From: roger@crux.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig)
Subject: Re: ``Functionality''
Originator: news@nimaster
Reply-To: roger@astro.princeton.edu (Roger Lustig)
Organization: Princeton University
Distribution: alt
Date: Sat, 9 Jan 1993 20:08:04 GMT

In article <1993Jan9.192102.10669@news2.cis.umn.edu> charlie@umnstat.stat.umn.edu (Charles Geyer) writes:
>In article <CANNAM.93Jan7131200@quattro.sc.ZIB-Berlin.de>
>Cannam@sc.ZIB-Berlin.de (Chris Cannam) writes:

>>Can anybody tell me why I find the jargon word `functionality'
>>so irritating?  To my ear (as a native British English speaker)
>>it sounds not only ugly but downright wrong.

>Perhaps because its only use is silly pseudo-scientific abstraction.

Not that you're familiar with the way it's used or anything, but go 
ahead...

>No postmodern person would ever dream of committing the ultimate sin
>of actually explaining what something does and whether it does it well
>or poorly.  

Today's demon: postmodernism.  Last week it was computer scientists 
or television or something; what will it be next week?  

This sort of thing is *so* much easier than actually paying attention
to the word and what it means.   

>No, the thing must said to "function" and to have a greater
>or lesser degree of "functionality".

Wrong.  That is *not* what the word means, is *not* how the word is
used.

"Functionality" is merely the noun form of the adjective "functional."

And "functional" has several meanings, the most important one wrt its
noun form being "designed with function in mind" or similar  (as opposed
to design with decoration or some other attribute in mind).

>Before Roger jumps on this one saying that "functionality" performs
>an important service, let me circumvent the flame war by agreeing.
>If a marketroid said (or even *knew*) what something actually did
>instead of hyping "a major breakthrough in functionality", one might
>suspect that he got his MBA from Boondock State instead of Harvard.

More snot, more ignorance.  Also an odd shift -- or are marketroids 
suddenly postmodern?  

Perhaps you could make the effort just *once*, Charles, to discuss
a word without being insulting.  Many people who are not marketroids--
whatever that is--use the word plainly and with a specific meaning. 
Your rage has obviously kept you from thinking clearly about what 
the word means, and what its contexts suggest.

Can you present a single citation of the word in the sense you claim?
Can you present one that comes from a "marketroid"?  One that you
feel should be revised?

To be sure, I *have* seen the word used in the sense of "how it works."
But saying "The functionality of the device is..." instead of "The function
of the device is..." strikes me as less than criminal and certainly not
deserving of invective.

>No doubt the word has its uses as a shibboleth.

And no doubt you intend to use it as such, so you can feel superior or
something.  Again, much easier and cheaper than thought.

>>Why?  And can anyone think of a more graceful alternative,
>>without losing the full extent of meaning behind the word?

>Any exact equivalent would be just as silly.  The only graceful alternative
>is to avoid the abstraction and say something intelligible.

What abstraction?  If you mean the difference between "Its function/ality
is" and "The way it works is", that's not much of an abstraction, nor
is "unintelligible" anything more than pomp and affectedness on your part.

Strunk and White didn't invent the language, Charles, nor does everyone
speak the way you write.  Get used to it.

Roger

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