Entries - W

W boson

A fundamental particle and a carrier of the electroweak force. There are two separate W bosons, W+ and W- , which have opposite electric charges.

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physics

waveform

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waveguide

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wavelength

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web, the web

 

Lower case, and likewise for webpage, web address (but three cap Ws and no hyphen for the World Wide Web, in the unlikely event that you ever need to refer to it that way).

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webpage

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website

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weekday

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weekend

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weight

The force exerted on the mass of a body by a gravitational field.

Do not confuse weight with mass.

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physics

well known (pred.); well-known (adj.)

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well-being

use hyphen

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which or that?

This is quite easy, really: "that" defines, "which" gives extra information (often in a clause enclosed by commas):

This is the house that Jack built; but this house, which John built, is falling down.
The Guardian, which I read every day, is the paper that I admire above all others.
I am very proud of the sunflowers that I grew from seed (some of the sunflowers);
I am very proud of the sunflowers, which I grew from seed (all the sunflowers).

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grammar

White Paper

Capital W, capital P.

A White Paper is an authoritative report or guide helping readers understand an issue, solve a problem, or make a decision.

CERN openlab – the public-private partnership between CERN, leading IT companies and research institutes – today released a White Paper on future IT challenges in scientific research.

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Who or which?

While in normal circumstances 'who' is used to refer only to people and 'which' or 'that' to refer to things, on the home.cern website we try to refer to departments and organisations (since they are made up of people) as 'who'.

 

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Wi-Fi

spelling, translation

wideband

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WIMPs

Weakly interacting massive particles

Spell out in first use then use acronym for the CERN Courier

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abbreviations, acronyms, Courier

wireless

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WLCG

Worldwide LHC Computing Grid

No article

Acronym doesn't need spelling out for the CERN Courier

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abbreviations, acronyms, Courier, translation

word count

Use the following word counts for content types on the public website. These formats are defined in detail under the Formats tab above. You'll notice from the table that word counts in French are approximately 30% longer.

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word processing (noun); word-processing (adj.)

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Words to avoid in web texts

The following is a list of the web editor's pet peeves. It is intended to make writers think more about simple use of English, and for editors to cut jargon where possible and avoid overusing clichés. We encourage you to avoid these words, except in direct quotes.

Please note that this list does not apply to official documents, which often use a more formal language, or texts for a scientific audience.

Access (as a verb)

And/or (Logic gates do not belong in prose)

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work plan

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workload

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worksheet

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worksite

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workstation

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worldwide

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worthwhile

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