Talk:Slash (punctuation)
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Slashification
Why is the Solidus slashified? In the moment there are inconsistencies all around due to this change. Pjacobi 19:22, 9 Jul 2004 (UTC)
- See Talk:Solidus. All links to solidus should be fixed now to point to slash (punctuation) Nohat 19:42, 2004 Jul 9 (UTC)
There is a large column containing a plethora of Punctuation symbols , word dividers, general typography etc. Why is that there? DGerman (talk) 15:48, 28 May 2017
Slash: history of the word
In the History section, the article currently reads
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The name "slash" is a recent development, first attested in American English Template:Circa,[1] but has gained wide currency through its use in computing, a context where it is sometimes even used in British English in preference to the usual name "stroke".
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Can anyone verify that against the "long" OED? Because the only reference in New Oxford American Dictionary (3 ed.) entry for "Slash" accessed via the Wikipedia Library says:
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2. an oblique stroke (/) in print or writing, used between alternatives (e.g., and/or), in fractions (e.g., 3/4), in ratios (e.g., miles/day), or between separate elements of a text.
β [usually as modifier] a genre of fiction, published chiefly in fanzines or online, in which characters who appear together in movies, television, or other popular media are portrayed as having a sexual (especially homosexual) relationship.
[1980s: from the use of an oblique stroke to link adjoining names or initials (as in Kirk/Spock and K/S. ]
[ ... ]
β Template:Sc late Middle English: perhaps imitative, or from Old French Script error: No such module "Lang". "break in pieces". The noun dates from the late 16th century.[2].
Comments? πππ½ (talk) 20:30, 4 December 2022 (UTC)
Template:Re The online full OED says "Template:Tq" The list of examples starts with 1961, but here we have a common error: the OED does not claim to know the earliest use of a word! Incidentally the 1961 citation is to Webster's 3rd New Internat. Dict. Eng. Lang., so that could be a place to look for further information. Zerotalk 05:41, 5 December 2022 (UTC)
This technical report ca 1950 has it. And this 1949 military signals manual. And this 1947 manual. Zerotalk 06:00, 5 December 2022 (UTC)
- Thank you. TBF, the current text does say "earliest attested". TBH, what drew my attention to the current citation is that it looks amateurish and thought surely we can do better than that. I'll try later on to see if I can a form of words to cite the 1947 manual without a WP:OR vio. --πππ½ (talk) 14:44, 5 December 2022 (UTC)
, 36.37.152.147 (talk) 18:05, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
Proposal to replace the infobox
Template:Infobox symbol The article currently uses Template:Tl, so that it gives the primary symbol for an "ASCII slash" and then (smaller) a fairly arbitrary selection from the list of other slashes listed near the end of the body. It is not at all obvious that this meets the criteria in MOS:INFOBOX:
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The purpose of an infobox is to summarize, but not supplant, the key facts that appear in an article. Barring the specific exceptions listed below, an article should remain complete with its infobox ignored. The less information that an infobox contains, the more effectively it serves its purpose, allowing readers to identify key facts at a glance. Some infoboxes need to use more than a handful of fields, but information should be presented in a short format, wherever possible, and exclude unnecessary content. Avoid links to sections within the article; the table of contents provides that function.
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Conversely, IMO, Template:Tl gives the essential information in a better form.
Full disclosure: I wrote Template:Tl, so wp:Mandy Rice-Davies applies.
Comments? πππ½ (talk) 12:08, 26 February 2025 (UTC)
Template:Infobox punctuation mark
- I think you could also remove the extra symbols from the current infobox, it looks like it is slightly better for instance it does not have both the words "Related" and "see also" in it. IMHO this should be done in almost all existing uses of this inbox, random Unicode decisions do not belong here. Spitzak (talk) 19:14, 26 February 2025 (UTC)
- Makes sense to me. I will be bold and go ahead with your suggestion. WP:BRD is available if anyone disagrees. πππ½ (talk) 21:07, 26 February 2025 (UTC)
De Morgan backslash
Template:Reply Greetings! Regarding this revert: Whether U+2216 Template:Char or U+005C Template:Char has a greater slant is an accident of the particular font being used to display them. On my screen, the difference in slant is very slight to the point where's it's not really noticeable. What I do notice is that U+2216 is taller than the forward slash Template:Char so it looks mismatched. If we need to convey to readers the exact appearance of what De Morgan wrote, we should use a picture, not HTML, or add a textual description. I took a look at the Google Books scan, and the backslash division character is actually extremely wide and short, and does not closely resemble either of these characters, nor any other I could find in Unicode. The only reason there is a U+2216 separate from the ASCII backslash is to have the semantic meaning of the mathematical set minus operator, but that is not the meaning intended by De Morgan. Screenreaders, if they recognize this character at all, will probably read "set minus" or something similar out loud, which is incorrect in context, and unhelpful to readers who don't have an advanced understanding of mathematics. For these reasons, I would prefer to use U+005C in this article in the absence of a picture. -- Beland (talk) 03:27, 22 May 2025 (UTC)
- Well, you're right on all counts, there β although I had hoped that the short-wide appearance of Template:Unichar would be ubiquitous, given that the reference glyph in https://www.unicode.org/charts/PDF/U2200.pdf is like that. (I also think it's possible that U+2216 really is the same character as the line in this document, although they presumably wouldn't have called it a set minus, if the line was created in the same way as they would create the later set minus symbols, eg with the same piece of metal type. But this is an intractable question.) No further complaints from me; a U+005C backslash is close enough. Dingolover6969 (talk) 03:52, 22 May 2025 (UTC)
- Cool, I just switched the article back to U+005C. -- Beland (talk) 03:55, 22 May 2025 (UTC)
- β "slash, n.1". OED Online. December 2020. Oxford University Press. https://www-oed-com.library.access.arlingtonva.us/view/Entry/181388?rskey=kGzdlw&result=1&isAdvanced=false (accessed February 14, 2021).
- β https://www-oxfordreference-com.wikipedialibrary.idm.oclc.org/view/10.1093/acref/9780195392883.001.0001/m_en_us1291295?rskey=5Cn7US&result=4