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From: jeremy@inf.rl.ac.uk (Jeremy Isserlis)
Newsgroups: comp.text,comp.std.internat
Subject: Re: American vs. European numerical usage
Message-ID: <3970@rlvd.UUCP>
Date: 10 Oct 88 11:07:04 GMT
References: <3443@phri.UUCP>
Reply-To: jeremy@inf.rl.ac.uk (Jeremy Isserlis)
Organization: Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Didcot. UK.
Lines: 27

In article <3443@phri.UUCP> roy@phri.UUCP (Roy Smith) writes:
>
>	I just got back page proofs for an article to appear in a British
>journal.  I notice that the editors changed the way I wrote numbers, but in
>what appears to be an inconsistent way.

First,  do not assume that British really means European!
I can only talk as UK/NZ usage, especially UK:  In normal, everyday use and general
casual working use in Britain:
      Commas are used to denote thousands as in
	  1,988 = One thousand nine hundred and eighty-eight.
      Other than on computers and older style printed matter the full stop does not
meand decimal point, it means "times" as in 6.(3+4) = 42.  It is true that this
notation is used less and less, mainly because of confusion with American usage.
      A decimal point can not be represented properly on most computers: it is
written as a dot, occupying about half a space or less, in the middle of the
vertical line, NOT ON the line.  In UK newspapers, advertising hoardings etc. generally
use the proper decimal point now, seem to have found the right type face character!  A full
stop, ".", is just that, other than on computer print-out.

>	What do Europeans do with things like "SunOS-3.2"?  Convert it to
>"SunOS-3,2" or leave it the way it is?

   This is not a problem:  it is treated as any trade name, i.e. left unchanged.
>-- 
                        Jeremy Isserlis
			<jeremy@inf.rl.ac.uk>