8 ms·

Side bar: Does anybody else dislike this one-sentence-per-paragraph format?

by jpcfl 3y ago

ada1981 3y ago
I dislike it less than the hyphen-between-every-word format.
- jpcfl 3y ago
  You sound like a run-of-the-mill chocolate-chip-loving stay-at-home mother-in-law.
  - ada1981 3y ago
    You-nailed-it.
cratermoon 3y ago
I dislike it, but there's something maybe related to it that I do like and recommend. Unsurprisingly, it appeared here on HN about a year ago. One sentence per line: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31808093 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31808093 I started writing like that after I saw it here and it's definitely improved my writing process. Note that this is not one sentence per paragraph. After my source writing (in markdown) is processed to whatever output format, the paragraphs look normal. Just like the comment you are reading now.
- jpcfl 3y ago
  Yes, I use one sentence per line for things like latex or markdown, but I mainly do that because of line-based diff tools. For me, reading one sentence per paragraph is fine for short things like comments, but I find it gets exhausting after 8~10 sentences. It feels like the author is unable to focus and expand on one thing, and keeps moving on new points over and over again, or like every sentence is of equal importance and some pivotal revelation in the story.
  - cratermoon 3y ago
    The part of about line-based diff tools caught my attention at first, too. In the section "Hints for Preparing Documents" in Unix for Beginners[1], Brian W. Kernighan writes, "Make lines short, and break lines at natural places, such as after commas and semicolons, rather than randomly." At the time he was writing that, around 1978, the unix editor was ed, a line-based editor. As Derek Sivers notes in his post, there are many other reasons for semantic linefeeds[2], and over time I've found those reasons more important. 1 https://web.archive.org/web/20130108163017if_/http://miffy.tom-yam.or.jp:80/2238/ref/beg.pdf https://web.archive.org/web/20130108163017if_/http://miffy.t... 2 https://rhodesmill.org/brandon/2012/one-sentence-per-line/ https://rhodesmill.org/brandon/2012/one-sentence-per-line/

Side bar: Does anybody else dislike this one-sentence-per-paragraph format?

by jpcfl 3y ago

Side bar: Does anybody else dislike this one-sentence-per-paragraph format?

ada1981 3y ago

I dislike it less than the hyphen-between-every-word format.

jpcfl 3y ago
You sound like a run-of-the-mill chocolate-chip-loving stay-at-home mother-in-law.
- ada1981 3y ago
  You-nailed-it.

cratermoon 3y ago

I dislike it, but there's something maybe related to it that I do like and recommend. Unsurprisingly, it appeared here on HN about a year ago. One sentence per line: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31808093 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31808093 I started writing like that after I saw it here and it's definitely improved my writing process. Note that this is not one sentence per paragraph. After my source writing (in markdown) is processed to whatever output format, the paragraphs look normal. Just like the comment you are reading now.

jpcfl 3y ago
Yes, I use one sentence per line for things like latex or markdown, but I mainly do that because of line-based diff tools. For me, reading one sentence per paragraph is fine for short things like comments, but I find it gets exhausting after 8~10 sentences. It feels like the author is unable to focus and expand on one thing, and keeps moving on new points over and over again, or like every sentence is of equal importance and some pivotal revelation in the story.
- cratermoon 3y ago
  The part of about line-based diff tools caught my attention at first, too. In the section "Hints for Preparing Documents" in Unix for Beginners[1], Brian W. Kernighan writes, "Make lines short, and break lines at natural places, such as after commas and semicolons, rather than randomly." At the time he was writing that, around 1978, the unix editor was ed, a line-based editor. As Derek Sivers notes in his post, there are many other reasons for semantic linefeeds[2], and over time I've found those reasons more important. 1 https://web.archive.org/web/20130108163017if_/http://miffy.tom-yam.or.jp:80/2238/ref/beg.pdf https://web.archive.org/web/20130108163017if_/http://miffy.t... 2 https://rhodesmill.org/brandon/2012/one-sentence-per-line/ https://rhodesmill.org/brandon/2012/one-sentence-per-line/