In 2010 Me Write Good
By
I hate how certain words in the tech industry are spelled by the media. For example, website is spelled Web site, and email is spelled e-mail. I’ve resisted spelling words that way, hoping and holding out for the media to drop the spaces and hyphens. However, after waiting several years, they haven’t budged.
Starting in 2010 I’m going to lay down arms and accept the media status quo–at least as tech industry spellings are concerned. At this point, I think it’s more harmful than helpful to spell those words differently, and I want articles I write for my sites to be as media friendly as possible. I’ll be following the AP‘s style, which is taken from their Stylebook (hey, shouldn’t that be style-book or Style book?!).
AP Style for Internet and Information Technology Terms
- ASCII
- For American Standard Code Information Interchange. Uppercase acronym.
- download
- One word. Also, upload.
- CD-ROM
- For compact disk as read-only memory. Uppercase acronym, with hyphen.
- cyberspace
- One word, lowercase.
- database
- One word.
- domain name
- Two words, lowercase.
- dpi
- For dots per inch. Lowercase acronym.
- DVD
- For digital video disk. Uppercase acronym.
- Lowercase, with hyphen. Also, e-book, e-business, e-commerce, e-shopping.
- end user, end-user
- Two words as noun, hyphenate as adjective.
- FAQ
- For frequently asked questions. Uppercase acronym.
- freeware
- One word, lowercase.
- FTP
- For file transfer protocol. Uppercase acronym, lowercase spelled out.
- GIF
- For graphics interchange format. Uppercase acronym, lowercase spelled out.
- gigabyte
- Abbreviate GB.
- home page
- Lowercase, two words.
- HTML
- For hypertext markup language. Uppercase acronym, lowercase in URLs. Generally spell out in sentence.
- hyperlink
- One word, lowercase. Also, hypertext.
- Internet
- Always capitalize.
- intranet
- No capital, one word.
- IP address
- For Internet protocol address. Uppercase acronym.
- IT
- For information technology. Uppercase acronym. Generally spell out in sentence.
- Java
- Capitalize. Also, Javascript.
- JPEG, JPG
- For joint photographics expert group. Uppercase acronym, lowercase spelled out.
- kilobyte
- Abbreviate KB. No space used with number, as 400KB. Also, kilobit, abbreviate Kb, or Kbps for kilobits per second.
- listserv
- One word, lowercase.
- login, logon, logoff
- Lowercase, no hyphen.
- Macintosh
- Capitalize. Also, Apple Macintosh, Mac.
- megabyte
- Abbreviate MB.
- megahertz
- Abbreviate MHz.
- online
- No hyphen.
- OS
- For operating system. Uppercase acronym, lowercase spelled out.
- portal
- Lowercase.
- For portable document format. Uppercase acronym. Also, Adobe Acrobat PDF.
- Pentium processor
- Capitalize, with Roman numeral, as Pentium III processor. Also, Intel Pentium processor.
- plug-in
- Hyphenate.
- RAM
- For random access memory. Uppercase acronym, lowercase spelled out.
- ROM
- For read-only memory. Uppercase acronym, lowercase spelled out, with hyphen.
- search engine
- Two words, lowercase.
- shareware
- One word, lowercase.
- URL
- For Universal Resource Locator. Uppercase acronym, capitalize when spelling out.
- Usenet
- One word, capitalize.
- Unix, UNIX
- Capitalize for generic use, uppercase acronym for trade name.
- World Wide Web or Web
- Always capitalize.
- Web site
- Two words. Also, Web page, Web browser, the Web.
- webmaster
- One word, lowercase. Also, webcast
- workstation
- One word.
