I'm being told by an experienced BA (> 25 years) that "Numeric numbers are usually totaled therefore should be right justified." And that text should always be left justified.
I have never heard this before now. Is this a true "standard"?
Answer
Yes. English text is usually left-aligned. Numbers are normally aligned so that the various places (unit, tens, etc.) are in columns. If the numbers are integers, this just means right-aligning the numbers. If they have decimal fractions, then the decimal places should be aligned, with the units digits all in a vertical line.
This makes it easy to compare the numbers' magnitudes. Mac OS X gets this wrong in the Finder: File sizes are given in abbreviated form, such as 342kB or 6MB. When reading a file listing, it's hard to spot the 342MB file amongst all the 342kB files.
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