title: Sudden popularity of: obfuscate, why?

text: I hope there is a real reason for this and that my question won't be seen as 'primarily opinion based'. What's the deal with the sudden popularity of the word 'obfuscate' and it's variants? Ngram shows a pretty big leap in usage of obfuscate and it's variants since the 1960s but personally I've noticed in articles that I've read online recently that more and more articles are using this term. Is there a reason behind this? The only reason I can guess is something to do with code and programming (especially ios, android, etc.) but that's pretty much all I got.


title: Is it proper grammar to refer to four digit number in hundreds?

text: Sometimes you will hear people refer to four digit numbers in terms of hundreds. For example, sometimes people will say fifteen hundred when talking about the number 1500. Is this proper? What are the rules of usage? In my personal experience, the hundreds notation is common for values less than 2000, but rare for larger values. Can I refer to 7300 as seventy-three hundred? I know this has been discussed in another question, but that was in terms of years. I'm asking about numbers in general.


title: Verb endings with complex nouns

text: Which is correct: > One of the clearest analogies which helps us understand ... or > One of the clearest analogies which help us understand ... I think it's the first one because 'One of ...' is the subject and it's in the singular form, but it doesn't sound right. Which one is grammatically correct?


title: What's a better word for "part" in this sentence?

text: The new technology divided the world - or at least the part that could pay - in two: those who [blah blah blah] and those who [blah blah blah]. I would use "or at least those who could pay" but I refer to people using the word "those" in the second part of the sentence, so it would seem repetitive. But I don't think "part" is quite right - or is it just me?


title: What is the meaning of "transparent contempt"?

text: I came across this phrase "transparent contempt" a couple of times, but was unable to get the meaning from the context. I am not able to track down the source.


title: What function does this prepositional phrase have in this biblical sentence?

text: From Mark 7:13: > Making the word of God of none effect through your tradition, which ye have > delivered: and many such like things do ye. Although this sentence may be incomplete, I am wondering what component the part "of none effect" acts as in this sentence. Is it object complement?


title: Why do people use "I hear that..." when talking about the past?

text: I often see that people write ‘I hear that…’ meaning the past. For example: > I hear that Sally has won in lottery. (If I remember correctly it is used in English Grammar in use by Cambridge University) Why is it used? Shouldn’t be ‘I heard that…’ when we mean the past?


title: What's the better preposition to use with "love" -- "love for" or "love of"?

text: > He had always had a fond love **_of_** literature. _Love of_ something or _love for_ something? What's the correct preposition to be used with _love_ , in the above context?


title: Correct order of representing information

text: I've been writing a research and I've come across this silly question. In the below sentence _"Network investigation"_ is a general term that consists of many sub practices of which analysis of data is one of them. > Network investigation is involved in analysis of dynamic and volatile > information My question is that, is this sentence all right this way (syntactically) or I should change it with > Analysis of dynamic and volatile information is involved in network > investigation


title: What does the expression "Round up below the cut" mean?

text: Or what's its equivalent? The whole sentence was: "Let me give you a round up below the cut"


title: Is there a specific word for this kind of re-sealable plastic seal?

text: You know those re-sealable plastic bags, where the seal is one plastic strip that you squeeze between two other, parallel plastic strips on the other surface? Like on a Ziploc™ bag, only without the zip? Is there a common word or phrase used to describe those seals?


title: What term refers to those who adhere to scientism?

text: What do you call to a person who places dogmatic faith in the methods of science? What is the agent noun (eg biologist for biology) corresponding to _scientism_? Here _scientist_ would be confusing. I'm looking for what I intuitively want to call "scientist", but that means the opposite of what I'm looking for.


title: Usage of 'on the brink of'

text: (Talking about a chimp): "In human age, he would have been on the brink of puberty." I was told that this sentence is odd because 'be on the brink of' is usually used for something negative: suicides, disasters etc. Though this is most often the case, I don't think this is necessarily true. For example, you can say "on the brink of greatness". In this particular sentence, would it be sound more natural, comparatively speaking, to use "on the threshold of puberty" instead? -Edit-  Google Ngram Viewer makes it clear, I think: http://goo.gl/IqozD


title: How to format "and" or "&" in a three-line header or title

text: I need to know which formatting is more appropriate. Should I place the connecting _and_ or _&_ at the end of second line or at the beginning of the third line? Here is what I mean: > Lorem ipsum   >  Blah Blah **and/ &**   >  Blah Blah or > Lorem ipsum   >  Blah Blah   >  **and/ &** Blah Blah Which one looks better? PS: I’m asking this for a poster design, so it has to be split across three large lines.


title: Usage of the word "demise"

text: Is it appropriate to use _demise_ in the following sentence: > it is with deep sympathy that we announce the sad **demise** of ... It sounds archaic and I was not sure whether it was used correctly. How is _demise_ usually used?


title: Prepositions/Reference : In or From?

text: I have a reference website with quotations from movies, tv-shows and anime. Now the optimal way would be using a title like "Movie Quotes, TV Quotes and Anime Quotes" but since there's a character limit I need something shorter. I thought of these:   _Quotes in Movies, TV and Anime_   _Quotes from Movies, TV and Anime_ Now what I'm wondering is if there's any difference in terms of meaning between 'in' and 'from' in this context? Which one is better suited for my purpose? * * * From : —used as a function word to indicate the source   In : used to indicate inclusion within space, a place, or limits


title: Why is "data," of all the abstract nouns in English, considered plural?

text: Most, if not all, of the abstract nouns I've come across are singular. Examples:   1\. My _love_ for him **is** great.   2\. _Peace_ **is** very difficult to achieve.   3\. The _temperature_ of that pot **is** very high. So can somebody please explain why out of every abstract noun, data is the one people think is plural? Of course, I realize this is because of the whole "it's plural for datum in Latin" argument, but I see two flaws in this:   1\. nobody uses the word "datum," and   2\. this is English, not Latin. Please, I beg of you, prove me wrong. I want to know why this is.


title: Is the expression "to float someone's boat" possible outside of "Whatever floats your boat"?

text: According to the Urban Dictionary, the expression " _whatever floats your boat_ " means > [...] whatever "soothes your soul" or whatever "works best" Aka- Whatever > you feel like doing. Is it possible to use "float someone's boat" outside of that specific expression? I'm thinking of conversations between co-workers or acquaintances, where the goal of the asker is to find out more about the other person, especially what drives them personally, but without sounding like having romantic interest. (Bad) example: > So Peter, what is your driving force in life? What floats your boat? Would it be used by native speakers? Within which relationships (close friends, acquaintances, colleagues) would it be considered polite? What would be a good alternative expression for this kind of query?


title: Term for "Improvement During Isolation"

text: I'm looking for a term (ideally, word) to describe an event or its main participant. In military, athletic, or heroic stories a person may be set apart from others to improve. This question was inspired by reading Orson Scott Cards's _Ender's Game_. The summary from Wikipedia says: > [Colonel Hyrum] Graff... offers [Andrew "Ender" Wiggin] a place in the > Battle School, situated in Earth's orbit, where Graff quickly isolates Ender > from the other cadets, but encourages him to continue training despite > frustration... The solitude I want to describe also has its place in philosophical and spiritual works. In philosophy, there is Henry David Thoreau's retreat to Walden Pond, about which he says: > I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the > essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, > and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. And the Christian Messiah spent 40 days and nights in the Judaean desert, where he was tempted. This seclusion may not be total, allowing for a trainer or emotional support. Examples include:   * Luke and his trainer Yoda on Dagobah in George Lucas's _The Empire Strikes Back_   * Jonas and the Giver in Lowis Lowry's _The Giver_: > So it is without real protest that [Jonas] initially accepts... a job he is > told will be filled with pain and the training for which will isolate him > from his family and friends forever.   * Rocky Balboa, his trainer Duke, and Rocky's brother-in-law Paulie in _Rocky IV_ > [Rocky] flies to the USSR without Adrian, setting up his training base in > Krasnogourbinsk with only Duke and brother-in-law Paulie (Burt Young) to > accompany him. The isolation need not be voluntary. The IMDb synopsis of 2002's film _The Count of Monte Cristo_ says of prisoners Dantes and Abbe Faria: > Dantes befriends a fellow prisoner named Abbe Faria (Harris), who is a great > scholar and who, very gradually, transforms the unworldly Dantes into a > wise, learned and cultivated man. I would like an emphasis on isolation; there may not be an opportunity to do other things for a while. The work to improve during the seclusion is trying (or rigorous) and sustained over a period of time. I can't remember if Daniel in _The Karate Kid_ , for example, spent the summer with Mr. Miyagi, which I would consider isolation, or visited him after school, which is less so. And I consider Bruce Wayne's training under Henri Ducard at the League of Shadows headquarters in _Batman Begins_ to be isolation, even though there are many other people there. Because those other characters are peripheral, the effort to improve Bruce seems as focused as Eliza Doolittle's in _My Fair Lady_ or Alejandro's in _The Mask of Zorro_. The best words I know, _metamorphosis_ and _transformation_ , by themselves emphasize the change (or improvement) but not the isolation. An analogy can be made with _metamorphosis_ and a caterpillar turning into a butterfly, but until it's made my audience may not know that that's what I'm getting at. Other terms I can think of are too general or too specific: _Back-to-basics_ and _meditation_, for example, are about specific types of self-improvement that can be done during solitude; others are synonyms for _solitude_, which itself can be isolation for any number of reasons, like > ... bad relationships, loss of loved ones, deliberate choice, infectious > disease, mental disorders, neurological disorders or circumstances of > employment or situation... Is there a term, preferably word, that more concisely expresses "isolation for the sake of (self-)improvement"?


title: This book will change your wife – trope?

text: “This book will change your wife.” The cliché is “This book will change your life”. By changing one word, the cliché is transformed into a more interesting sentence: in this case about a novel, _50 Shades of Grey_. Is the word _wife_ in this context a trope? > trope (trp) n. > >   1. A figure of speech using words in nonliteral ways, such as a metaphor. >   2. A word or phrase interpolated as an embellishment in the sung parts of > certain medieval liturgies. > "This book will change your wife" was one of the comments in a television program on Channel 4. http://www.channel4.com/programmes/sex-story-fifty-shades-of-grey > The programme examines the sociological and cultural effects the book is > having in the UK, as sales of obscure classical music and bondage gear > increase. > > TV REVIEW: Sex Story - 50 Shades Of Grey - The Study Of A Phenomenon Of > BDSM, Or 'Mummy Porn' http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2012/07/29/tv-review-sex-story-50-shades-of- grey_n_1717230.html **BDSM** bondage and discipline sadism and masochism Actually, I was hoping for a little bit more of a discussion about **'What is a trope?** ' and **'Why, _wife_ in this context, is not a trope?**


title: Any folklores about stealing secrets from the gods to humans?

text: Hi I am looking for a a folklore _in any language or culture_ which involves a hero stealing information from a divine source and giving it to humanity. Something similar to Prometheus but with a happier ending. Any one able to help?


title: Is it correct to say "it is not that far a distance"?

text: Is it correct to say: "it is not that far a distance"?


title: "In the next years to come" or "In the years to come"

text: I want to write a sentence saying that I hope that something will still happen in the following years. Which is the best way to write it ? I would like to keep doing that in the years to come. OR I would like to keep doing that in the next years to come.


title: Is 'on an annual term' the same as ' on a yearly basis '?

text: Let's assume I have an entity called Policy. Well, policies get renewed on an annual term, so there's likely an entity called Period. The sentence is extracted from http://msdn.microsoft.com/en- us/magazine/dd419654.aspx


title: What is the difference between a "part" and a "segment"

text: What is the difference between the two and and should I say "a part of the text" or "a segment of the text"?


title: Looking for a positive way to describe "no-nonsense" or "no-frills"

text: I was looking up the term "no-nonsense and got the following synonyms: > earnest, grave, humorless, no-nonsense, po-faced [British], sedate, severe, > sober, sobersided, solemn, staid, uncomic, unsmiling, weighty Words like sedate, grave, and humorless all make no-nonsense sound like a negative word, but I don't think that has to be the case. Same story with no- frills: > austere, spartan, stark Again, these make no-frills sound like a bad thing. Austere and spartan are rarely used in a complimentary sense. But I don't think that has to be the case! I know that a no-nonsense car is going to deliver something that's simple and effective. A no-frills car would get me from point A to point B without trying to upsell me on crazy features and trendy marketing. So, is there a word to describe something that is 'no-nonsense' or 'no-frills' that would put it in a positive light?


title: Is "uncollaborative" a word?

text: I am describing a process as being antithetical to collaboration. To clarify, I'm referring to its quality as being "not naturally collaborative", not "actively anti-collaboration" Is "uncollaborative" a word? Is there a word that isn't a variation of "collaboration" that gets the job done?


title: How to punctuate "To be, or not to be, that is the question"

text: What would be the correct way to punctuate this line from Hamlet? Should there simply be commas or should a colon be used? e.g.: To be, or not to be: that is the question.


title: Words containing 'unimp'?

text: I'm looking for some words which contain **unimp** in them, for example 'unimportant'. But it would be great if the word does not have negative meaning.


title: Takeout vs Pickup, is there a difference?

text: A restaurant offers "Takeout or Pickup" and it appears the difference is that takeout are orders placed onsite to be consumed offsite, and pickup are orders placed offsite that are retrieved from restaurant to be consumed offsite; delivery being orders that are both orders and consumed offsite? Is this correct, what is the history of the use of these terms?


title: What does ‘Democratic sharpies’ mean? Is the usage of ‘sharpie’ as a political figure well-received?

text: Mark Helperin’s column titled ‘Snapshot’ in Time magazine (August 15) begins with the following sentence: “Here are the two data points most compelling to me: (1) Many _Democratic sharpies_ now think if unemployment doesn’t go above 9%, Romney is done and dusted. (2) Speaker Boehner is reportedly having to calm the conference over the selection of one of its own to join the national ticket." From the context, I suppose ‘ _sharpies_ ’ here means ‘hard-liners, hawks, or persons fervent in their principles’ But I don’t find such meanings in any popular dictionaries: Cambridge online dictionary has no entry of this word. Oxford online dictionary defines ‘sharpie’ as   1. A sharp-plowed, flat-bottomed New England sailing boat, with one or two masts each rigged with a triangular sail.    2. (informal, chiefly North American) another term for sharper. Merriam-Webster simply defines it as a long narrow shallow-draft boat, with flat bottom, plus ‘sharper’ as an ‘exceptionally keen or alert person’ which seems to me pretty close to my interpretation of ‘political sharpies.’ Wikipedia defines ‘sharpie’ only as an American manufacturer of writing instruments whose products are sold in over 20 countries. Originally a name designating a single permanent marker. In net, none of dictionaries I’ve checked registers ‘sharpie’ in political connotation. Is ‘sharpie’ a received English word? What does it exactly mean?


title: I will (have the package sent) vs (have sent the package) by next week

text: I'm aware that: > I will **have the package sent** by next week is correct. But what about: > I will **have sent the package** by next week Is it completely wrong to say it or is there some _correctness_ in it? I'm asking this question because I was writng an email and I first wrote: > By next week **I will have discussed the projcet** with the professor and > would be able to answer your questions then. Then I changed it to: > By next week **I will have the project discussed** with the professor and > would be able to answer your question then. Is the first one ( **I will have discussed the project** ) absolutely wrong? And is there a way to rewrite it so that **discussed** still appears before **the project** when using **have** (to emphasize the discussing action)?


title: What's the "opposite" of "any more"?

text: Consider the following sentence: > [This] is not important for the younger generation any more. Now let's suppose that for some reason I am willing or obliged to use the adjective "unimportant" instead of "not important"1. Would the following sentence be grammatical? > [This] is unimportant for the younger generation any more. If it's not, is there anything I could replace "any more" with to preserve the meaning but make the sentence grammatical? My question is purely out of curiosity. What's the equivalent, if any, of _any more_ that can be used in sentences where the verb is affirmative? 1 Instead of _not important/unimportant_ any other similar pair could do, e.g. _not useful/useless_.


title: Is the use of "this" correct in "There is this blog, but I don't remember its name"?

text: What I write should mean the following: "There is this blog, but I don't remember its name." So I thought I have to write it this way to achieve the meaning in a short way: "This blog." But is this correct? Does is mean what I want to say? Because I've learned at school that "this" points to something specific. But I that's not what I want to achieve. Sorry if the question is unclear. But I have no idea how to explain it differently.


title: Using "skies" instead of "sky"

text: Why do people use "skies" instead of "sky" (when, indeed, we only have one sky)? > Reach for the sky/skies! and > I'm glad to finally see some blue skies. > > I'm glad to finally see a blue sky.


title: What is the correct term for “mince pies”?

text: I have always called mince pies filled with fruit just that: _mince pies_. However, lately I have been seeing many different variations of this: _fruit mince pies_ , _mince fruit tarts_ , and even _mincemeat pies_ — which makes absolutely no sense to me, as the pies contain no meat whatsoever. Is there a single correct term for fruit-filled mince pies? What are the reasons for the other terms?


title: How to Explain Dependent Clause to a German?

text: I'm trying to help a friend with written English. I told her that I wouldn't be able to provide too much assistance in the way of grammar because I quite frankly just don't know the rules. I'm supposed to provide "real-world" practice outside of her schoolroom studies. However, she did ask me why this sentence is grammatically correct. "As Leo realises that he is nothing more than an instrument of a fundamentally deadly and unstoppable totalitarian regime, a crisis of conscience ensues." You have to understand, as a German speaker, if you start a sentence with "Als,", you have to complete it with a dependent clause, which I think I did here, but I'm not comfortable enough with my understanding of it to explain it to her without feeling as I'm telling her a lot of false information.


title: Do 'already' and 'just' require the present perfect?

text: Compare: > 'We already gave him a response'. > > 'We have already given him a response'. Do 'already' and 'just' strictly require the present perfect?


title: My shoes can't think; how can they be sensible?

text: Recently as some of us were getting ready to take a walk through the snow, somebody said to me "you're wearing sensible shoes". Now my shoes haven't developed cognitive abilities so far as I know (and I spend enough time with them that I think I would notice), but everyone there knew what this means. It's a common phrase in my experience, but it got me wondering. The adjective _sensible_ here, while syntactically bound to the noun _shoes_ , really applies to another noun in the sentence instead. Is there a term for this sort of modifier migration, or is this sentence technically ungrammatical? I checked dictionary.com for alternate or obscure meanings of _sensible_ but found none, and a Google search on the phrase turned up uses but no explanations. I also don't think this construct is limited to this particular phrase, but I don't have any more clever ideas.


title: Why are "homework" and "work" uncountable in English?

text: In Bulgarian both "homework" and "work" are countable. Why are they uncountable in English then? What is the difference in meaning that makes that happen?


title: Quote of some advanced text?

text: I am trying to make a video and in it I need a piece of advanced text. You should get the feeling that this text is just advanced for the sake of being advanced, not for any practical reason, and being seen as a joke or similair. (It is acceptable that this quote's complexity is perfectly reasonable in its own context, it should just look too complex to an average person.) Maybe something from a very advanced philosophy course or a book about epistemology or perhaps a passage about linguistics with numerous abstraction levels and lots of referencing and triple/quadriple negations or something like that. Ideally, this shouldn't be just a technical text where every word seems like jibberish, but a quote where you sort of understand each word, but they are so "high class" and rare, and put together in such ways that you almost feel like the writer makes fun of you :P. Although if you do have techincal quotes like that, please respond too. I have tried to google it, but how does one search for something like that? Maybe some of you have some quotes written down that you have encountered earlier, or know some good book that I can lookup and look through to find this? It should be longer than ~50 words. It should be syntactically correct for the most part. (It is ok if some parts of it are not, if those parts are so complicated that you have to study the quote first to notice it. But it shouldn't just be a mix of random words.) Sorry if this is a wrong place to post this kind of query, it seemed appropriate though :)


title: Reminder of promised resource

text: Someone promised me a resource and I haven't received it yet. I am tired of waiting so I would like to remind this person that he/she promised me something and ask about the situation. My question is how can I ask about it in a polite kind of way? Can I ask: > What is the situation on this resource?


title: How do "need" and "not" mix and match?

text: 1. You don't need to play   2. You need to not play   3. You need not play   4. You needn't play   5. You need not to play What does each of these mean, and which ones are equivalent to the others? Is the meaning of the negation equivalent to what I would get if I replaced need with "must"/"have to"?


title: Where can we find anacoluthon nowadays?

text: > An anacoluthon <...> is a rhetorical device that can be loosely defined as a > change of syntax within a sentence <...>. Grammatically, anacoluthon is an > error; however, in rhetoric it is a figure that shows excitement, confusion, > or laziness. Apart from poetry and rhetoric, can you give examples of anacoluthon nowadays? Is this technique widely used in popular media? My thought is since anacoluthon is an intentional grammatical error it would rather appear in newspaper headlines (where everybody understands will never be errors) than in article text? Can you give examples?


title: What is the difference between "excuse me" and "forgive me"?

text: I am hesitated when I use the sentence "forgive my fault, please." instead of "excuse me, please." because the word "forgive" has a religious theme and probably carries some additional meanings. Also it seems the usage of the word "forgive" for apologies depends on the social rank of the people in the conversation too. **Question:** What are the differences between "excuse me" and "forgive me" in current and historical meanings and usage? Does the meanings of these phrases change when the social rank of audiences changes? Which one is more frequent among literate speakers?


title: Where should I put the comma in this sentence?

text: > The three main factors of bullying among teenagers are problematic family > background, strong desire of power and popularity and influence from mass > media. The number of _and_ s in this sentence confuse me, so I don't know where to put the comma. Where should it go?


What do you call someone who is easy to relate to? For example, someone who has been through something you have been through, like similar life experiences.


title: What's the best way to write "Ugly Dog brand Dog Food"?

text: What's the best way to write this? I'm thinking "Ugly Dog-brand Dog Food" as the most likely candidate... what is grammatically-correct?


title: One word to say to someone who's being in a state they're usually not (or doing something they never did)?

text: In my native language, there is a singe word to say to someone who apparently are doing something they never did before, or being in state they never were before. Like: > Mr. X had always been late. But today he came on time. > > Mr. Y said, "[...], you're always late before." Or: > Ms. A had never kept in touch with Mr. B. One day she dropped him a line all > of a sudden. > > Mr. B said, "[...]. What makes you call me? I thought you'd forgotten we're > friends." Or: > A student had always been so much lazy. But one day he finished all of his > homework and listened to the teacher during the whole class. > > So the teacher said, "[...]. You're being diligent. You usually are not." I know that this condition is described by means as in _you are being diligent_ , or _you're not usually like this._. Or perhaps _this is not you._? But I need an expression for that (one-word expression, if possible), and I can only think of these: >   * How odd! >   * For the first time. >   * What happened? (Or what's happening?) >   * Hey, is this really you? > Well, I don't think I'm doing this right. **P.S.** : What we say to this person (according to my mother tongue, Indonesian): _Tumben!_. **P.P.S.** : I'm looking for an _insinuating_ or _joking_ expression, not swear-word interjections like the ones in the suggested possible duplicate.


title: Single word for representing a person who guides at right time

text: Please help me finding the single word for representing a person who guides at right time (at the time of need).


title: Is "off" also an acronym?

text: I found the term _off_ used in the following way (technical document): > ... a total of two (2 off) Single radio channels ... While the meaning seems pretty clear, I'd like to know what _off_ stands for in such a context. I supposed it could be an acronym, but could not find any references.


title: "Is there" versus "Are there"

text: > Are there any questions I should be asking?   >  Is there any articles available on the subject? My instinct is that in the two questions above, it should be 'are' as the subjects of the sentences (questions/articles) are plural. However I also recall being told that the singular 'is' is valid here too, and of course see it very often in usage online, and this has left me a bit unsure. **Update:** I have stumbled upon the reason for the confusion. > Is there any water?   >  Are there any questions? The sentence structure is the same but of course water is not plural, although it is not singular either.


title: In British English, should it be "licensee" or "licencee"?

text: We all know that "license" in American English is "licence" in British English. But what about the person to whom the licence is given? Various dictionaries show the 'c' version, e.g.:   * http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/licencee Additionally, I can see other resources in my own country using this spelling, e.g.:   * http://www.centennialparklands.com.au/about_us/event_organisers/toolkit/glossary But managers in my own company (in Australia) claim to have done "a lot of research" on the subject, and decided to use the 's' version. This seems wrong to me, but I would like a better answer to the question before I decide whether to request a change or just change our spell checking to allow their spelling.


title: English counterpart to Japanese signal word, “Dokkoisho”

text: What is an English counterpart to the Japanese signal word, “Dokkoisho” uttered unconsciously in such case as sitting down on the bench? When you get old, it becomes tough to move your body. We Japanese, particularly old people and the middle-aged use to utter a signal word or interjection, “Dokkoisho” when we sit down on the chair, bench or stone on the roadside and when holding up a bulky and heavy thing like heavy luggage. It sounds like a kind of sigh or onomatopoeia. It may be similar to ‘upsy-daisy,’ but “Dokkoisho” is addressed to yourself as a monologue, and seldom used by young people or people who are in the prime of age. When you start to say “Dokkoisho” in taking any motion, it’s a sign that you’re getting old. It has a tone of both “Relax” and “Be aware of the action now you are taking.” I’m curious to know if there are counterpart words to “Dokkoisho” in English.


title: How to say one minute past midnight in military time?

text: I first would like to say that I did read How should one say times aloud in 24-hour notation? but my question isn't answered there. How do you say 0001 in military time?   * oh one hours?   * oh oh one hours?   * oh oh oh one hours?   * something even weirder?


title: Saying "gate 'ooks" instead of "gateaux"

text: My father-in-law will say "gate 'ooks" instead of "gateaux". He claims this is a regional/dialectal thing and that it was common in the part of Sussex where he grew up. Is that likely, or is it more plausible that it was just him and a few of his friends mocking the spelling? My googling can find nothing useful on the subject.


title: What does ‘a lunch best forgotten’ mean?

text: There is the following sentence in Jeffery Archer’s fiction, “The Fourth Estate.”: > He droppped into three newsagents on the long walk into Kingston, and > purchased Time, Newsweek, and local papers. He then stopped at the first > restaurant he came across, with American Express sign on its door, took a > quiet table in the corner and settled down for a lengthy lunch. > > **Having paid for a lunch best forgotten** , Townsend left restaurant and > began to stroll around the town. It was the first time he had spent like a > tourist since his visit to Berlin back in his student days.” – P436. What does ‘ **a lunch best forgotten’** mean? Does it mean the lunch he ate was terrible rather than mediocre, and worthless to remember, or he almost forgot to pay? According to Google Ngram, the incidences of usage of ‘best forgotten’ is significantly lower than ‘best remembered’ by almost 10 digits (best forgotten: 0.0000046 - 48 vs. best remembered: 0.000032 - 28 during 1998 through 2008), and I don’t think I’ve met this word so often. Is ‘something best forgotten’ an idiom to mean the thing you’d better to forget, like ‘a lost love best forgotten’, ‘a failure best forgotten,’ and ‘one’s ex-wife best forgotten? I learnt there is a hit song, “Better Best Forgotten” by Steps released in March 1999 with Wikipedia, but it doesn’t seem to be relevant to “a lunch best forgotten” here.


title: Can Quotation Marks be Used When Describing the Contents of a Label?

text: I am using the sentence below to describe what is written on the image of the button below. ![enter image description here](http://i.stack.imgur.com/Y9F4d.jpg) The log-in page may also be located by going to the homepage at www.website.ca and clicking the red button located at the bottom left, labeled “Staff Portal”. Is this ideal to put quotation marks over what is labeled on the button?


title: What's the meaning of "roll out" here?

text: The following is an advice given to someone who is looking for ways to make a couple thousand bucks in a short period: > With no deets on your situation it's really hard to help you. But I will say > for sh-ts and giggles my fiance and I went garage saleing like a mofo last > summer for shit to re-sell on Craigslist. Made quite a bit of cash. But > selling ANYTHING on Craigslist is a fucking bit-h. > > But on the other hand if you're hard up for money. You can **roll out** with > $50 and easily turn it into $200+ if you have the time and patience, > > I found an expensive light fixture for $35 that I sold for $125, and a set > of 2011 F150 side view mirrors I got for $100, and sold for $350. I have a general idea of what he meant by the term _roll out_ , but what exactly does it mean? I found a few definitions of the phrase _roll out_ in the dictionaries, but they don't seem to fit the context. The definition I found are: >   1. to get out of bed. >   2. _football_ to execute a rollout. >   3. to show (a new type of aircraft) to the public for the first time >   4. to launch (a new film, product, etc) in a series of stages over an > area, each stage involving an increased number of outlets >   5. to cause (pastry) to become flatter and thinner by pressure with a > rolling pin >


title: make question for periodic event

text: I like to make question about the happening of some events whether it is happened every day or every week or every month...etc how can i make question? this is my try: Does this event happen every day or every week or every month? is it right?


title: What does "lit" mean, in The Cat in the Hat

text: _The Cat in the Hat_ , by Dr Seuss contains the following: > I do not like this said the fish as he lit. I do not like it, not one little > bit. What on earth does **lit** mean in this context? A guess is that it means **alighted** , considering the fish has landed in the teapot. Perhaps it's a typo? Thanks to my 5-year old daughter for spotting this, somehow I never noticed it myself.


title: Should "Have your peer partner send you her plans" be considered a directive?

text: If you tell a person to _have_ someone do something, is that considered a command? Our boss sent an email which told us to "have your peer partner send you her plans". Should that be considered a directive? Our union is actually filing a grievance over this language. Our contract states that we cannot be forced to give our lesson plans to anyone. Our principal, as part of a professional development activity wrote "have your peer partner send you her plans," as opposed to "send your peer partner your plans". Since I have no means of "having" (forcing) her do this (I am not her boss), the implication to me is is that we should "request" this of our peer partners. I think she deliberately chose "have" over "request" (in fact the union asked her to amend the email to state this was voluntary, and she refused) to confuse people into thinking she was telling them to send their plans to their partner since indeed, "have" connotes a command, but was covering herself by being able to say that she never told anybody to send their plans to the peer partner- she told us to have them send theirs to us. Since we can't "make" our peer partners do this, in this case "have" means "ask". It seems to me that this was a way of tricking people into thinking it was a directive, but the language was chosen carefully — so if necessary, it would prove it wasn't. I think the union will lose the grievance on these grounds, unless there are provisions in the contract against deliberately using language to mislead overworked teachers who don't have time to read emails through the lens of a lawyer.


title: What are the comparative and superlative forms of 'lively'?

text: My teacher taught me that to form the comparative and superlative degrees of a mono- or di- or tri-syllabic word, I should add 'more' and 'most', e.g.: > lively -more lively-most lively I know it is correct, but today I saw these words in these forms: > lively -livelier-liveliest Which way is correct? Or are both of them correct? Why?


title: Should I add "anyway" in the following sentence?

text: > She looked at herself in the mirror and wondered if she should wear makeup. > She decided not to. What was the point if she'd remove it in a couple of > hours, (anyway)? I'm a little confused. It sounds OK with and without the _anyway_ to me.


title: Usage of "would" instead of "used to"

text: I sometimes lurk on "AskReddit" and when people are telling stories, they often read like this: _"After I **would** cook dinner for us, we **would** sit at the large dining room table and he **would** make a point to ..._" (Source) or _"I was told a story once about a lady who [...] painted pictures that **would** reflect her depression. Her paintings **would** sell for a lot of money."_ (Source) I always wonder about the usage of "would". As I have been thought in school, would is a modal verb that indicates a subjunctive. I never heard about the usage of "would" instead of "used to" before, although for instance this site claims: " _Would can be used to talk about actions that repeated in the past. It is used in the same context as used to_ ". So my questions are:   1. Is this a regional thing or do all native speakers use this form?   2. How common is this? In which context can this substitution be used?   3. Does it sound colloquial or strange to native speakers?


title: Reply to "I hope you are well"?

text: What is the most appropriate response to "I hope you are well"? What are your reasons for choosing one reply above another? Replies I've thought of:   * I am very well, thanks. How are you?   * I am very well, thanks, and hope you are as well.   * I am very well, thanks. I hope it is the same with you too.   * (Ignore it completely.) I guess it depends on the relationship with the person, but my question is mainly focused on politeness in everyday emails with colleagues/customers.


title: Source of the term Munter (unattractive person)

text: I'm a rock climber and I live in the UK (both of these will become relevant soon). In the UK (typically southern England) it's common to call an unattractive person a Munter. > What a Munter Now in rock climbing (presumably sailing before it) there is a knot called a Munter Hitch. Are these two things/word uses related? If so how and why? It's not a particularly unattractive knot!


A simple question, so to re-iterate the title: Why is a "field" on a form called a field? A quick search for the etymology results in: > Old English feld "plain, open land" (as opposed to woodland), also "a parcel > of land marked off and used for pasture or tillage," probably related to Old > English folde "earth, land," from Proto-Germanic *felthuz "flat land" > (common West Germanic, cf. Old Saxon and Old Frisian feld "field," Old Saxon > folda "earth," Middle Dutch velt, Dutch veld Old High German felt, German > Feld "field," but not found outside it; Swedish fält, Danish felt are > borrowed from German), from PIE *pel(e)-tu-, from root *pele- (2) "flat, to > spread" (see plane (n.1)). > > Finnish pelto "field" is believed to have been adapted from Proto-Germanic. > The English spelling with -ie- probably is the work of Anglo-French scribes > (cf. brief, piece). Collective use for "all engaged in a sport" (or, in > horseracing, all but the favorite) is 1742; play the field "avoid > commitment" (1936) is from notion of gamblers betting on other horses than > the favorite. Field glasses attested by 1836. No mention of its use in forms?


title: TANKED - meaning is not clear

text: will you please help me with "translating"/explaining a couple of things? "I always had a "plan B" in case my materials were too hard, or just TANKED" - the capitalised word is the one I'm interested in.. I can't make head or tail of it


title: Not sure if I should use 'the' or 'a'

text: So I just commented (tried to, the answer turned out to have been deleted) on an answer and wrote this: "I also feel that the disclaimer was just a tincy wincy bit unnecessary". I then though to change it to this : "I also feel that the disclaimer was just a tinsy, wincy, littlest bit unnecessary". I then thought that the 'a' should/could change to 'the' as in "I also feel that the disclaimer was just 'the' tinsy, wincy, littlest bit unnecessary". However I then realized I didn't actually really know which one it should be... In my mind at least, both seemed to be correct. A slightly dumb and mundane question but still, it got my gears grinding a little bit so I thought to come here for some internet ultimate wisdom. Also in an afterthought: what's the correct use of commas within this quote?


title: Why "bench" for judges?

text: Why is the word "bench" used specifically to describe a judge or the judicial process?


title: Does saying 'then' after 'sorry' imply reluctance?

text: `A` did something wrong but didn't realize it. `B` explained to `A` why what (s)he did was wrong. Then `A` said: "Sorry then". Is `A` really sorry? Literally, "sorry then" (in my head) means in light of the new information, I am sorry. But my friend say the 'then' after the sorry means `A` said it reluctantly and (s)he is not really sorry. So which is it? Do you have any more examples of when placing 'then' after a statement makes it imply the speaker's reluctance?


title: Should the abbreviated forms of Latin terms be placed in italics?

text: When writing English, one often uses Latin terms, such as _exemplī grātiā_ , _opere citātō_ , and _id est_ , but in abbreviated forms, "e.g.", "op. cit.", and "i.e.". When writing Latin terms in English, one often places them in italics. Should the abbreviated forms of such Latin terms also be placed in italics?


title: comprehendible vs comprehensible

text: Just got into a debate at work whether _comprehendible_ is a word. It appears as I type this that _comprehensible_ is preferred in Firefox's dictionary. However, when I used Outlook's spellchecker it changed _comprehendable_ to _comprehendible_. So which is it?


title: Name for cognitive bias suggesting a person is special or important

text: I'm looking for the name of the cognitive bias that leads people to think that they are extraordinary in some aspect. This is similar to Illusory Superiority but generalized to encompass uniqueness in general, not just positive traits. It's the " _Why is it always me?_ " bias. **Added**   This is the belief that unusual things happen more often to _you_ , and is typically caused by the fact that unusual things get more of your attention when they happen to you rather than when they happen to others. **Clarification**   I'm not looking for a **disorder,** I'm looking for the name of the trait that is common in nearly everyone such that they think that things that they don't notice in other people is believed to only happen to them.


title: "Learn to code" vs. "Learn coding"

text: Is there a semantic difference between `learn to code` and `learn coding`? Can both forms be used interchangeably?


title: Can I say "Why not you study literature?"

text: May I ask you this question meaning to emphasize the importance of studying literature? What has confused me is that the question, ironically, carries the same implication of, "Why study literature?" I wont to use it exactly as is. The pronoun "you" is important: > And why not you study literature? Is this an acceptable 'native' construct?


title: Would you use a period after text: Thank you for helping to build the new building

text: My boss told me that I shouldn't have a period after the text: Thank you for helping to build the new building. She said that it is not a complete sentence.


title: Are there religious swear words in English the way there are in French-speaking Québec (like “Câlisse!”)?

text: Are there in English any cases of using religious words for swear words, most likely in predominantly Christian regions? I ask because in the Canadian province of Québec, which is primarily **francophone** , religious words get used for swearing quite a great deal when speaking French. (I suppose this might be explained by a will to express against religious abuse from time to time, or by a rejection of religious authority.) For example, French profanity like _maudit tabarnack_ , _mon enfant d’criss_ , and _hosti d’faux prètre_ could be respectively translated into English as _damn tabenacle,_ as _my son of Christ_ , and as _host of false priest_. Most use cases conjoin the word _damn_ with some religious object, but at other times they are turned into imperative verbs such as _décolisse_ or _décrisse_ (saying “de-chalice” and “de-Christ”), which could translate into _go away_ or _break_ or _tarnish_. The most common swear word one hears in Québec is _Tabarnak!_ Is there anything in the **anglophone** world comparable to this peculiarly Quebecker/ _québécois_ habit of using words related to religion for profanity?


title: Is it common to omit a preposition (in / on / of) before “the month (year / week /day) when they are used adjectively and adverbially?

text: There was the following sentence in New York Times (April 12) article titled, ‘Lone Wolf’ Theory Gains Ground in Texas Deaths” > “The Kaufman County district attorney’s office is small compared with those > in Houston or Dallas. It has about 13 prosecutors, and **Mr. Hasse’s docket > the month** he was killed provides a glimpse of the kinds of cases common in > the county: burglary, aggravated assault, forgery, theft of a firearm.” Is it common in today’s English not to use prepositions such as “in,” “of,” or "during" before nouns specifying time? I know the expressions like “It happened the day he arrived in New York” is prevalent, but does it look redundant or outdated if I put “Mr. Hasse’s docket of (in) the month he was killed ....”? Are there any handy rules with which I can judge easily when I should use and not use prepositions before nouns of time - year, month, week, day, and hour?


title: how do we read this sentence '50X better software quality'

text: I am browsing a website. There is one sentence: > 50x better software quality here _x_ should mean _times_ , but I don't know how to read it. Can someone explain it to me?


title: What is the meaning of the phrase "for my sins"?

text: I have a sentence: > No, Sir, for my sins, I am not a regular church-goer. What does "for my sins" mean in this case? The phrase is from a book but not published yet and I am translating it to Czech.


title: What is the correct term to describe 'primary', 'secondary', etc

text: What is the correct term to describe the words in the following sequence: _primary, secondary, tertiary, quaternary, quinary, senary, septenary, octonary, nonary, denary, duodenary_ , etc. I am thinking '-tier' but I don't think I am correct.


title: What's the meaning of "direct" here?

text: Consider the following quote: > When a pipe carries water, or a wire carries electricity, it contains and > **directs** the flow of the water or the electricity. Is _direct_ here sense 2 from OALD? > 2 [transitive] to control or be in charge of somebody/something


title: Is there a word/phrase/idiom for temporarily satisfying strong feeling of hunger?

text: Imagine a situation where you've been invited to dinner at a friend's place. You're extremely hungry but you learn that the dinner won't be ready for another half an hour. So you decide to eat an apple or a bite of bread or some other small thing which will not satisfy your hunger fully, but will temporarily make it more tolerable. Is there a word/phrase/idiom to describe this small snack prior to a big meal? The Russian equivalent of what I am looking for is _заморить червячка_ , which literally means _to starve/kill the little worm_. The only translation I found of this idiom was _to stay one's hunger_. However, I couldn't find any usage examples of it and the google query for define:to stay one's hunger doesn't return anything useful, so I guess this idiom, if used at all, isn't very common.


title: Does the term 'eccentric screw pump' have weird associations?

text: A progressing cavity pump is sometimes referred to as an _eccentric screw pump_ , because it features a screw that turns abound an axis other than its center. 'Eccentric screw pump' yields many Google hits, while professionals seem to use the term 'PC pump'. The German term would be Exzenterschneckenpumpe, so to me and to other Germans it may come naturally to translate this verbatim and arrive at eccentric screw pump. But 'eccentric screw' might also sound like a sex act. **Does the term 'eccentric screw pump' have sexual connotaions to a native English speaker?**


title: "Like" or "have liked"?

text: Is this sentence correct? > From early ages people like travelling. Isn't it better to say: > Since early ages people have liked travelling.


title: What does 'Ibid' mean in this context?

text: Someone I know got a interview call letter part of which read as this: > .. you are requested to appear for the ibid interview .. What does _ibid_ mean in this context?


title: Is there a suffix for loathing?

text: For instance trichomania is a love of hair, and trichophobia is a fear of hair. But what suffix would denote a loathing of hair? **Edit:** Maybe I'm looking at the wrong end of the word, and I should be considering the prefix "miso-".


title: Terms for generic forms of 3D motion on the 3 axes

text: Consider up & down, left & right, and back & forth. Up & down can be stated generically as "vertical". Side-to-side is "lateral". What about back & forth?


title: "Whn U Ck Me, U WL Fnd Me Sez da Lord." in this picture (publicity)

text: Does the style (if it is) shown in the picture below have a particular name? ![enter image description here](http://i.stack.imgur.com/GeR6Z.png)


title: Hatred of Chinese

text: Sinophobia specifically describes fear of all things Chinese. Is there a word specifically to describe hatred (not fear) against a particular race? Right now I'm using _anti-Chinese sentiment_ , but that is really clunky. Perhaps a new word made from the combination of the prefixes "miso" (indicating hatred) and "sino"? Perhaps _missinogy_? I am writing an essay on Chinese discrimination.


title: "Fill out a form" or "fill in a form"

text: Does one _fill out a form_ or does one _fill in a form_? I've gotten different answers from the people I've asked. Google search results: >   * fill **in** a form — 14,200,000 >   * fill **out** a form — 7,000,000 >


title: What is this "of" here?

text: Does the criminal justice system need more or less **of** a governmental relationship to be effective?


title: Should the words "city"/"state"/"province" be capitalized (if not followed by the name of the city)?

text: When referring to an entity like a government body, should it be capitalized if referring to is by classification(?). E.g., if I write: > The City of New York requires us to get a building permit. Certainly "city" should be capitalized. However, if I'm communicating in a context where everyone should know what city I'm referring to (the one we are in), when I write: > The city requires us to get a building permit. Should "city" still be capitalized?


title: What's the meaning of "the stage-type of statesman" and "the statesmen of the old type"?

text: In this quotation: > The stage-type of statesman was amusing, whether as Roscoe Conkling or > Colonel Mulberry Sellers, but what was his value? The statesmen of the old > type, whether Sumners or Conklings or Hoars or Lamars, were personally as > honest as human nature could produce. What's the meaning of “the stage-type of statesman” versus “the statesmen of the old type”?


title: Ambiguity in "free shipping of the product"

text: Trying to write a mail in English I have a problem with the following sentence: > Only free shipping of the product will be asked I tried many ways to tell that using other words, other formulations … but I still can’t figure if there is some ambiguity or not about the fact that both the shipping itself _and_ the product should be free and not just the delivery.


title: Punctuation between clauses when the first clause is a series

text: I have this sentence: > Even if I seem too busy, or you made a mistake, or someone we care about > will be upset, or you feel embarrassed, if anything bothers you, I want to > know. I believe that it is correctly punctuated as is, right? I have a style question... Would the sentence be easier to parse if there was a dash between _embarrassed_ and _if_ instead of a comma? And is that an accepted punctuation choice for a sentence like this? > Even if I seem too busy, or you made a mistake, or someone we care about > will be upset, or you feel embarrassed--if anything bothers you, I want to > know. Thank you for your help!


title: Which pronoun should be used with "anyone"? "They" or "you"?

text: Sample sentence: If anyone has the files, could ( _they_ or _you_ ) please upload them to a file-hosting website? Context: I am writing an email to a group of people requesting that if anyone has the files I mentioned, to please upload those files to a file-hosting website. "Anyone" could be one person or more.


title: Using first names with the titles Mr. and Mrs

text: It is proper to use the first names with _Mr._ & _Mrs._? For example, in the invitation of an anniversary party, can one say the following: > Celebrate the anniversary   > of Mr. and Mrs.   >  James and Martha King


title: Can “along with” be used to mean “as a consequence of”?

text: I have this sentence: > Along with _something (cause)_ , _something else (effect)_ happened. From text books I know that parts that are connected by “along with” should be in the same form and in the same category. What are the possible corrections for this sentence? p.s. I need both meanings: _cause and effect_ and _happening together_.


I was reading the Mac OS X Lion upgrade page, and it said "make sure" all over the place. It struck me as odd. Where does the term "make sure" come from? What are you making to be sure? Yourself? Shouldn't the expression be, more verbose, but more accurately, "make yourself sure", or something similar?


title: What are these symbols called in the English language?

text: You see these all the time in movies, usually when some poor guy has been wrongly imprisoned and begins counting the days since his incarceration, but what are these markings called? I used to know, but I've forgotten and now it's really bugging me. ![enter image description here](http://i.stack.imgur.com/HlwfQ.gif)


Where "talent" here refers to a personal quality of "from birth, being able to do a specific skill well", what is the precise opposite? I.e. what word means on innate inability? Just as an example, someone who has absolute pitch can readily detect (even name) a note, so they would be talented in the skill of transcribing notes. Someone who is born tone deaf, however, has an innate inability to do this skill. In searching the dictionary, I found several suggested antonyms, however, when presented alone (without the word "talent" given), readers will not recognize the precise meaning. E.g. when readers see "weakness", they will not immediately think of some "innate inability", nor will they imagine some talents that someone might be poor at. What is the most precise antonym of "talent"?


title: Print vs type. What is the difference exactly?

text: I am filling out some employment forms and came across the following sentence that I don't fully understand: > Print your full legal name, address, date of birth and social security > number. Please don’t type this information. I am not sure what is the difference between print and type here. I assume this is related to printing using a printer vs printing by hand? Which is which?


title: How should I quote a book's name?

text: When writing, one often needs to quote the name of a book. How should I do it properly? I have met all of the following kinds of quotation. Which one is correct and what's the principle?   * _An Introduction to Manifolds_   * _AN INTRODUCTION TO MANIFOLDS_   * _an Introduction to Manifolds_   * _An introduction to manifolds_


title: Summarizing what makes a home a home

text: **Meta:** I considered asking this on WritersSE, but I am less familiar with it. I would not object to a migration. **Problem:** I want to edit the following sentence so that it is as brief and aesthetically pleasing as possible. I specifically want to change the italicized part. > My home _is a place where I (i) enjoy being, (ii) can work and rest > effectively, (iii) can escape from the world to be alone, and (iv) can spend > several days without going stir-crazy_. I have made the description long for the benefit of this question. I don't want to have a list like that. A word or short phrase to describe my home would be ideal. Feel free to alter the structure in any way. The revised sentence needn't perfectly capture all of the above qualities but should bring to mind their core concepts. **Non-solutions:** Here are some options that I have found and rejected after checking some thesauri and similar threads on this site. Words that are close but not right (in somewhat descending order): _shelter, refuge, sanctuary, retreat, sanctum, harborage, respite_. The problem with some of these is that they suggest that I am in serious danger outside of them, which is not what I want. Some are not especially enjoyable or long-term. I'd also like to avoid religious or spiritual undertones. I would consider using these words if these problems could be largely avoided. Words that are definite rejects: _lair, den, roost, manor, demesne_. These are mostly getting more specific than _home_ in an irrelevant way. The meaning of _roost_ is not terribly wrong, but I do not want to compare myself to a chicken or other animal. I also want to avoid being obscure or highly metaphorical. My best current idea is something like: > My home is truly/thoroughly/?? my shelter. > > My home can completely shelter me. These are missing the idea that I am happy and productive there. I also want to avoid the implication that I am sheltered in a negative way. > My home shelters and nourishes me. This is very close but could use improvement. Very different options are of course welcome.


title: "Sound engineering"

text: What does "sound engineering" mean in this context: "Establishment and use of sound engineering principles to obtain economically software that is reliable and works on real machines efficiently. (Fritz Bauer)"? The definition above is for software engineering. However, the word "sound" used here definitely is not engineering for audio.


title: What is the verb for dividing something into regions?

text: Imagine a piece of paper on which you can draw some "regions". How do you call this act? These words can probably better tell you what I mean, but I know they don't exist in English:   * Regionize: I regionized the paper   * Enregion: I enregioned the paper   * Region itself as a verb(?): I regioned the paper * * * In reality, I am a programmer "enregioning" a skin. I would be happier if the verb had clear relation with "region", because that is the technical term I am using for those parts of the skin. That way, the "enregioner" would both have a meaningful name and one that makes users understand it is creating "regions"


title: What does "just between you and me" function as?

text: We are trying to figure out the parts of speech in the following sentence and have been stumped by the first phrase: > Just between you and me, those boots aren't cool this year. I say interjection, but we think maybe it is some type of adverbial phrase. What do you think?


title: Where did the phrase "diddly-squat" come from?

text: It sounds like something Ned Flanders would say. I believe it just means "nothing at all". But what are the origins of the phrase? Is it common in the US as well as the UK?


title: Difference between "uncompress" and "decompress"

text: What is the difference between _decompress_ and _uncompress_? Is there any? Context: > The receiving node has to **uncompress/decompress** the data.


title: "perhapsy" as a slang term for "perhaps"

text: I've recently heard somebody answered "Yes, perhapsy." Or could it be "perhapsee"? Could this be used as a slang term for "perhaps"? It happened in NYC area a few weeks ago.


title: A word describes things that can be used only once

text: I am wondering if there is a single word that describes things that can be used only once. My focus is links that usually sent to our emails in order to activate accounts or reset passwords. However, I do not mind to find a word for all kind of items that can be used only one time (e.g. Bullets, bombs, diapers, baby wipes, pads ... etc.


title: Is the use of dependent clauses undesirable? (in scientific writing)

text: I tend to use dependent clauses frequently in scientific writing. This is especially true when discussing a problem-solving process where the result from one step leads into the next. Here's a made-up example, with the dependent clauses in **bold**. > **To overcome the issue of noise,** we performed a Fast Fourier transform on > the resultant time series. **Although the output represented only half of > the observations,** we temporally interpolated the remaining observations > based on historical trends archived previously. **Moreover,** the use of > temporal interpolation allows us to fill data gaps when the detector failed > to make observations. When I try to integrate the dependent clause into the independent clause, the paragraph loses the logical flow of problem-then-solution sentence construction and the sentences feels disjointed: > We performed a Fast Fourier transform on the resultant time series **to > overcome the issue of noise**. We temporally interpolated the remaining > observations based on historical trends archived previously **because the > output represented only half of the observations**. The use of temporal > interpolation **also** allows us to fill data gaps when the detector failed > to make observations. While I do prefer the first version, is it stylistically and technically undesirable to use dependent clauses in successive sentences? Or am I just being paranoid?


title: Alternatives for "I told you so."

text: Sometimes, "I told you so" is expected by the target. What if we want to surprise them with another famous phrase which would deliver the same message, perhaps with more intensity. Sometimes, "I told you so" doesn't quite say it, maybe because we wish it carried more weight. What are other possibilities? A single word, or phrase or idiom maybe.


title: Use of hyphens in acronyms

text: PTP-SD is a type of algorithm. PTP stands for "probabilistic tree pruning" SD stands for "sphere decoding" PTP-SD is a type of algorithm that uses PTP **with** SD. My question is about the use of the hyphen here. In the paper I am currently editing, the author has written the following: "Increasing radii algorithm (IRA) [10] and probabilistic tree pruning with sphere decoding (PTP-SD) [11] reduces the complexity by adopting the different radii in each layer instead of fixed radii used in the literature." In such examples, the spelled out form contains no hyphen. Is this okay? Should there be one? If so, where should it go? Why should only the abbreviation contain a hyphen but not the spelled out form?


title: Term for "soft hate"

text: I don't know the word for it, so I will call it _hate_ , but it might seem too extreme a word for people from the US. Example from one of the comments I got: > Maybe you're playing the wrong sort of game, if you don't like RPG > limitations. Maybe you should be playing The Sims instead (not trying to be > funny here). The person disagrees with me, but because he _softly hates_ me he says I should play The Sims. If he had nothing against me, he would not say the _The Sims_ part.


title: What is the term for an integer one larger than a given integer?

text: I'm looking for a concise term to say a number must be exactly one higher than a previous number. None of "subsequent", "incremental", or "next" seem to convey the restriction that it must be contiguous to the previous number. "Contiguous" does not convey that it must be larger rather than smaller. Is there a specific term for this or am I going to have to use a phrase like "contiguous to and larger than"?


title: Is "has or will read" grammatical?

text: I just wrote _[he] **has or will read** [some text]_ in an ELL chat room. But looking at it (or more accurately, listening to my "inner voice" trying to "read it aloud"), I find it bothers me a lot. A quick check on Google Books finds a claimed 1020 written instances of **has or will read**, and 2480 instances of **has read or will read**, which suggests a significant minority of writers don't have a problem with the fact that the two different _read_ 's don't sound the same. When I check the same construction with other verbs that _don't_ have the same written form for past participle and present tense, it seems people nearly always include _both_ (e.g. has worked or will work:1230, has or will work:8; has arrived or will arrive:357, has or will arrive:7). I'm not usually a big fan of "grammatical rules", but it seems to me there "ought" to be a rule that you shouldn't delete one instance of the verb unless it's "the same" as the one you're keeping. And it also seems to me that since language is primarily _spoken_ , "the same" ought to mean "sounds the same when spoken", not "looks the same when written". Can anyone who knows more than me about formal rules of grammar settle this one? * * * As an aside, offhand I can't think of any verb where the past participle and present tense sound the same but are written differently (maybe there aren't any), but would deletion be okay in _that_ case?


title: Does "oath" have an implied religious connotation?

text: In Singapore you don't have to swear an oath in court if you are of certain religions. Instead you affirm that you're speaking the truth: > Circumstances under which affirmation may be made 16\. Any person who —(a) > is a Hindu or Muslim or of some other religion according to which oaths are > not of binding force; or(b) has a conscientious objection to taking an > oath,and who is required to take an oath of office or judicial oath under > any written law may, instead of taking the oaths referred to in section 15 > (1) or (2), as the case may be, make an affirmation in the form of those > oaths, substituting the words “solemnly, sincerely and truly declare and > affirm” for the word “swear” and omitting the words “So help me God”. I'm curious if that means oaths in British English have an implied religious meaning? It seems to be the case that you swear to God usually, but an oath in itself is irreligious, no?


title: Does English have "plural" verb forms?

text: A friend of mine and I were having a linguistics argument (actually, this one), and she brought up as evidence the "plural versus singular conjugation" of the past-tense form of "to be", i.e. "was/were". I'm sure we all know the 6-form conjugation table:   * I [verb]   * You (s.) [verb]   * He/She/One/It [verb]   * We [verb]   * You (pl.) [verb]   * They [verb] I'm equally sure we all know that the first three are singular, and the latter three are plural. Now, interestingly, we both agreed on the answer to the original question ("Yes"), but my friend put forth as evidence that You (s.) is conjugated with the "plural conjugation", namely "were", just like We and They, whereas I and He/She/One/It are conjugated with the "singular conjugation", "was". My argument was that verbs are not conjugated in plural and singular forms, and the fact that "to be" in many tenses seems to follow that pattern is just a coincidence, an artifact of its highly irregular nature. So, which of us is "right"? Do verbs have explicitly "plural" versus "singular" conjugations, or do they simply have the 6 conjugations (per tense), and "to be" just happens to look like "plural" versus "singular" by mere coincidence?


title: "Some champagne for my real friends, some real pain for my sham friends."

text: > Some champagne for my real friend, some real pain for my sham friends." Is there a name for this kind of sentence? Note: I'm not sure the origin of this, but it is a line in Spike Lee's movie, 25th Hour


title: Single word for "separated for a while with the expectation to be reunited"

text: I'm writing a story in first person view. In that story the main character is writing about how he is now separated from a once close friend. In telling the story, I want the main character to subtly express how he really want to reunite with the friend when he say the word that is supposed to mean "separated". So what I'm looking for is a word that also carries the expectation to be reunited in addition to be separated, that can be used to replace the word "separated" in the following sentence: > This is the story of me being separated. And as a side note, I actually want to use the word as the title of the story also.


title: Meaning: channel vs river

text: What is the difference between a channel and a river? **UPDATE** I understand the difference between _canal_ and river, but why there is also channel? Is that the same as canal?


title: Thorough and Through

text: I rather like to use the word **_thorough_** , but was recently informed by a reviewer that it was "archaic". Indeed, Merriam-Webster lists it first as an archaic spelling of **_through_** , with the familiar definition only as a secondary one. Is this specific to American spellings, or is this a general trend?   What should I use instead?   Saying "painstakingly" might be all right, but it seems odd to say "He was very painstaking.".


title: Which preposition to use when referring to computer environments

text: The computer software can have versions targeting different hardware and operation systems. For example, the same game can be run on PC, Xbox and Mac. My question is - when describing the release of the version targeted the specific environment, which preposition is best to use? E.g.: `The company X has finally released their famous Zombie Undeads game on/for/to/? Xbox?` The same question for virtual stores - `We plan to release a new version for/on/in/to/? App Store and Google Play in March` \- which preposition is the most appropriate here?


What is the term for a word that alters the degree or severity of the subsequent word? In the example below, what is the term for "somewhat"? Ex: He was somewhat unhappy.


title: Is it considered rude language to omit interrogatives in speech?

text: At least, I think the proper word is _interrogatives_. But, for example, in proper sentence structure, you would see sentences such as, > Are you still here, Alouicious? > > Is there a doctor in the room? In informal speech, sometimes you can omit the actual questioning word, but still pass it off as a question, so long as it isn't confused for a completely different query. > You still here, Alouicious? > > There a doctor in the room? I know it's probably not sound in terms of grammar, but my concern is, is this considered a rude or uncouth kind of language? Or at least, is it considered far less polite than to use the full sentence? It also shows up in the case of converting, say, "What the <intensifier> are you doing?" into "The <intensifier> you doing?", but I imagine the politeness of that scenario tends to get clouded by the choice of intensifier.


title: What is "dook dook" called in English?

text: I've noticed that there are some sounds like:   * Animal sounds   * nature sounds e.g. raining sound what are these called in English?


title: What is the name of the phoneme produced in an upper-class Briton's pronunciation of the word "Duke"? What's different in the articulation?

text: When someone with a Received Pronunciation accent pronounces the word _duke_ , as in _The Duke of York_ , he doesn't pronounce it with a "hard" 'd', as one might pronounce the word _duh_ , but a softer type 'd', which I can only spell phonetically as "dj", so as to pronounce _duke_ somewhat like "djuke." My question is composed of two parts:   * What would a linguist call this phoneme?   * What is the difference in articulation between it and a "regular" /d/?


title: What does a "man of leisure" do exactly? What is the definition and the connotation?

text: I watched the BBC adaptation of Charles Dickens' _Little Dorrit_ some weeks ago, and have happily remembered a question I had forgotten from it just now. In this dialogue, Mr. Clennam, a dashing and rich gentleman, asks Frederick Dorrit -- whose brother is the principal character William Dorrit, and whose lamentable tale of being locked up in Marshalsea Prison for his debts forms the basis of the entire story -- about his fortunes. As Frederick Dorrit was once guarantor to his brother's debts, his fortunes have been laid very low, and he recalls the story of his past life (paraphrasing): > Things were not always the way they are now. I was once **a man of > leisure.** I ran a boarding school for young girls... My question is: What exactly does it mean to be a "man of leisure"? Mr. Frederick Dorrit doesn't sound to me particularly upper-class, from his job description as a proprietor, yet he applies a very gentlemanly sounding appellation to himself. I'm thinking maybe the phrase has a more nuanced meaning than merely "free from work." Can anyone help me figure that meaning, with it associated connotations, out?


title: What connotation exactly does the word "noddy" have in British English?

text: I watched a BBC adaptation of Charles Dickens' _The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby_ the other day, and came across a bit of dialogue I couldn't quite decipher: > **A character named Squeers** : I hope you didn't set out the good cut of > meat. > > **His wife** : Do I look like a _noddy_? What does _noddy_ mean exactly? Is it archaic slang? I'm guessing it means something close to "fool" here, but I want to be quite sure of the connotation of the word and when one would use it.


title: The word "I" is singular, but it does not follow the subject-verb agreement for a singular subject

text: When you have a singular noun as subject, a singular verb follows. However, the pronouns "I" and "you" are singular but singular verbs do not follow after them. Does anyone know something about this reason or historical explanations? For example, you say "I live" instead of saying "I lives".


title: How to understand the phrase "through its successive approaches to perfection" in the given context?

text: I don't understand the bold sentence below. I guess it means "I should not attempt to find the origin of the human's organization by studying its evolution progress." What confuse me is that I don't know the **prefection** refer to. Could you interprete this sentence for me, especially the phrase _through its successive approaches to perfection_. > However important it may be, in order to form a proper judgment of the > natural state of man, to consider him from his origin, and to examine him, > as it were, in the first embryo of the species; **I shall not attempt to > trace his organization through its successive approaches to perfection** : I > shall not stop to examine in the animal system what he might have been in > the beginning, to become at last what he actually is; I shall not inquire > whether, as Aristotle thinks, his neglected nails were no better at first > than crooked talons; whether his whole body was not, bear-like, thick > covered with rough hair; and whether, walking upon all-fours, his eyes, > directed to the earth, and confined to a horizon of a few paces extent, did > not at once point out the nature and limits of his ideas. This sentence comes from A Discourse Upon the Origin and the Foundation of the Inequality among Mankind


title: Are pronouns for non-universal divines capitalized?

text: When following the formal English rule of Reverential Capitals, any reference to God Almighty is capitalized, as are equivalent non-Christian entities such as "Allah" or the neo-pagan "Goddess" (and various similar entities from fiction, like the Creator from Robert Jordan's _Wheel of Time_.) Does the rule extend as well to polytheistic deities of infinite character? If discussing a variation of Greek gods where each deity has infinite and omnipresent control over their particular sphere of influence, would pronouns be capitalized when they wouldn't otherwise be? > Zeus controls lightning. Do not anger **Him**. or > Zeus controls lightning. Do not anger **him**. (Assume, of course, that reverential capitals are otherwise used, as in "Jesus and His apostles.")


title: Expression: wanted the skinny on

text: Is there an expression like _wanted the skinny on_? I can hazard a guess on the meaning of the phrase but will be grateful if anyone can tell me the exact meaning. Here is the exact quote: > I'm a faculty person and just _wanted the skinny on_ how my students can > best utilize your services?


title: Can "to escape" also mean "to go on holiday"?

text: The Macmillan Dictionary s.v. "escape (verb)" says that "to escape" can also mean > to go away on holiday in informal contexts, e.g. "We're hoping to escape to the Algarve in May". I can't find this meaning in any other dictionary at my disposal. Is it actually used in this sense?


title: What is a "Quickfire Auction"?

text: I see a lot of Google results for this term, but not a single one explaining it. The phrase search "What is a quickfire auction" returns zero result (and will soon return this question). What does it mean exactly?


title: Why "English" but not "Anglish"?

text: Etymology of English from Etymonline: > Old English **Englisc** (contrasted to Denisc, Frencisce, etc.), from > **Engle** (plural) " **the Angles** ," the name of one of the Germanic > groups that overran the island 5c., supposedly so-called because **Angul** , > the land they inhabited on the Jutland coast, was shaped like a fish hook > (see angle (n.)) * * * "Old English" article from Wikipedia: > Old English ( **Ænglisc, Anglisc, Englisc** ) or **Anglo-Saxon** is an early > form of the English language that was spoken and written by the Anglo-Saxons > and their descendants in parts of what are now England and southern and > eastern Scotland between at least the mid-5th century and the mid-12th > century. * * * Also, Anglish is used as a resulting language of linguistic purism. (coined by the author and humorist Paul Jennings). It is mentioned as English minus many of the non-Germanic elements. * * * **Questions:**   * Why didn't the name of the language become **Anglish** and survive till today?   * Etymonline says that it comes from **"Englisc"** but there are three different spellings of Old English and the root is mentioned as **Angul**. So why from Englisc but not Anglisc? * * * **Note:** There is this question asked before: Where did the name "English" come from? Accepted answer mentions that English is the corruption of Anglish. But there is not much detail about it. Is it ever called Anglish then? When and how is it corrupted? Also, English is "Anglais" in French. I'm not sure if it is beyond this website if I ask why it is "Anglais" in French and if connection to other Germanic languages is related to this topic. The topic can go deeper in regards to origin of tribe names also. I may have missed some points and this can be asked in linguistics stackexchange as well.


title: Be careful for what you eat or Be careful what you eat

text: I usually hear "Be careful what you eat" and also Google is telling me that but it seems "Be careful for what you eat" to me right. Could you please explain which one is right and why please?


title: Is "delete" a hyponym of "edit"?

text: In computer science, is _delete_ considered to be included in _edit_ , or are they two separate things? Example: Editing item details and deleting items. In my case, both can be done by the same user and from the same place.


title: Parentheses vs. commas vs. hyphen or dash in a list of people

text: In a list of people published in a bulletin, which is correct? >   * We continue in prayer for: Amy B.(cancer), T. Jones(nephew of Tim), > Lillie (on the death of her brother), Sally(Nursing Home), >   * We continue in prayer for: Amy B.,cancer; T. Jones,nephew of Tim; > Lillie, on the death of her brother;Sally,Nursing Home; >   * We continue in prayer for: Amy B.-cancer, T. Jones-nephew of Tim, > Lillie- on the death of her brother,Sally-Nursing Home; >


title: Real word for "equippable"

text: _Equippable_ , while not a really a word, seems to be accepted by the gaming community as a term for _this can be equipped_. Is there a more appropriate word which is real, singular and essentially means the same? For example, > I may pick the item up and carry it. However, whether I may put it in my > hand or not would be distinguished by whether it is **equippable**.


title: How would you properly show deletion of unnecessary text in a quote?

text: I assumed you would use dots to show left-out unnecessary text in a quote, such as in > The definition of used oil is "oil ... that is xyz". The deleted portion is non-useful text that would confuse my readers, but I want to show them that the cited passage is a direct quote from regulations except for leaving out some words. Are dots the correct way to do this?


title: What is the word for an image hidden inside a painting?

text: My father-in-law has a painting by Vu Cao Dam of two girls and a man on horseback. He found a hidden fox in the painting, and today we were looking at it and found some more. What do you call it when an artist intentionally puts a hidden image within a larger work of art? My father-in-law swears there is a word, and that it is a general term which can apply to different media. It can apply to actors who make cameos or easter eggs in software. What word is this?


title: Can ‘nickel and dime’ be used for the object not related with money?

text: There was the following sentence in the pretty old article of Daily Finance titled “How to avoid getting nickel and dimed with fee: “These days, it seems as if everyone's trying to squeeze every penny out of us. From banks to colleges, American consumers are being _nickeled and dimed_ like never before. Here are some of the biggest offenders, and your best defense against them.” OALD at hand defines hyphenated ‘nickel-and-dime’ as an adjective (Ame. informal) ‘involving only a small amount of money; not important.’ Oxford Online Dictionary defines hyphenated ‘nickel-and-dime’ as an adjective meaning ‘of little importance,’ and as a verb meaning ‘harass someone by charging for many trivial items or services.’ Cambridge Online Dictionary defines ‘nickel and dime’ as an adjective meaning ‘something that is not important, usually because it does not involve much money.” Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary defines hyphenated ‘nickel-and-dime’ as an adjective meaning ‘involving or offering only a small amount of money.’ Though it seems the usage is more often associated with money, can ‘nickel- and-dime’ be used as a verb for the object that has nothing to do with money, in such a way as ‘Indulgence in alcohol nickel-and-dimed his health’ or ‘Rapidly ageing population with declining birth rate nickel and dimes the strength of the country’? Which is more common to use the word, with hyphen, or without hyphen?


title: "Vaccine Advisor" vs. "Vaccination Advisor"

text: I am making an Android application which will serve info about diseases which can be prevented by immunization. All in all it's an app targeted at travelers so it can help them protect themselves and educate them. Now my dilemma is whether I should use   * Vaccine Advisor or   * Vaccination Advisor The first option sounds like everythng is about the vaccines themselves and not about the process of immunization. What do you think — which one would be correct?


title: Where does English get the word “condom” from?

text: Although once a word that dared not speak its name, thanks to popular-culture references as well as the devastating AIDS tragedy, **_condom_** seems to be on everyone’s lips these days. But does anybody really know where the word **_condom_** (BrE `/(ˈ)kɒndɒm/`, AmE `/ˈkɑnd(ə)m/`) ultimately comes from? The OED says: > Etymology: Origin unknown; no 18th-cent. physician named Condom or Conton > has been traced though a doctor so named is often said to be the inventor of > the sheath. It is probably a coïncidence that it first appeared in the same century as _shag_ , as the device surely predates the word. It just must have been called something else back then. Even if you allow that trees can be barked, folk etymologies related to an apocopation of _condominium_ , amusing though they may sometimes be (particularly as blue punch-lines), seem to be barking up the wrong tree. So where do we anglophones (and others?) get the modern word **_condom_** from?


title: Is mafia an acronym?

text: Is _mafia_ a word of Italian origin or is it an English acronym? It seems that there are several theories, but it seems that there is no prevalent view.


title: suitable positive alternative to unimpaired (e.g. in neuropsychological function)

text: I'm translating a neuropsychological assessment report into English and I'm not sure which word/phrase to use here: The neuropsychological functions related to the performance of volitional and differentiated actions, motor production, perception, verbal memory and attention are... The idea is that these functions are unimpaired, or _functioning normally/properly_. "Unimpaired" is a negative word, with a negative prefix. I'd like to use a positive word. "functioning" sounds clumsy: "the functions are functioning".


title: Correct English words for trade 'source item' and 'destination item'

text: First of all, I hope I'm on the correct site asking a question, usually I'm around on Stack Overflow itself. So here's the story: I am designing a database table involving trading and I'd like to use the correct words, the table involves at least:   * A user that wants to trade his item.   * The item he wants to trade, codenamed `sourceItem` for now.   * The item he wants to trade his item to, codenamed `destinationItem` for now. What are the correct English words for `sourceItem` and `destinationItem`? I sadly don't even know it for Dutch (my language), so cannot translate it either. **Edit** to clarify: I am looking for the genuine English naming of the words I've asked, I am _not_ looking for a variable name or something of that kind.   I'm sorry if this question looked too much like a "How should I name this variable?"


title: Is "a person without desire" correct?

text: Can I use desire in its singular form without an article before it? That is, if I write "...so also a person without desire", will that be correct? or I'll have to use "..so also a person without any desire" or "..without desires"?


title: How many sentence types are there in English?

text: As the header says - how many distinct sentence types are there in the English language?


title: does "sluggish" have a negative connotation?

text: Context: The Processing Speed for situations requiring immediate attention is **sluggish** I'd like to know if this sounds acceptable in a neuropsychological report, or if there's a more suitable word. Thank you!


title: Distinguish contraction of "ain't"

text: I know the contraction of _am not_ , _is not_ , _are not_ , _has not_ , _have not_ , _do not_ , _does not_ , and _did not_ can be represented as _ain't_. How can I understand correctly which contraction the speaker meant?


title: Is there a word that has the following meaning: to distribute a portion of funds

text: I am interested in a single word, if such a word exists.


title: "Connection to/with the server was/has been lost"

text: Which one is correct? > Connection to the server **was** lost. > > Connection to the server **has been** lost. Also, should _to_ or _with_ be used with _server_?


title: "integer multiple" vs. "integral multiple"

text: >   1. Nine is an integer multiple of three. > >   2. Nine is an integral multiple of three. > > Which is more common? If both are accepted, what's the subtle difference between them?


title: "Justification of" or "justification for"?

text: Do "justification of" or "justification for" mean different things? Is one more appropriate than the other?


title: Term for things like "naughty step" where the step is not what is naughty

text: Can anyone remind me of the grammatical term for the apparent misapplication of an attributive adjective, as in the phrase "the naughty step" (where it is **not** the step itself that is naughty but the person consigned to it)?


title: What does it mean when someone has 'issues' with something?

text: This seems another of those fashionable expressions (like awesome) which may not stand the test of generations. But when someone tells you that Suzannah has 'issues with self confidence', what does that mean? Is it a euphemism for saying 'she lacks self confidence'? What are the limits to this expression? Could I say:'In a moment I will have an 'issue' with the clock, as I have to go to a meeting', or perhaps: 'In the car yesterday I had an issue with another driver, and my passenger is now in hospital', or 'the doctor thinks there is an issue with Fred's heart', (it has stopped beating). How far could we go with this?


title: What is the name of the moment when the detective solves the mystery or realizes who the murderer is?

text: In many Whodunit mystery stories, there's a scene when the detective (e.g., Hercule Poirot) discovers (or overhears) the final clue (or a phrase another characters says) that makes this detective realize who did the crime. This is of course before the "Reveal". Does this event have a name?


title: Why do programmers always use 'we' when really they mean 'me' or 'you'?

text: Something I've noticed a lot from reading articles on stack overflow is that programmers tend to use the term 'we' a heck of a lot. I'm a programmer myself and I must admit, of all the times I've given people a few programming lessons or a bit of programming help, I've never felt compelled to use the term 'we' when talking about something you can do in the language. For example (picking from some stackoverflow suggestions): "When do we really need to use hibernate for our Java code?" and "Why do we use process when we do have threads? [closed]" Really what these people mean is: "When do you really need to use hibernate for your Java code?" (in which case 'you' acts as an informal equivalent of 'one') and "Why is process used when threads can be used instead?" Has anyone else noticed this? Is there a reason programmers tend to use 'we' when discussing programming when really they mean 'you' or 'me' or the question could be asked without the terms. Does anyone know where this trend/habit started or why so many people do it? Frankly it's starting to bother me because it results in an awkward use of English that doesn't feel natural and isn't particularly easy to take in.


title: Who is ‘Brad’ who doesn’t want you to succeed in public speaking?

text: In association with my yesterday’s question about the meaning of ‘metaphysical impossibility’ of the chance of making speech at Oscar Award wining for most of us, I found the following sentence in the New York Times’ (February 23) article titled “Tips for Public Speaking”: > “Nearly everyone gets some anxiety about public speaking — even Oscar- > winning actors. Here are some tips to help you through a big speech: -- > > Remember, the audience really wants you to succeed. Except that one guy in > the back, **Brad**.” Who is Brad who sits in the back of the hall? If it is Bradley, why should he be Bradley, not Dick, Charles, John, or anyone else? Why those who don’t want you to succeed is only one person while there could be several of your rivals who don't like your success at anytime.


title: It is just like him to be late

text: What a strange construction is it? Why does it sound so strange to me, Ukrainian fella? For instance, why "him" instead of "he". And, first of all, what does it mean? I even cannot translate it correctly.


title: Could you replace these words with simple words? "rent strike" and " mount".

text: The leader of the rent strike mounted the platform to deliver an effective philippic against the management. NB I should say I looked them up in dictionaries but still I have my doubts if the word "mount" refers to plan something. I also have my doubts if " rent strike" means protest against raising cost of renting houses, does it?


title: What's the origin of "flipping the bird"?

text: What is the origin/meaning of the phrase "flipping the bird"?


title: What's the meaning of "bitching"?

text: What's the meaning of "bitching" in the following sentence taken from references in 'tfd.com'? > December: I quit bitching with grateful thanks for all the good times, > things and friends God has provided me with this year.


title: What does "P.U." (in reference to stinkiness) stand for?

text: "What does {holding nose} P.U. mean?" my son asked me tonight. I told him I didn't know, and he laughed and said "It means _stinky_ , Mommy!" Very funny and well said, but it left me wondering. A search of Wikipedia and Etymology Online came up wanting and my etymological dictionaries are packed in boxes. What does this abbreviation stand for and why does it mean _stinky_?


title: Is there a better / correct term for the de facto usage of ‘ironic’?

text: The word ‘ironic’ is known to be quite frequently misused, to the point that some dictionaries have actually started accepting the de facto usage as another definition, usually calling it _situational irony_. Is there a better, more appropriate term for this construct?


title: Word for "obsession with reliving past mistakes"

text: I am looking for a word that is close in meaning to _nostalgia_ , but not so passive. Something that is compulsive. It should also be unambiguously negative. A bonus would be a connotation of anxiety. **Edit:** I am looking for a noun, like _nostalgia_ , that describes the state or emotion.


title: What does "Someone was wearing heavy black coats" mean?

text: * I came across a sentence "They were wearing heavy black coats" . I want to know what 'heavy' means here. Does it mean the coat was heavy ( maybe the materials used to make the coat are of high density to make it thick enough to keep warm) ? Or does it mean the color of the coat was very dark? And what about light grey jacet? Is it talking about the color or the weight ? THanks . * * *


title: What’s the opposite of “wider”?

text: What is the opposite of _wide_ and _wider_? For instance, is the corresponding opposite to sentence one below really sentence two?   1. The Ipad2 is **wider** than the iPad Air.   2. The iPad Air is **narrower** than the iPad2.  I ask because _narrower_ does not sound right to me.


title: Implicit "which is "

text: > A new study has shown that millions of pieces of junk **floating in space** > could be a big hazard for satellites orbiting Earth. Is there an implicit " _which is_ " in front of floating in space? Why is " _which is_ " not written?


title: What does "I can get behind that :)" mean when you suggest someone to compromise on an alternative option?

text: "How about we compromise and ... ? ;)" Answer: "I can get behind that :)"


title: What's it called when you're paid while the business is temporarily closed

text: I'm trying to find a word to describe `an individual whom is paid while the business they work in is temporarily closed.` Example: While a library is renovated, the staff are paid for the hours they would have worked. I've thought about "paid leave" and "paid time off" but it doesn't seem correct as leave would suggest the workers voluntarily took the time off, and the latter would suggest a vacation. The closest I've come to would be a "paid furlough". Any ideas?


title: "Café" vs. "coffee shop" in American English

text: When is _café_ used and when is _coffee shop_ used? Are there any differences? Which is more widespread?


title: Is it wrong to use "The Albatross is now on the sky"?

text: Is it wrong to use "The Albatross is now **on** the sky"? Is it like we should always say "The Albatross is now **in** the sky"? I would like to get an explanation for this. Thanks.