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NWS doing away (mostly) with the ALL CAPS format.


Solak

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In fact, in web speak, use of capital letters became synonymous with angry shouting.

 

While it wouldn't have made sense to mention in the article per se,

one can type out the alphabet in all caps, then a few lines above or below type it in lower case, then use something like Photoshop to blur them, and at the same amount of blur, the lower case letters are mostly illegible, while the capital/upper case can still all be discerned.

 

I'VE ALWAYS NOTICED A DIFFERENCE/IMPROVED EXPERIENCE IN MY ATTENTION WHEN READING A NWS REPORT BUT COULDN'T PIN DOWN EXACTLY WHAT IT WAS.  I UNDERSTAND WHY THEY WANT TO CHANGE IT.

I DO FEEL THAT MANY OTHER PEOPLE NOTICED A GREATER CLARITY IN THEIR ATTENTION AS WELL!

IT IS DEFINITELY MORE THAN JUST YELLING IF IT HELPS PEOPLE.... TO SOME EXTENT IT MAY ACTUALLY BE THAT ALL CAPS CAN BE BOTH READ, AND WRITTEN, WITH GREATER ACCURACY.   :)

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While it wouldn't have made sense to mention in the article per se,

one can type out the alphabet in all caps, then a few lines above or below type it in lower case, then use something like Photoshop to blur them, and at the same amount of blur, the lower case letters are mostly illegible, while the capital/upper case can still all be discerned.

 

I'VE ALWAYS NOTICED A DIFFERENCE/IMPROVED EXPERIENCE IN MY ATTENTION WHEN READING A NWS REPORT BUT COULDN'T PIN DOWN EXACTLY WHAT IT WAS.  I UNDERSTAND WHY THEY WANT TO CHANGE IT.

I DO FEEL THAT MANY OTHER PEOPLE NOTICED A GREATER CLARITY IN THEIR ATTENTION AS WELL!

IT IS DEFINITELY MORE THAN JUST YELLING IF IT HELPS PEOPLE.... TO SOME EXTENT IT MAY ACTUALLY BE THAT ALL CAPS CAN BE BOTH READ, AND WRITTEN, WITH GREATER ACCURACY.   :)

 

The legibility is, in this case, simply a function of size.  The capital letters are larger than the small case letters.  It doesn' change your fact, but that is the reason.

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so pretty much instead of 

 

THIS IS A PDS TORNADO WARNING EMERGENCY

 

we get

 

this is a pds tornado warning emergency

 

makes sense to me..

 

Upper case letters in forecasts will not become obsolete – forecasters will have the option to use all capital letters in weather warnings to emphasize threats during extremely dangerous situations.

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I agree...  after years if reading them in all caps, mixed case will not have the same impact.

 

I could see making the change if that's what our customers and partners wanted, but in my 13 years in the NWS I've never heard of anyone complaining about all cap text products. Content yes, but font? No.   

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Good.  Reading all caps got painful after a while.  It's nice to see things getting dragged out of the 50s.

 

Now, if only we could get the FAA to stop issuing ridiculously-abbreviated all-caps things like NOTAMs and change to plain English...

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