User:NoAmCom

Note

This is an alternative account of JamesLucas.

North American Comma

This account is used for semi-automated editing with a tight focus of the use of commas in dates and place names. Edits made by this account largely focus on two closely related types of comma use:

restoring missing commas in American-style dates

In North American date formatting, the year is appended as a comma-delimited parenthetical. Formatting rules would be straightforward if we used parentheses because we'd always close them regardless of context:

July 4 (1776)
She spoke of July 4 (1776) with tears in her eyes.

But the comma is a logical nightmare, often mistaught in school, as it is not present as a closing mark in a free-standing date but is needed to close the parenthetical in a sentence:

July 4, 1776 
He spoke of July 4, 1776, with tears in his eyes.

restoring missing commas from place names

Analogously, a place name in the format of City, State or City, Country requires a single comma in free-standing text and a second, closing comma in complete sentences:

Edmonton, Alberta 
The Oilers brought the Stanley Cup home to Edmonton, Alberta, five times in a seven-year period.

This rule applies to place names worldwide, but NoAmCom's work on place names is presently restricted to the U.S. and Canada. NoAmCom's search-and-replace code generates few false positives, but each edit is reviewed.