Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!uunet!wang!wdr
From: wdr@wang.UUCP (William Ricker)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.smalltalk
Subject: Re: correct `string' protocol??
Summary: only printers use printers' quotes.
Keywords: punctuation quotes typography desk-top publishing
Message-ID: <786@wang.UUCP>
Date: 15 Jan 90 15:01:11 GMT
References: <25922@cup.portal.com>
Organization: Wang Labs, Lowell MA
Lines: 26

MJB@cup.portal.com (Martin J Brown-Jr) writes:
>Two of the three smalltalk texts that I have use the following format when
>dealing with single quoted strings:
>          Prompter prompt: `Name: ' default: `'
>  ** note that the open quote is an ascii xx60, while the end quote is xx2C *
>Another smalltalk text uses the following format in the same situation:
>          Prompter prompt: 'Name: ' default: ''
>  ** note that the open and end quotes are both ascii xx2C
>(The V/286 manual uses the first format, but V/286 only works if you use the
>second format.)

I'm afraid someone in the Technical Publishing department(s) at the
sources of the books is not technical enough.  There is a problem
in desktop publishing of getting too fancy; some systems and style
guides do a global search and destroy on typewriter quotes, changing them
with Artificial Ignorance to printers open-and-close quotes.  

Digitalk's older (PC XT level) manuals for Smalltalk/V had no 
such confusion, and Smalltalk/V PM edition has been corrected,
using a type-face with *vertical* open quotes for all code samples,
just like their screen font.

I don't know if Xerox/PARCPLACE ST uses printersquotes; if it does,
it would be, to my knowledge, unique among programming languages.

-Bill Ricker, erstwhile Smalltalk programmer