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Since the advent of proportional spacing that word processing programs provide, it’s been deemed unnecessary to place two spaces after a period (or other punctuation at the end of a sentence). This custom harks back to the days of typewriters, when two spaces followed a full stop at the end of a sentence. In a line of nonproportional spacing, this made it easier to discern that the sentence was, in fact, at an end. Today, both word processing and layout software such as InDesign have a tiny, built-in space in the period character, resulting in slightly more than one space after the period and subtly allowing for the visual break the eye welcomes at a sentence’s end.