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Eric brings up the important topic of how many spaces to type after a period.

I learned to use a typewriter on a Royal(?) portable typewriter borrowed from the English department. It was an ancient typewriter even at that time. It must be from the 1920's. It has a typeface where the little circles of the number "6" and the number "9" line up.

It was then when I learned to

• Type two spaces after a period
• Listen to the bell. Finish the word at hand when it rings and pull the return lever
• Type two spaces before and after Latin or other foreign words and mathematical symbols
• Consult the dictionary before typing a word whose spelling I'm not certain

None of these make sense on a computer anymore. And I have given up on the bell (do you know that you can still enable the bell in vi?) and the dictionary. I put mathematical symbols in dollar signs out of respect for Donald Knuth and TEX (and all mathematicians get it).

Yet I still type two spaces after a period. I kept the habit for two reasons: i) in places where it doesn't matter the two spaces will be converted to whatever they are converted to; ii) there are still places where this conversion does not occur (notably in source files) and two spaces after a period still look better than one:

<p>Yet I still type two spaces after a period.  I kept the
habit for two reasons: i) in places where it doesn't matter
the two spaces will be converted to whatever they are
converted to; ii) there are still places where this
conversion does not occur (notably in source files) and two
spaces after a period still look better than one:</p>