AP on Hyphenated Prefixes

• Always use a hyphen with “all-”:all-knowing, all-seeing, all-caring Rushbo

• Hyphenate “anti-” words with some exceptions: see Stylebook for list

• “Co-” is generally hyphenated for job titles, no hyphen for most of rest. Stylebook lists exceptions.

• “Ex” is hyphenated when it means “former,” as in ex-president. No hyphen when it’s part of a verb.

More AP Hyphens • “In” takes no hyphen if it means “not”:

intolerable. Takes hyphen in compound adjectives: in-depth. Always a hyphen if used as a suffix: break-in.

• “Post-” A jumble of exceptions. Postwar, post-mortem. Look it up.

• “Pro-” Hyphenate only when it means showing support: pro-war, profile.

• “Re” is hyphenated when the next letter is an “e”. See Stylebook for other rules.

AP on Numbers• Don’t start sentences with big numbers;

spell them out if you must.

• In proper names, use what they use.

• Spell out one-nine, then use numbers.

• Use 1st, 2nd, etc. in forming titles.

• Dates never take suffixes:

Right: Dec. 2

Wrong: Dec. 2nd

More AP Numbers• Don’t use more than two decimal points in

text unless there’s a special reason.

• For money, the whole number up to 999,999, then words and numbers:

999,999

1 million

1.36 million

• Instead of a “-” minus sign, use “minus”.

Yet More AP Numbers• U.S. Highway 1, state road FM2222,

Interstate Highway 35.

• Use numbers when measuring dimension, formulas and speeds. Folo standard rule with distances.

The tornado’s path was 2 miles wide.

The group drove five miles to safety.

• 6.5 percent; 0.5 percent.

It Never Stops!• Express ratios this way: a 2-1 ratio; the

ratio was 2-to-1. (Note hyphens.)

• Use figures exclusively for scores, sizes, telephone numbers, weights.

• All temps are figures except for zero.

• All times are figures except noon and midnight: 10:30 a.m., noon.

• Years are always figures, and a year can start a sentence (though that sucks).