Re: How formal or informal?
I would also avoid contractions. They can be confusing to non-native
speakers--how many native speakers of English confuse its and it's, ones
and one's, your and you're?
Don't confuse writing with reading. When writing, many people confuse the words you mention, and many native speakers get them wrong. When reading, however, just about nobody confuses those words. It's much easier to understand those words when they're handed to you (as in reading), instead of having to choose among the three variation of "its" (as in writing).
I've had editors tell me to avoid contractions for a lot of reasons:
* Translation issues. At the same time, I've also had translators tell me that's not reasonable. How can anyone make a valid translation of a document from English without knowing about contractions, and how to handle them? If a translator came to me and said "I can't figure out how to translate 'it's' in this sentence," I'd be very skeptical of his translation skills in general.
* Reading comprehension issues. I addressed those above. It's easy to read almost any contraction, regardless of how difficult it may be to write it correctly.
* Concerns over a "less formal style" issue, which is a valid choice made by the client's organization. Can't really argue with this one.
So unless a client or organization specifically requests a more formal style, and fewer companies are doing that these days, I don't go out of my way to avoid contractions. Hey, millions of Dummies books can't be wrong, can they? ;-) (Disclaimer: I wrote one.)
----->Mike
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