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Re: NEED HELP-process words in a text file

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Steven D'Aprano wrote:
> On Fri, 24 Jun 2011 19:17:29 +0000, Cousin Stanley wrote:
> 
>> Chris Rebert wrote:
>>
>>> Netiquette comment: Please avoid SHOUTING ....
>>   The brilliant beam of light that first thought capitilized words
>>   amounted to shouting never programmed cobol, fortran, or pl/1 in the
>>   1960s or 1970s .... :-)
> 
> That's probably because the use of capitalisation for emphasis pre-dates 
> the invention of computers by centuries. It is hardly an accident that 
> the technical term for uppercase is derived from the same root as 
> "majestic" and "major".
> 
> The history of so-called "minuscule" and "majuscule" letters is complex, 
> and it hasn't been a universal rule that Capital Letters have ALWAYS been 
> read as emphatic, but it has been true for hundreds of years (at least 
> for languages that have capital letters).
> 
> Not the ONLY form of emphasis, of course (underlining, bold face, italics 
> and  l e t t e r - s p a c i n g  are only a few of the other 
> alternatives available), but in a plain-text medium with little control 
> over the display of font, the use of lower and UPPER case letters is one 
> of the few alternatives available. (The use of *markup* seems to have 
> been a late invention in English, although in other languages it has been 
> used much longer.)
> 
> If ONE word in uppercase is read in a SLIGHTLY louder voice, then 
> naturally it doesn't take much imagination TO READ EVEN QUITE SHORT 
> PASSAGES OF UNINTERRUPTED UPPERCASE WORDS AS SHOUTING LOUDLY -- 
> regardless of the poor design of programming languages in the 60s and 70s.

Well said.  :)

~Ethan~

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Re: NEED HELP-process words in a text file Chris Rebert <clp2@rebertia.com> - 2011-06-18 16:30 -0700
  Re: NEED HELP-process words in a text file Cousin Stanley <cousinstanley@gmail.com> - 2011-06-24 19:17 +0000
    Re: NEED HELP-process words in a text file John Gordon <gordon@panix.com> - 2011-06-24 19:32 +0000
      Re: NEED HELP-process words in a text file Cousin Stanley <cousinstanley@gmail.com> - 2011-06-24 21:36 +0000
    Re: NEED HELP-process words in a text file Steven D'Aprano <steve+comp.lang.python@pearwood.info> - 2011-06-24 23:43 +0000
      Re: NEED HELP-process words in a text file Ethan Furman <ethan@stoneleaf.us> - 2011-06-24 19:50 -0700
      Re: NEED HELP-process words in a text file Cousin Stanley <cousinstanley@gmail.com> - 2011-06-26 16:09 +0000

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