3 ms·

They’re not smart quotes - they're just open and close quotation marks. What is smart about them? And I don’t see how one is any “softer” than the other. Peop

They’re not smart quotes - they're just open and close quotation marks. What is smart about them? And I don’t see how one is any “softer” than the other. People’s programming editors often do paren matching - does that make them smart parens? No they’re still just regular old parens.

TheDong 4y ago
Why do we call them "hot dogs" when they typically have a very low percentage of dog meat (often 0% I think)? Why do we call it a "gravy boat" when it's not literally a boat? Did you know there are male ladybugs? Language is descriptive, and people do in fact call them smart quotes. That doesn't mean there has to be anything smart about them, and I'm not making the claim there is, I'm just using an agreed-upon term to convey what I'm talking about.
- Manu40 4y ago
  "gravy boat" Cause it's shaped like a simple boat. Or sort of is. Kind of like how 'soft quotes' are considered soft because they aren't in a very hard like up and down position, and are instead positioned like a feather softly falling. (or so I guess)
- fuckstick 4y ago
  > Why do we call them "hot dogs" when they typically have a very low percentage of dog meat Because historically, the insinuation was that cheap sausages contained dog meat, that’s why. Someone has answered your gravyboat question. And your ladybug example is bordering on blatant troll baiting. > Language is descriptive, and people do in fact call them smart quotes. That doesn't mean there has to Some “people” call them ATM machines even though the M stands for machine. > I'm just using an agreed-upon term to convey what I'm talking about. The agreed upon terms are Left Double Quotation Mark and Right Double Quotation Mark - nothing about smart quotes in the Unicode tables. I get that the term smart is used colloquially - but your comment suggests that their Unicode names are “smart”. I do think it is overall silly and confusing to refer to the characters themselves based on some formatting or automatic insertion feature.
ratg13 4y ago
On my computer quotation marks default to low/high, so it depends on your language setting. i.e. - the quotes are smart because they adapt to your region.

TheDong 4y ago

Why do we call them "hot dogs" when they typically have a very low percentage of dog meat (often 0% I think)? Why do we call it a "gravy boat" when it's not literally a boat? Did you know there are male ladybugs? Language is descriptive, and people do in fact call them smart quotes. That doesn't mean there has to be anything smart about them, and I'm not making the claim there is, I'm just using an agreed-upon term to convey what I'm talking about.

Manu40 4y ago
"gravy boat" Cause it's shaped like a simple boat. Or sort of is. Kind of like how 'soft quotes' are considered soft because they aren't in a very hard like up and down position, and are instead positioned like a feather softly falling. (or so I guess)
fuckstick 4y ago
> Why do we call them "hot dogs" when they typically have a very low percentage of dog meat Because historically, the insinuation was that cheap sausages contained dog meat, that’s why. Someone has answered your gravyboat question. And your ladybug example is bordering on blatant troll baiting. > Language is descriptive, and people do in fact call them smart quotes. That doesn't mean there has to Some “people” call them ATM machines even though the M stands for machine. > I'm just using an agreed-upon term to convey what I'm talking about. The agreed upon terms are Left Double Quotation Mark and Right Double Quotation Mark - nothing about smart quotes in the Unicode tables. I get that the term smart is used colloquially - but your comment suggests that their Unicode names are “smart”. I do think it is overall silly and confusing to refer to the characters themselves based on some formatting or automatic insertion feature.

ratg13 4y ago

On my computer quotation marks default to low/high, so it depends on your language setting. i.e. - the quotes are smart because they adapt to your region.