Ending punctuation where there are brackets

Where do you put the ending punctuation when a sentence ends with a bracket?

E.g. if you have something like:

Please enter a number between 1 (this aspect of my work is excellent) to 5 (this aspect of my work is very poor).

Does the full stop go before, or after, the closing bracket?

I note that in a large document that I've been inconsistent in this respect.

Please note I'm cheating here. This is for the day job, not any form of creative writing.

 

It goes after the closing bracket, as you placed it in your example.

 

Thank you.

 

and in the us, [ ] is a bracket... ( ) are parentheses... i understand that differs in the uk...

 

Thanks. Now, that's got a potential for confusion. Because I reasonably often write parsers for formal computer languages as part of my day job. And if anyone American was to look at my code, they will be confused.

 

It's okay. I speak BNF also, and I understood your meaning.

 

The general rule with brackets is that the sentence should read correctly if the brackets and everything in them is removed. If you put the ending punctuation inside the brackets then it would break that rule because the sentence would be left without that punctuation.

 

What about an example where the text inside the brackets is terminated with an exclamation or question mark? I mean something like this:

Is that final full stop correct?