, there is no guarantee the surfer viewing your pages will see what you see.

Your Web page, the way you design it, is not sent over the Internet as if it were a picture. A Web page is a set of instructions, codes and commands (HTML) that is sent over the Internet. The Web browser, like MS Internet Explorer or NetScape, interprets those codes and commands and displays the information on the monitor the best it can.

For example, if you used the Arial font on your Web page, my browser would try to find the Arial font on my computer and display that font on my monitor when I view your page. The HTML code might look like this:

<font face="arial">North Dakota State University</font> and would display 'North Dakota State University' using the Arial font.

If my browser can't find the Arial font on my computer, it will pick another font to use, which may look quite different than the Arial font.

There are billions of computers out there using hundreds of different operating systems, computer programs and monitor sizes. A number of common fonts, however, are installed on 99.9 percent of those computers. That's why Web developers tend to use very common fonts.

General recommendations for fonts on Web pages:

• Use common sans serif fonts like Arial, Courier New, MS Sans Serif, Century Gothic, Comic Sans MS and Verdana. Arial and Verdana seem to be the most often recommended fonts for on- screen reading. Times New Roman is a serif font but was designed for on-screen reading and is perhaps one of the most popular fonts in use today.
• Whenever possible, use a 12 point font or larger. Remember, many surfers have a hard time reading small text on the monitor.
• Use a very limited number of fonts per page, perhaps just one or two. ;-)
• Try not to use italics, which is harder to read than regular fonts.

Dave Rice, 231-7381, drice@ndsuext.nodak.edu

Core Rules of Netiquette

In her book Netiquette, Virginia Shea lists 10 core rules. Rule 9 is Don't abuse your power.

Some people in cyberspace have more power than others. There are wizards in MUDs (multiuser dungeons), experts in every office and system administrators in every system.

Knowing more than others, or having more power than they do, does not give you the right to take advantage of them. For example, systems administrators never should read private e-mail.

We'll cover the last rule in the next Let's Communicate. To review these rules, see www.albion.com/netiquette/corerules.html