bullet point

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
•
Punctuation marks
Comma, comma ,
Semicolon, semicolon ;
Colon, colon :
Point .
Ellipsis ...
Focus ·
bullet point •
Question mark ?
Exclamation, exclamation, call signs !
Apostrophe, apostrophe '
- - Hyphen ; Hyphen ;
Supplementary line
Indent ; Up line -
quotation marks "" »«  /  «»
‚'› ‹  /  ‹ › 
Slashes / \
Brackets () []

Bullets are punctuation marks that mark individual points in a list in a text. They are always at the beginning of each entry in the list. The list (also bullet points is called) usually formatted as a block of text with a feeder is provided and the first line of the font baseline with the bullet has in common. Except for very many and very small blocks, these usually have a bullet on.

If a point is used as a bullet, it is also referred to as a bullet .

typography

Types of bullet

Geometric figures such as points, circles, arrows, squares and triangles are used as bullet points. They are preferably placed halfway up the middle length.

You can find suitable signs here:

Frequently used are:

●     U + 25CF ● the full circle
• U + 2022 • the fat point (Engl. bullet ), and bullet points, called
◦ U + 25E6 ◦ the hollow point
◘ U + 25D8 ◘ the inverted point
◉ U + 25C9 ◉ the fisheye (tainome) in Japanese texts
· U + 00B7 · the center point , similar to the “ painting point ” (U + 22C5)
- U + 2014 — the long dash or indent, of the typographical length of a square stroke has
- U + 2013 – the indent or shortened indent, of the length of a typographical en space stroke has
→ U + 2192 → one of the arrows from the arrows unicode block
* U + 002A * one of the asterisks
× U + 00D7 × the mark

Ordinal numbers as bullets

➀ Hot cathode
➁ Wehnelt cylinder
➂ Anode screen

By combining characters or by using special Unicode characters:

Numbers with the following point:

  • 1 .   , 2 .   , 3 .   , 4 .   , 5 .   ...
  • I .   , II .   , III .   , IV .   , V .   ...
  • i .   , ii .   , iii .   , iv .   , v .   ...

Dingbats numbers in circles:

  • ➀, ➁, ➂, ➃, ➄, ➅, ➆, ➇, ➈, ➉ ...

Letters as bullets

  • a .   , b .   , c .   , d .   , e .   ...

use

The type of bullet used will vary depending on the circumstances. For example, legal texts must be clearly referenced; therefore one mostly uses numbered lists here. In other legal systems, such as European law , so-called bullets are also used. B. “third indent”, which, however, forces you to count these bullet points in longer passages structured by indented lines.

A particularly common example is the use of the bold dot:

  • first point to consider
  • second point,
  • third point,
  • fourth and last point.

To emphasize advantages and disadvantages, the positive bullet points can be marked with a plus sign, the negative ones with a minus sign.

Lists can be expanded to several levels. For the sake of clarity, it is advisable to use separate, indented bullets for each level, which should become smaller with increasing depth. The numerical enumeration is most common when there are several hierarchies. It can be found mainly in scientific texts.

For short blocks of text is ragged the justification preferable. Too deep lists with multiple and irregularly nested levels quickly appear confusing and should therefore be avoided.

Typographic rules

Modern word processing and typesetting systems allow any characters or small graphics to be used as bullets. The same character is then used for all bullet points in the list. However, the use of such effects should be carefully considered, as they unnecessarily bloat the text, which can quickly affect the effect of the text. No distinctions should be made in lists.

Punctuation rules

Basically

Basically, from the point of view of punctuation rules, bullets are treated as if they did not exist. This means that punctuation must be set as if there was no typographical structure.

Example:

The man saw a yellow car, a black dog, a green handbag and a brown horse in his kitchen.

This sentence becomes the following:

The man saw
  • a yellow car
  • a black dog,
  • a green handbag and
  • a brown horse
in his kitchen.

A colon after the introductory sentence is always possible. The semicolon is used if the components of the list are themselves complex parts of sentences .

Example:

The man saw
  • the yellow car that had belonged to his mother but had been sold by her years ago;
  • a black dog that didn't seem to be from the area, as indicated by its dog tag;
  • a green handbag that the man completely disliked, and
  • a brown horse that smelled unpleasant,
in his kitchen.

If the enumerated units are not part of a sentence, punctuation can be omitted.

Example:

The man saw the following items in his kitchen:
  • yellow car
  • black Dog
  • green handbag
  • brown horse

However, you can traditionally use commas and a period here as well.

Example:

The man saw the following items in his kitchen:
  • yellow car,
  • black Dog,
  • green handbag,
  • brown horse.

Pragmatic

According to Duden-Sprachberatung, lists that consist of free-standing lines arranged one below the other have the option of writing with or without punctuation at the end of the line.

References and comments

  1. ↑ a b Punctuation in lists ( memento from April 26, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Duden-Sprachberatung, newsletter from November 18, 2005