This guide provides some ground rules to write user-facing texts for 0 A.D.

Capitalization

Use ​title case for:

• Button captions
• Entity names (including generic unit and structure names)
• Key names
• Proper names

Never use full capitalization.

For example:

Good	Bad
Click the Citizen Soldier icon	Click the CITIZEN SOLDIER icon
Hold shift and click	Hold Shift and click

Cursor vs Mouse

Mind the difference between the cursor (virtual) and the mouse (physical).

English Dialect

Use US English.

For example:

Good	Bad
Color	Colour

Terminology

In texts that the user needs to understands, such as menu entries, help tooltips, and similar, you must be consistent with the vocabulary that you use.

An object should always be referred to using the same word everywhere in the game, and an action should always be referred to using the same verb.

For example, if there is a unit type called ‘female citizen’, always refer to it as such, do not also use alternative forms such as ‘females’, ‘women’, and so on. Even in the same paragraph or sentence, you should use the same term.

For specific words that you should use or avoid in 0 A.D. gameplay texts, see the tables below:

Actions

Good	Bad
Collect (treasures)
Gather (resources)	Collect
Train (units)	Produce, build

GUI

Good	Bad
Icon	Portrait

Stats

Good	Bad
Health	Hitpoints, HP

Structures

Good	Bad
Civic Center	Civic Centre, Civil Center, Civil Centre

Units

Good	Bad
Cavalry Citizen Soldier
Citizen (cavalry or infantry, female or male)	Worker
Citizen Soldier (cavalry or infantry)
Female Citizen	Female, Female Worker, Woman
Infantry Citizen Soldier

Unicode

We have a somewhat complete Unicode support, do not limit yourself to ASCII and learn how to use ​Unicode input in your system.

For example:

Good	Bad
…	...