2  Style Guide

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  1. Prepare the text in English. The Chicago Manual of Style 17th Edition (CMOS) is being used as the overall publication style. We will stay close to (CMOS) but not 100% compliant as we have many non/English native writers and styles vary. Points to note will be:
    1. We will use International English as the primary audience is English as a second language in Europe as the expectation of the reader leans towards UK English. For example end wods is ise and ize, but use US License as Creative Commons use the US form of license. This also applies to en and em dashes, use spaces unlike the US with no space. Refer to The Economist style guide as that caters to a US EN audience.
    2. Use the Oxford Comma. Which means the presence of a comma before and or or in a list of three or more items.
    3. En and em dash policy. For em dash use we’ll keep with CMOS guidelines on em dash used for punctuation em dash with space before and after (USA and CMOS have no space but in Europe it is more common to have space either side. Make sure en dashes are used where needed and not hyphens.
  2. Typesetting punctuation:
    1. Use no breaking hyphens in phrases like Co‑creation – Word instructions https://word.tips.net/T001116_Inserting_a_Non-Breaking_Hyphen.html – HTML https://www.toptal.com/designers/htmlarrows/punctuation/non-breaking-hyphen/
  3. Capitalisation:
    1. For terms like open science, open access, open data, or FAIR data, etc. Generally we will aim for lowercase words to keep the reading flow easy, follow this rule for movements, schools. https://7sage.com/admissions/lesson/capitalization/ Capitalize the names of movements and schools derived from proper nouns; lowercase those that are not. Unfortunately, there are some exceptions: “Cynic,” “Scholasticism” and “New Criticism,” for example, are capitalized when used as movements. Look a term up in Merriam-Webster if you’re not sure. romanticism; Keynesian economics; cubism; Cynicism. The rule of thumb can also be applied that capitalisation is to get rid of ambiguity. So in our example
    2. FAIR data would have acronym capitalised
    3. Open science, open data, and open access – would all be lowercase
    4. Open source software – here we run into the ‘rival camps’ problem. There is the Free Software Foundation (Richard Stallman) and the Open Source (Eric Raymond) movement who disagree on ideologies. Properly the full term should be use Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) but its a mouthful. And there is more to the story. Our get out is to use the precompound adjective open-source.
    5. I will list more examples as they come up.
    6. Article titles capitalised as ‘title capitalisation’, running headers only first word and after :
    7. Job or role title removed.

2.0.1 Article Template Guides

2.0.1.1 Section introduction - to be written by section editor

  • The text is a maximum of 400 words, 2800 characters including spaces (including Tables, Figures, Photos)
    Title and headline.
  • One image
  • Add three or more learning outputs in an info box style. What you will learn in this section. An additional 300 words can be give to the ’learning outputs#.

Total for the section into 700 words.

2.0.1.2 Quick start guide - p5 example from SciStarter guide

This could be to introduce a topic, or a service someone could use, like FloraIncognita.

  • Main title, subtitle
  • Definition box: 6 bullet points
  • Video online tutorial: Title; image; description 255 characters; URL
  • Learn more: List of supporting resources - 1060 characters, 135 words

2.0.1.3 Overview / Essay / Expository text - p6 SciStarter (3 page example, can also be longer with 4 page example and more text 9000 characters)

2.0.1.3.1 3 page version
  • Total character length 5600 characters, 830 words
  • Title, subtitle
  • Two images in main text
  • Main text: Use bullet points and sub-headers; 5000 characters of total
  • Summarise main points in infobox. No more than four points. 600 characters of total
  • End section to show how library can make use of idea, with examples for resources. Title; 1000 characters of total.
2.0.1.3.2 4 page version
  • Total character length 9000 characters, 1320 words
  • Title, subtitle
  • Main text: Use bullet points and sub-headers; 7800 characters of total
  • Use a series of small images - 7 max. If images described in the text then no picture caption needed.
  • Use two info boxes to highlight important issues with bullet points and use an image here if preferred. 600 characters each of total char. length.

2.0.1.4 Project highlight or example, this could also count for a video piece - one pager p20 SciStarter

  • Title
  • Headline description 90 - 140 char.
  • One or two images
  • Text: 1200 -1500 characters

2.0.1.5 Step-by-step guide

2.0.1.5.1 Short - p28 SciStarter
  • Title, headline 95 characters
  • 5000 characters; Use bullet points and sub-headers
  • 2-4 images
2.0.1.5.2 Long - p30 SciStarter
  • Title, headline 95 characters
  • 14,000 characters total
  • 10 pictures max
  • Break process into no more than 7 steps of 500 characters each
  • Then following text