-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 Alan Lord wrote: > J. Greenlees wrote: > > TheOldFellow wrote: >>> The non-native-English writers amongst us, are probably wondering about >>> the frequent misuse, by so-called native-English speakers in these >>> threads... >> something about pot and kettle comes to mind. ;) >> >>> your = a possessive pronoun. It never, ever, means 'you are'. >>> e.g. your book, your crap software, your stupid explanation etc,etc.. >>> >>> you're = 'you are' and never, ever, a possessive pronoun. >>> e.g you're a fine chap, you're right about that, you're a imbecile, >>> you're idea is rubbish. >> Since grammatically, "you're an imbecile" is the correct phrasing. :) >> English requires the 'an' when the following word begins with a vowel. > > I had to drop in some comments. couldn't resist... > > Except for Hotel... It should also be "an hotel". Not "a hotel". > >>> You all = Texan (not English) for something friendly.... >>> >>> This is a bit like me, in the easy days of learning Spanish, saying to >>> a Spaniard: 'No habla Espaniol' ( = YOU don't speak Spanish - which of >>> course he did, and I didn't (hablo)!) >>> >>> Please fix this before fixing the software! >>> >> The issue about correct spelling and grammar in english, even with those >> for whom it is their first language, is common everywhere. The internet >> has become a melting pot for corruption of English, since so many >> youngsters use text messaging spelling online. Things like u instead of >> you, and the really common 'a.f.a.i.k.' etcetera don't help with the >> spelling and grammar issues. > > Agreed. Although these are generally accepted "international" standards. > >> It is made worse by the number of English dialects, being Canadian, my >> English is mostly British in spelling and grammar, but has been strongly >> affected by French. [ centre instead of center or theatre instead of >> theater for two examples. ] These "dialectic" spelling differences help >> contribute to the confusion. > > This is the correct and true spelling of centre and theatre as far as I > am concerned. > >> Since the end of World War II, the "official" language for international >> business and communication has been US English, it might help if >> everyone ran their documents through a spell checker using the US >> English dictionary for the spelling errors. Unfortunately, the grammar >> checkers available outside of MS Office, Star Office or Corel Office >> suites really suck at catching even the your / you're errors, never mind >> the English oddities with exceptions to every rule. > > Says who??? Since when have we adopted US English? That is not the case > here in the UK. we certainly don't stoop to US centric > spelling/adulteration of our beloved language. If we can help it that > is. ;-) In fact I try my hardest to educate our North American > colleagues into their linguistic failings and misdemeanours...
The post WWII N.A.T.O. / U.N. [ etc. ] agreed that for international trade purposes US English is the language to be used. [ probably because of the impact the US had in WWII ] I was chucking over a spelling difference on a CNET owned site, Techrepublic added tags to their discussion postings, and the tag used for joke threads on this US site.. Humour << not the US spelling of Humor :D Seems that Canadian, British and Aussie members have significantly impacted the spelling habits of the American members there. I actually prefer to set my boxes to use en_GB, so I don't see any Americanized spelling being accepted as correct. ;) > Of course we *could* go on to discuss to the [mis]use of the apostrophe > - now that would be fun :-) That's just it, we can discuss this endlessly, it doesn't change anything. Jaqui -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.7 (GNU/Linux) Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org iD8DBQFG645BylMakk+oQ1oRAsIoAKCIJ6sTqQ1U3VG5z1Tzia3dvBNcvQCeKekx gHpQcOYCIfg3heVEWtdbl1w= =eklo -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- http://linuxfromscratch.org/mailman/listinfo/alfs-discuss FAQ: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/faq/ Unsubscribe: See the above information page
