Re: [RFR] templates://webfs/{templates}
Mats Erik Andersson wrote:
> I did in fact consider replacing the ellipsis with "etc.", but got
> cold feets due to the closing period. After checking, my dictionary
> states "et cetera" as the only fully spelled out option.
The two-word version is certainly commoner in print, but I've always
tended to write it as one, myself, and I've always been able to find
dictionaries that allowed it. I justify it by telling myself that
"etcetera" is a single naturalised English lexical item now (often
pronounced "excetera") while "_et_cetera_" is just one of the the
forms it took en route from the original Greek!
> Is a bare abbreviation 'etc' approriate here? I would prefer either
> "et cetera" or "etc" over the ellipsis based on the very same
> argument as you state.
Using "etc." should be fine. There's also the question of "etc"
versus "etc."... en_GB tends to allow full stops to be left out in
cases like "eg Mr J B Rye", while en_US styleguides prefer "e.g. Mr.
J. B. Rye" - and even sentence-final "foo, etc.!", which looks
horrible to me.
Mind you, there's also an argument for avoiding all Latinate
abbreviations (a lot of people get "e.g." and "i.e." mixed up).
It's a pity we don't have a native abbreviation for "and so on".
--
JBR with qualifications in linguistics, experience as a Debian
sysadmin, and probably no clue about this particular package
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