Everybody learns that What is the right way? is a Wh-Question structure. Add the intonation (which is what the question mark is for), and the context, and it's ordinary. As a question. It's formed from something like The right way is X, where the unknown X becomes what.
But as the Object Complement of a mental or communicational predicate, like know, be sure, or say, it's embedded in the sentence, rather than being the sentence. That makes it an Embedded Question (aka Headless Relative or Wh-Clause), and that's a standard complement type, with slightly different syntax from ordinary questions.
The slight difference is that the normal Question-Formation rule inverts the Subject and the first auxiliary verb
[with two caveant:
- be is always an auxiliary verb
- if there isn't an auxiliary verb, invoke Do-Support]
while an Embedded Question normally does not invert.
- Where are they? ~ I'm not sure where they are.
But, just in case the sentence is intended by the speaker to request information (rather than to merely comment on one's mental deficiency), one way of many that this indirect request can be signalled as a question is to use the other question structure, the one that actually resembles a question, with inversion, instead of without inversion.
- I'm not sure where are they. (means "Where are they?")
This is frequently intoned like a question instead of a statement, and punctuated with ? to mark this.
And that has become a very widespread pragmatic convention in the last 40 years or so, though it still varies locally and socially. And that's all, really. Both are correct, though they don't mean the same thing, pragmatically.
Using the preposition in vis-à-vis " the road" normally describes an action that takes place in such a way that the normal progress of the thoroughfare might be blocked, or which calls attention to the act in progress.
Take, for example, the Beatles song "Why don't we do it in the road?" Here it means doing something (i.e., fornicating) right out there in front of everybody in such a way that people will stop and take notice. The Beatles were a British band, so that should put paid to any notion that in means something different in BrE.
To simply walk in the road means to put oneself in some danger from traffic.
He was walking in the road, officer. I didn't see him until it was too late.
Normally, to describe the simple act of using the road for pedestrian traffic alongside vehicular traffic, the prepositions up, down, or along are commonly used. They don't carry the connotation of mortal danger, though that may exist as well.
To walk on the road describes the relationship of one's feet to the road surface.
Best Answer
This isn't a question of right vs. wrong. Rather, you are describing style differences. The sentence "I'm not sure this is right" is elliptical, meaning it leaves out words that have a grammatical function in the sentence but are implied.
The word "that" is often omitted.
In regards to your use of "if." This word is informally used to indicate options. The more formal word to use here is "whether," as in "I'm not sure whether this is right." However, that sentence, too, is elliptical. The full sentence, with the implied words in place, is "I'm not sure whether or not this is right."
Leaving out the implied words is not incorrect. As I said, it's a style choice. If a sentence is clear without the implied words, and if the sentence has an appropriate level of formality according to the purpose and audience, leaving out the implied words is generally acceptable.