references are often to archive sources or interviews which do not readily fit standard formats, and secondly, to the fact that historians expect to see the exact nature of the evidence which is being used at each stage. The MLA (Modern Language Association) requires the superscript numbers in the main text to be placed following the punctuation in the phrase or clause the note is in reference to. The exception to this rule occurs when a sentence contains a dash, in which case the superscript would precede it. However, MLA is not known for endnote or footnote citations, rather APA and Chicago styles use them more regularly. Historians are known to use Chicago style citations. Aside from their technical use, authors use notes for a variety of reasons: As signposts to direct the reader to information the author has provided or where further useful information is pertaining to the subject in the main text. To attribute a quote or viewpoint. As an alternative to parenthetical references; it is a simpler way to acknowledge information gained from another source. To escape the limitations imposed on the word count of various academic and legal texts which do not take into account notes. Aggressive use of this strategy can lead to a text affected by "foot and note disease" (a derogation coined by John Betjeman). Government documents The US Government Printing Office Style Manual devotes over 660 words to the topic of footnotes. NASA has guidance for footnote usage in its historical documents. Legal writing Former Associate Justice Stephen Breyer of the Supreme Court of the United States is famous in the American legal community for his writing style, in which he never uses notes. He prefers to keep all citations within the text (which is permitted in American legal citation). Richard A. Posner has also written against the use of notes in judicial opinions. Bryan A. Garner, however, advocates using notes instead of inline citations. HTML HTML, the predominant markup language for web pages, has no mechanism for adding notes. Despite a number of different proposals over the years, and repeated pleas from the user base, the working group has been unable to reach a consensus on it. Because of this, MediaWiki, for example, has had to introduce its own <ref></ref> tag for citing references in notes. It might be argued that the hyperlink partially eliminates the need for notes, being the