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- Clarify why we use one sentence per line
- Add links to Microsoft Style Guide for verb tense, usage, and examples.
- Add `.vscode/settings.json` reference and example file.
Copy file name to clipboardExpand all lines: docs/contributing/documentation/authors.md
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@@ -337,16 +337,32 @@ We follow [Microsoft Writing Style Guide](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/styl
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Key concepts from that guide include the following.
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- Documentation should be informational, but friendly.
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- Address the reader by using "you" instead of "the user", or by using the collective "we" and "our".
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- Address the reader by using "you" and "your" instead of "the user" or "the user's".
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- When giving instructions, use the [imperative](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/style-guide/grammar/verbs#mood-of-verbs).
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- Use the [active voice](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/style-guide/grammar/verbs#active-and-passive-voice) whenever possible, avoiding the passive voice.
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- Headings should be "Sentence cased", not "Title Cased".
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The Plone Documentation Team adopted additional guidelines.
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- Use one sentence per line.
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Keep sentences short and understandable.
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This will greatly improve the editing and maintenance of your documentation.
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- Do not follow the PEP8 maximum line length standard.
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Documentation is narrative text and images, not Python code.
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Never break a single sentence across multiple lines.
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Documentation is narrative text and images, not code.
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Do not follow the PEP8 maximum line length standard.
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Similarly, never use English semantic line breaks.
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English semantic rules are difficult to understand and enforce.
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Not following this guidance makes pull request reviews needlessly difficult, often resulting in noisy diffs.
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The reviewer can't give targeted feedback for a single sentence when there are multiple sentences on one line.
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When a single sentence is broken across multiple lines, the reviewer has to submit one suggestion per line.
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Most reviewers won't do that, and instead make a comment instead of a suggestion.
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This in turn deprives you of the easy option to commit the suggestion to the pull request by a single click of a button in the GitHub user interface.
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Following this guidance will greatly improve the editing and maintenance of your documentation.
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- Have the file [`.vscode/settings.json`](/_static/settings.json) in the root of your project to prevent VSCode from reformatting files with the `.md` extension.
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- Use dashes `-` in filenames and avoid underscores.
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- Images should be no wider than 740 pixels to fit within the documentation's main view port.
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This avoids scaling and reducing legibility of images.
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