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Link to Help with Writing Official Correspondence
Guidance on Preparing Documents for the Secretary Style Guidelines for Official Correspondence Writing Basics Use of Specialized Terms, Abbreviations, and Acronyms On-line Writing Resources
Frequently Used Acronyms Style Guide for Internet Terms U.S. Postal Service Abbreviations
Style Guide for Internet Terms
 

With increasing frequency, NIH correspondence uses terminology related to emerging technology, especially Internet terms. The Executive Secretariat (ES) encourages consistency in NIH correspondence, and we recommend the following guidance.
Uniform Resource Locator (URL) and E-mail Address

These terms locate Internet sites. Within the text of a document, a URL or e-mail address should appear without delimiters (angle brackets or parentheses).

Use http://www.nih.gov not <http://www.nih.gov>

Use tg4v@nih.gov not (tg4v@nih.gov)

Frequently Used Web Terms

Although a variety of usages can readily be found, ES offers the following as our preferences for capitalization, hyphenation, and abbreviated notation:

CD-ROM, CD-RW

e-mail, e-government

FTP

homepage

HTML

HTTP, HTTPS

Internet

listserv

URL

Web site, Web browser, Web page

World Wide Web (or WWW)

It should be noted that there is not yet any consensus, either among Federal agencies or among literary style manuals, on the proper forms of Internet parlance. Our advice is to be consistent and to keep in mind the cardinal principle that the simplest graphic presentation is probably the best.

 
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Last updated: April 17, 2003