Ciao Carlos,
I am not sure too (it is the question for native speakers...)
http://www.nabble.com/message-standardization-on-wiki-tf3559274.html#a9939189
"Cannot open raster map" X "Unable to open raster map"
Martin
2007/7/6, Carlos Dávila <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
Martin Landa escribió:
Hi,
just a stupid note
- G_fatal_error(_("Unable to open raster map [%s]"), name_h);
+ G_fatal_error(_("Unable to open raster map <%s>"), name_h);
wouldn't be better to use "Cannot open raster map <%s>"?, see wiki and
discussion in grass-dev mailing list...
For sure I may be wrong, but I've been revising wiki and lists (dev and
translations) and I can't see where it is suggested to use cannot instead of
unable to.
What I found is:
>From wiki
Standard messages sandbox
First letter should be capitalized
Use the present tense (cannot instead of could not; better: unable to) ...
G_open_cell_old "Unable to open raster map <%s>" >From translation list:
> > > I would prefer not using "Cannot...". It's bad grammar. I would much
> > > prefer "Unable to..." or something to that effect.
> >
> > While I can see your point, that construction is quite common in error
> > messages, e.g.:
> >
> > $ ls -l foo
> > ls: cannot access foo: No such file or directory
> >
> > Neither "cannot ..." nor "unable to ..." form complete sentences.
> >
> > If you're concerned about grammar, you can provide an explicit subject
> > ("The program cannot ..."), or use the third person (e.g. "The file
> > cannot be found").
> >
> > Personally, I don't have a problem with just omitting the subject.
> Point taken. I was really referring to the usage of "Cannot". Some
> dictionaries do not recognize it as 'real word', yet others (that are
> generally more progressive with slang and contractions) say that it
> should replace "can not" in modern English.
>
> It's a non-problem. In modules I've [re]written, I've used "Unable to",
> but I can go back and change them for consistency.
It seems to me that "Unable to" is the most impartial form.
Martin
PS: Thanks to Carlos for this hard job!
Thanks to all of you for the support.
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Martin Landa <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> * http://gama.fsv.cvut.cz/~landa *
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