Good Style - Writing for Computer Science - page 89

This form has the advantage of identifying which of your colleagues contributed to
the intellectual content.
Some authors write their thanks as “I would like to thank” or “I wish to thank”.
To me this seems to imply that I wish to thank … but for some reason I am unable to
do so . Consider instead using “I am grateful to” or simply “I thank” or “Thanks to”.
Grammar
In this topic I have not given advice on grammar, because the clarity of writing
largely depends on whether it conforms to accepted usage. One aspect of grammar is,
however, worth considering: that some people use what they believe to be traditional
grammar to criticize other people's text, based on rules such as don't split infinitives
or don't begin a sentence with “ and ” or “ but ”. I dislike this attitude to writing:
grammatical rules should be observed, but not at the cost of clarity or meaning. Be
aware, though, that an excess of sloppy grammar annoys some readers.
Beauty
Authors of style guides like to apply artistic judgements to text. This does not mean
that scientific writing should be judged as literary prose; indeed, such prose would
be inappropriate. But some authorities on writing style argue that text should be
crystalline, transparent, and have good rhythm and cadence; and that one should
dislike stuffy, soft, stodgy, and sagging sentences.
How useful such judgements are to most writers is not clear. Doubtless, well-
crafted text is a pleasure to read, ill-written text can be hard going, and good rhythm
in text helps us to parse. But appreciation of well-written text does not always help a
novice to write it, nor is it evident that, to a poor writer, the argument that text should
be elegant is meaningful. It is sufficient to aim for simplicity and clarity.