Transcription of printed English passages, including punctuation and capitalization
This domain tests exact transcription of a printed English passage, including punctuation and capitalization. The standard is reproduction, not improvement: if the copy uses a comma, you type a comma; if it capitalizes a word, you capitalize it.
Rules
- Reproduce every mark: full stop, comma, semicolon, colon, question mark, exclamation mark, hyphen, dash, apostrophe, quotation marks and brackets.
- Capitalize sentence openings, proper nouns, titles, the pronoun I, days and months as printed.
- Do not put a space before , . ; : ? ! or a closing quotation mark; put one space after them, and use two spaces after a sentence-ending full stop only if the copy shows that spacing.
- Place opening quotation marks immediately before the first word and closing marks after the final punctuation.
Worked example
Copy: Mr. Rao said, “Bring the files.” Type: capital M in Mr., capital R in Rao, comma after said, one space after the comma, opening quote before B, capital B, full stop inside the closing quote, no space before the full stop. If you type “Mr. Rao said ,“Bring the files”.” you have introduced a space before the comma, used the wrong opening quote, and omitted the full stop inside the quotation. The reasoning: each visible mark in the copy has a position; moving or omitting it is a transcription fault even if the sentence is understandable.
Traps
- Changing single quotation marks to double marks.
- Omitting apostrophes in possessives and contractions.
- Adding a space before a full stop or comma.