Help:Grammar

This guide is intended to help you with your Grammar when writing a page, whilst this is not an exhaustive list of grammatical errors it does cover many of the common errors we see throughout the Wiki. If even after reading this guide you are unsure, found something unclear or you still very confused please do not hesitate to PM either Shonly or Intersocial on Habbox Forum or to leave a message on Intersocial's Talk Page.

Use of apostrophe

Apostrophes are used incorrectly on many pages throughout the Wiki, this is a very brief summary of how to use them:

1. Apostrophes can be used if you’re omitting a letter. For example:

• You are -> you’re.
• You will -> you’ll
• Who is -> who’s
• Do not -> don’t

2. Add an apostrophe with an “-s” suffix for singular nouns to indicate possession, for example: Habbo’s marketing strategy. The marketing strategy belongs to Habbo.

3. Add an apostrophe without an “-s” suffix for plural nouns to indicate possession, for example: “the taxpayers’ money”. The money belongs to the taxpayer but due to the taxpayer being a large group of people, it’s inappropriate to add the “-S”.

4. Don’t use an apostrophe to make a word plural. Common occurrences such as “Habbo eXpert’s” and “Habbo ID’s” do not need the apostrophe. Just put an “-S” on the end.”.

Avoid overuse of the comma

Some sentences, ramble on, just like this, and it's just not needed at all. Make use of more punctuation: colons and semi-colons, for example. There’s nothing worse than reading a page and just finding that it goes on without actually getting anywhere. This ties in quite nicely with the ability to use a wide range of sentence lengths. Here’s an example of a bad use of commas:

“Since Habbo has no way of showing that two Teles are linked, there are many teles that don't link or that go to random rooms, this caused a lot of annoyance throughout Habbo but yet still to this day they have done nothing about it.”

If we start to look at this in more detail, then it quite clearly should be two separate sentences. The second comma should probably be a full stop, simply because it sounds a lot more natural when you’re reading it back.

There’s also some inconsistency in that sentence, with a capital letter being used for “Tele” in one instance, but then leaving it in lowercase the next. It would be a lot more professional and clear if they were called “Teleports” too.

Comma before “and”

Commas should be avoided before "and", there is not a standard rule on this however for the sake of consistency unless you are intending there to be a pause do not add the commas as well.

Tense

Tense is a very common error and a lot of Staff time is spent re-writing entire paragraphs of pages in order to fix the tense. If you’re discussing a piece of furniture which is currently available in the Shop, then use the present tense. If you’re discussing the Habbo X team, then use the past tense. Use your discretion, but always keep it consistent.

Were or Was?

“Habbo eXperts, also known as "HabboX", was a small team of experienced players.” Both “were” and “was” are past tense, but the problem arises when we’re deciding whether it’s concerning a singular or plural. The general rule seems to be that if you’re talking about a plural, then you should use “were”. If you’re talking about a singular, then you should use “was”. For example:

“The Habbo Xs were a helpful set of people” “Some would suggest that Mathew was a nice guy”

Naturally there are exceptions to the rule, but this should be the general way to decide which to use on the Wiki.

Capital Letters

A lot of capitalisation issues crop up on the wiki. The main one is “Habbo”. It’s a proper noun due to it being the name of a company; hence both “Habbo” and "Habbos" (Although it is more favourable to use the term "Habbo users") should always have a capital “H”.

Page titles should also use capital letters, for example: "Falling Furniture". It should also be mentioned when to avoid using Capital Letters As It's Annoying When People Type Like This. For example, book titles such as "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time" capitalise the most important words, and ignore the small fillers. The same should apply in page names.

There / Their / They’re

Make sure you keep an eye on these and always read through a page for these before submitting. It's very easy to get caught out on these.

• There – “it’s over there!”
• Their – “it was their own fault”
• They’re (they are) – “They’re terrible”

A or An

“An” should be used if the next word begins with a vowel. If it doesn’t then you should use “A”. For example:

“Thomas is an animal” “Thomas is a cat” There are some exceptions with this, most notably with the letter “H” as it is quite often a silent letter. Some people may say “A historic town” with emphasis on the “h”… whereas others may say “an historic town”. This is the case if they’re saying it quickly or treating the “h” as a silent letter (hence skipping straight to the ”I” and giving it more prominence). For Wiki purposes, unless you have a good reason, please always stick to the conventional form.

Run by or Ran by

This is a tricky one to pin down, by "run by" should be used in the present tense and "ran by" should be used in the past tense. Sometimes both are correct however it is easiest to stick by this.

Exclamation marks!!!

Despite perfectly valid use, on a Wiki most of the time it is inappropriate to use them on a content page as content should be objective as possible. Exclamation marks indicate excitement which is too subjective.

Colloquialisms

"Further HC was a cheap way of getting better features to a norm because it only costed 15c rather then paying 25c to buy a month of VIP. "

It is not generally appropriate to label people as "norms" as it is far too informal. It's something that experienced players use to belittle the newer ones and therefore shouldn't really be promoted. It is more appropriate (And accurate) to write "standard account".

"Costed" is not correct either, as the past tense is still "cost". Some people may say "costed" out loud, which is another instance where spoken language gets in the way of written language.

Lastly for Wiki consistency, furni should be written as Furniture, Credz, creds and c (Even when being used after a number) should be credits and coins should also be rewritten as credits.

Numbers

In written prose it is good practise to write out an entire number unless it has a unit, for example 3m, or it is a currency, such as 5 credits. However "There are 5 different recolours." is not as clear or professional as saying "There are five different recolours." nor is it consistent for it to change continually.