Hi Simon, On Sat, Aug 29, 2009 at 9:09 PM, Simon King<simon.k...@nuigalway.ie> wrote:
<SNIP> > Can someone tell me the rule in what cases one uses "a" and in what > cases "an"? E.g., one has "an" if (and only if?) the next word starts > with a,e,i. Usually "an" comes before a word that starts with a vowel, i.e a, e, i, o, u. So one would say "an eight o'clock meeting" or "an 8 o'clock meeting". More examples: an amphibian, an egg, an igloo, an octopus, an umbrella. However, there are situations when this rule doesn't apply. In software engineering, one uses UML diagrams as part of the design process. Although this acronym starts with a capital "u", it's pronounced and written as "a UML diagram" not "an UML diagram", just as in "a ewe" not "an ewe". > And is there a function (or at least an easy algorithm that I can > implement myself) that for a given integer n answers the question > whether it is "an %d-cochain"%n or "a %d-cochain"%n ? Any number that is spelt with a vowel, e.g. an eight-cochain an eleven-cochain an eighteen-cochain and you can safely put "a" before a number whose spelling begins with a consonant. However, depends on where you are, people do say "an hundred-cochain" with a silent "h", even though at least in Australia it's "a hundred-cochain" where the letter "h" is not silent in pronunciation. -- Regards Minh Van Nguyen --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ To post to this group, send email to sage-support@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to sage-support-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/sage-support URLs: http://www.sagemath.org -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
