The semicolon is often used to separate elements of a string of text. For example, multiple e-mail addresses in the "To" field in some e-mail clients have to be delimited by a semicolon. In Microsoft Excel, the semicolon is used as a list separator, especially in cases where the decimal separator is a comma, such as codice_2, instead of codice_3. In MATLAB and GNU Octave, the semicolon can be used as a row separator when defining a vector or matrix (whereas a comma separates the columns within a row of a vector or matrix) or to execute a command silently, without displaying the resulting output value in the console. In HTML, a semicolon is used to terminate a character entity reference, either named or numeric. The declarations of a style attribute in Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) are separated and terminated with semicolons. The file system of VAX/VMS, Files-11, uses semicolons to indicate a file's version number. The semicolon is permitted in long filenames in the Microsoft Windows file systems NTFS and VFAT, but not in its short names. In some delimiter-separated values file formats, the semicolon is used as the separator character, as an alternative to comma-separated values. In the argument list of a mathematical function formula_1, a semicolon may be used to separate variables from fixed parameters. In differential geometry, a semicolon preceding an index is used to indicate the covariant derivative of a function with respect to the coordinate associated with that index. In the calculus of relations, the semicolon is used in infix notation for the composition of relations: formula_2  The semicolon is commonly used as parts of emoticons, in order to indicate winking or crying, as in codice_4. Project Semicolon is the name of a faith-based anti-suicide initiative (since the semicolon continues a sentence rather than ending it) which has led to the punctuation mark becoming a highly symbolic and popular tattoo, which is most commonly done on the wrist. The Humphrey point is sometimes used instead of a decimal point in duodecimal numbers. Sources