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Should there be a space (thin space) in e.g./i.e. between a dot?

Taking in account that e.g. is shortening of exemplī grātiā, then one should use space between e.spaceg., is not it?

I believe that space should be thin, but it should be there no matter what. Or there is some other rule in english language?

saldenisov
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    Possible duplicate of Spaces within abbreviations and initials – jimm101 Jan 08 '16 at 12:32
  • @jimm101 It is close to dublicate, but they do not discuss this case or similar cases. – saldenisov Jan 08 '16 at 12:49
  • @Ricky in russian tradition we would put space in these cases, that is why I'm asking. French will put space before and after colon, and so one... – saldenisov Jan 08 '16 at 12:54
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    What colon? I don't see any colon. The French are generally weird about stuff. The only Russian abbreviation of this sort I can think of right now (I'm a bit drunk) is и т.д., and I don't remember any thin spaces anywhere in it. A thin space sounds like something from quantum mechanics. Heisenberg and all. – Ricky Jan 08 '16 at 13:06
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    @Ricky in russian и т. д., и т. п., и т. е. must be written with space http://writercenter.ru/blog/grammar/probely-tire-defisy-tochki-cifry-kavychki-abbreviatury-inicialy.html, but nobody does. It does not mean that they are correct. What I've written about french, is just that they have some funny rules about punctuation, that is all. – saldenisov Jan 08 '16 at 13:28
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    @saldenisov: The French have funny rules about many things. That's what makes them so lovable. As for the Russians: if there's a rule that nobody ever follows, then it's not really a rule, just an obscure superstition. I don't know what т.е. means. I gave it some thought, but nothing that could be repeated in polite company came to mind. "Трубадур ебаный" - that's as far as I got. Poor Verdi. So many faultless masterpieces, but it's the one opera in which he cut corners that his haters keep focusing on. – Ricky Jan 08 '16 at 13:41
  • @ricky it means то есть, meahwhile troubadour with certain qualities is a good guess. – saldenisov Jan 08 '16 at 14:11
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    Punctuation is just a matter of personal style and preference. However, a (thin) space in i.e. and e.g. is not necessary. There is nothing that could cause any confusion or misunderstanding. –  Jan 09 '16 at 04:20

2 Answers2

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No, there would be no space. When writing abbreviations that represent multiple words and that have periods appear within them, we don't put spaces after the internal periods.

Examples:

a.k.a. - also known as

d.b.a. - doing business as

e.t.a. - estimated time of arrival

Benjamin Harman
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    I’m also curious if there’s an authoritative standard for this assertion. The German version of “e.g.” is „z. B.“, with the DIN 5008 norm demanding a full space (because it abbreviates two actual words). I wonder what reasoning concludes the usage of “i.e.”, “e.g.”, etc. without an interjacent space of any kind. – dakab Jun 23 '16 at 09:14
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    @dakab There aren’t really authoritative standards for anything in English, because there is no equivalent to the Académie Française or DIN that applies to English. I can tell you, as a matter of interest, that Danish—just north of the border from Germany—also uses no spaces in abbreviation; while Swedish, one step further north(east) generally does, but frequently does away with the period (‘e.g.’ in Swedish is usually t ex, short for till exempel). Both those languages do have authorities that decide on officially recognised orthographies. – Janus Bahs Jacquet Nov 28 '16 at 16:00
  • @JanusBahsJacquet: Thanks for this interesting remarks. Having a standardizing authority doesn’t mean people are following rules. Most Germans will omit the space (and won’t see the difference). Obviously, it's a matter of predefinition rather than logical reasoning (like the DIN’s stated above). Anyhow, a space in e.g. or i.e. would be misplaced and a spelling error. – dakab Nov 28 '16 at 18:09
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There is not usually a space. Looking at these examples from the Oxford Dictionary you won't see spaces. In this context, the two word phrase is abbreviated to a single abbreviation, and is treated like a single word.

jimm101
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