A Must Read! Spelling & Grammar Tips

Achtung, everyone! It's me, Ramu, your resident Spelling and Grammar Führer, here to provide you with helpful reminders on proper spelling and grammar. Now, absolutely perfect spelling and grammar are not mandated [here], but if you think about it, expressing yourself in clean, neat, proper sentences and paragraphs makes it so much easier to get your point across, and using it frequently will get you lots of respect and admiration from those reading your posts.

Of course, it is understandable if you wish to use more casual "net speak" once and a while on purpose to "let go" and "have fun". That said however, you should not be lazily lapsing into it in every single post you make. That is sloppy, and frankly, quite rude. It is an insult to your readers; it says to them, "I'm lazy and selfish, and I don't care if you can read my post or not, so f_ck off!" Is this the kind of thing you want to convey to everyone every time you say something? Of course it's not.

All right, let's get to it. First up is grammar!

Capitalization
The rules of Capitalization are quite simple, really. You always capitalize proper nouns, such as people's names -- e.g. Sue, Mark, Jane -- and places -- e.g. Tokyo, America, England. You capitalize the first letter of words at the beginning of a sentence, and the word "I" is always made a capital letter no matter where you put it. Other words that are not proper nouns should not be capitalized.

Bad Examples
hello im new. my name is sue and im from england.
I'm new to this lucid dreaming Stuff, can You show me How to attain lucidity, Please?

Good Examples
Hello, I'm new. My name is Sue, and I'm from England.
I'm new to this lucid dreaming stuff, can you show me how to attain lucidity, please?

The term "Lucid Dreaming" is one exception here: it can be used with or without capital letters.

Punctuation
Punctuation can be a little trickier than Capitalization, however, you can stick to periods and commas and be just fine, as long as you use those correctly.

A period always comes at the end of a sentence.

Bad Example
That's what I'm here for

Good Example
That's what I'm here for.

A comma is normally used to indicate only a slight pause, if for nothing else, to prevent tedious, run-on sentences.

Bad Example
I though maybe it would help but then again there were so many more pros than cons.

Good Example
I thought maybe it would help, but then again, there were so many more pros than cons.

Ellipses, which are three dots -- and only three dots -- are used to indicate a sort of trailing off of a thought...to imply that there is more to be said without actually saying it. It can also be used in the midst of sentences.

Bad Example
Maybe we should get that dog......................................or maybe not.

Good Example
Maybe we should get that dog...or maybe not.

A semicolon is often used in the place of a period, usually used when two sentences are more closely related; think of it as shorthand for the conjunction "and".

Bad Example
Today was my birthday; the dog crapped on the couch.

Good Example
Today was my birthday; I turned twenty-one this year.

Colons are used either to directly define, clarify, or expound upon something you just said, or to formally head a list.

Examples
He would have to do the impossible: ask her to marry him.
My groceries consisted of: apples, pears, bananas, and band-aids.

Contractions are words that have apostrophes in them, i.e. don't, can't won't, that's, he's, it's, etc. These will always be the abbreviation of a verb normally followed by the word "not", or, a pronoun followed by the word "is". You must always remember the apostrophe when you type these words.

Bad Example
...and dont you forget that you cant eat that before dinner.

Good Example
...and don't forget that you can't eat that before dinner.

Question marks are always used to indicate the interrogative; to indicate a question. If you do not use a question mark, then there is no question, as much as one is implied otherwise.

Bad Example
Are you dreaming

Good Example
Are you dreaming?

Exclamation points are usually used to emphasize a sentence. Normally, you use only one, but it is also somewhat acceptable to use two, or at most three.

Bad Example
Oh my god I can't believe that happened

Good Example
Oh my god, I can't believe that happened!

Slashes are used primarily to indicate either an ambiguity or a choice between two values.

Example
It was quite cramped in his den/dining room.
He was, to say the least, overjoyed and/or relieved by the news.

Parentheses are used to indicate a small thought related to the main sentence, usually an inserted opinion on what is said (or simply an addendum; they don't have to be short, either, but try not to make them too long...). (You can even have entire sentences in and of themselves in parentheses, in which case, you put the period on the inside of the closing parentheses, and not on the outside.)

Dashes are very handy, and can usually take the place of any other punctuation mark (except for periods) -- so if you're not completely sure, try using some dashes!

Examples
Proper spelling and grammar are not mandated on the forums -- though I wish they were -- so you needn't worry about getting in trouble for it.
One night, Seeker came into chat thoroughly stoned -- the experience made for some very interesting quotes.

Now, on to spelling. In terms of most words, you should always consult a dictionary if you are not sure of the correct spelling. One perfectly easily accessible one is www.dictionary.com. If you type in an incorrectly spelled word, it will suggest the correctly spelled word (or sometimes several different words, depending on the word and your spelling of it). You can also simply type the word into Google, and it will also suggest an alternate (i.e. correct) spelling.

Speaking of "your", when you mean to indicate possession in the second person, you use the word "your"; when you mean to say "you are", you use "you're".

Bad Examples
Your a dumbass.
Is that you're plate?

Good Examples
You're a dumbass.
Is that your plate?

...and neither of these is ever spelled "ur".

Also, in the same vein, when you mean to indicate the possessive of a genderless entity, you say "its"; when you mean to say "it is" you use "it's".

Bad Examples
Its not nice to talk about people that way.
It's tail was short and stumpy.

Good Examples
It's not nice to talk about people that way.
Its tail was short and stumpy.

Numbers below four digits should always be spelled out. All of the round numbers even above that should also be spelled out, i.e. one-hundred, one-thousand, ten-thousand, one-million, ten-million, etc.

Bad Example
There must have been 329 frogs hopping around!

Good Example
There must have been three-hundred and twenty-nine frogs hopping around!

Also, never substitute a numeral for a homonym, i.e. 2 for "to", or 4 for "for". (Two and four)

You should never substitute an ampersand (&) for the word "and", unless it is part of a proper noun, or title (e.g. Tackey & Tsubasa) -- and sometimes not even then.

Use internet acronyms, i.e. LOL, OMG, BRB, etc. very, very sparingly. The acronym WTF is slightly more acceptable at a greater frequency -- however, you should more often use literature as a guide for censoring expletives, and use an underscore for at least one letter.

Bad Example
OMG WTF dude!?

Good Example
Oh my god, what the f_ck, dude!?

...

Having said all of that, of course we all make typos if we're typing in a hurry or sometimes just not paying enough attention to our typing. However, "typo" is an abbreviation of "typographical error"; the definition of "error" is "mistake". Everyone makes mistakes -- but there's no mistake in being lackadaisical about good spelling and grammar. There's no shame and no downside in trying to express yourself in the most civilized and clear way possible, for not only your own benefit, but the benefit of others -- of everyone else, essentially. If you don't do it for yourself, then do it for your fellow DreamViews members!

Thank you very much for taking the time to read this. I applaud your genuine interest in self-amelioration, and many other people will and do too.

Viel Erfolg! Auf Wiedersehen!

:mrgreen: