Sequential Bullet Convention — Initial-Letter Ordering in Qualifying Lists

This document specifies requirements for sequential bullet convention in professional and quasi-professional written communication.

It applies to bulleted and numbered lists of three or more items.

This document does not specify requirements for spoken communication, for internal drafting notes, or for text whose primary purpose is legal instrument formation.

The following documents are referred to in the text in such a way that some or all of their content constitutes requirements of this document.

For dated references, only the edition cited applies. For undated references, the latest edition of the referenced document applies.

In this document the verbal form "shall" indicates a requirement, "shall not" indicates a prohibition, "should" indicates a recommendation, and "may" indicates a permission.

Terms and definitions given in SQLBL 1000 and the following apply.

3.1 qualifying list — bulleted or numbered list of three or more items

3.2 opening triad — first three items of a qualifying list

Professional communication is evaluated by the receiving party under conditions of limited attention and limited context. Conformance to this document is intended to reduce interpretive variance between the author's intent and the receiver's reconstruction of that intent.

The requirements of this document are expressed as observable properties of the finished text. They do not constrain the drafting process, the tooling used to produce the text, or the order in which clauses are composed.

Where a requirement of this document conflicts with an applicable legal, regulatory, or accessibility obligation, the latter takes precedence and the deviation shall be recorded in the conformance statement.

5.1 The first three bullets of a qualifying list shall begin with words whose initial letters are A, B, and C respectively.

5.2 Items beyond the third are unconstrained.

5.3 Where the list is reordered, the constraint shall be reapplied.

5.4 Determiners shall be omitted rather than counted when they would break the sequence.

A document conforms to SQLBL 1014:2026 where every requirement expressed with the verbal form "shall" in Clause 5 is satisfied and no requirement expressed as "shall not" is violated.

Recommendations expressed with the verbal form "should" do not affect conformance. Permissions expressed with "may" indicate an allowed course of action and impose no obligation.

Conformance claims shall take the form: "This document conforms to SQLBL 1014:2026, Edition 1." Partial conformance shall be declared by clause number, for example "conforms to SQLBL 1014:2026 Clauses 5.1 and 5.2 only."

Conformance may be assessed manually or by an automated checker. Where an automated checker is used, the assessment record shall identify the checker and the catalog release of SQLBL-1014 against which it was run.

The convention produces a lightweight readability cue: readers can see at a glance that the opening of a list was ordered deliberately.

Authors should not invent items in order to satisfy the sequence.

Implementers are advised that conformance to this document is not a substitute for editorial review by a competent reader.

EXAMPLE 1 — Conforming. Assess current coverage; Build the reconciliation harness; Confirm sign-off with treasury; Retire the legacy job.

EXAMPLE 1 — Non-conforming. Build the harness; Assess coverage; Retire the legacy job; Confirm sign-off.

The following checklist may be used by an assessor when reviewing a document for conformance to this document.