Forum name typo fix request - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: funkathustra
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: July 08, 2015, 07:04:31 am
content: Can Dave please fix the stupid plural/possessive typo in the name of this forum? My OCD kicks in hardcore whenever I click on the link.The plural of "FPGA" is "FPGAs", not "FPGA's" -- you NEVER pluralize a word or acronym or number by using an apostrophe.These are plural words/phrases:MicrocontrollersFPGAsThe 1960sThe KennedysThe JonesesSecretaries of StateThe only time you would add an apostrophe-s to "FPGA" is when it is a posessive: "The FPGA's SERDES module supports up to 1.5 Gbps operation."The only other use of an apostrophe is in contractions, like:"I can't stand him""The '60s""Several new 'duino development boards have hit the market recently..."Drives me nuts!</rant>

author: Psi
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 08, 2015, 07:18:17 am
content: <troll>Their's 11 different rule's on how to use apostrophe's which is 10 too many.Best to just use 's on everything i say</troll>

author: VEGETA
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 08, 2015, 07:37:14 am
content: yes he is correct. I hope it is corrected.

author: Jeroen3
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 08, 2015, 07:57:35 am
content: Nothing wrong with FPGA's in Dutch

author: Bassman59
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 08, 2015, 05:42:35 pm
content: Quote from: VEGETA on July 08, 2015, 07:37:14 amYup.

author: miguelvp
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 08, 2015, 09:56:20 pm
content: Didn't happen half a year agohttps://www.eevblog.com/forum/chat/microcontrollers-fpgas/msg551689/#msg551689It doesn't bother me a bit, maybe my OCD is not as pronounced as other's.

author: edavid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 08, 2015, 10:28:09 pm
content: Quote from: funkathustra on July 08, 2015, 07:04:31 am+1I also wish there were a moderator express lane for fixing spelling errors in thread subjects. Better yet, make me the spelling czar.

author: Scrts
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 09, 2015, 10:25:34 am
content: Guys, you have severe OCD

author: dr.diesel
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 09, 2015, 01:31:56 pm
content: Plus one for the, to, too, your, your're, apostrophe, who gives a shit.

author: edavid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 09, 2015, 02:54:00 pm
content: Quote from: AcHmed99 on July 09, 2015, 01:19:07 pmThe big deal is that there are people who will ignore what you write, if you don't express yourself in a reasonably literate way. For example, I just added you to my ignore list

author: mark03
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 09, 2015, 04:14:58 pm
content: Quote from: AcHmed99 on July 09, 2015, 01:19:07 pmAnyone forced to read vendor documentation in the course of doing their job (most of us on this forum?) should appreciate the importance of proper punctuation, grammar, and spelling. If data sheets, app notes, and ref guides were written anywhere near as well today as they were fifty years ago, my job would be a lot easier.ESL is a big issue, no doubt, and as a native English speaker barely conversant in one other language, believe me, I sympathize. OTOH, once an error is pointed out, it should be fixed. Good writing may not be a sign of intelligence, but poor writing will call your intelligence into question, just as others will judge you for slovenly dressing.

author: xrunner
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 09, 2015, 04:48:35 pm
content: Quote from: funkathustra on July 08, 2015, 07:04:31 amFirst of all, this particular part of the forum is called a "board". The Forum (which is the whole thing), consists ofboards, of which this is one of theboards. So I wouldn't criticize too much whoever typed in the title of this forumboardif you can't even understand what the parts of the forum are called.

author: dr.diesel
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 09, 2015, 05:29:37 pm
content: Quote from: edavid on July 09, 2015, 02:54:00 pmA big bunch of this forum is multinational, ignoring them cause they don't speak perfect english, is well, just being an asshole.

author: donotdespisethesnake
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 09, 2015, 06:20:15 pm
content: Quote from: funkathustra on July 08, 2015, 07:04:31 amUnless it ends in S, when suddenly its ok. Stupid rulez.Apostrophes are redundant anyway, its never a problem in speech. I've never heard anyway say 'sorry, do you mean "it's" or "its" ?'

author: VEGETA
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 10, 2015, 12:32:56 am
content: Quote from: Bassman59 on July 08, 2015, 05:42:35 pmlol"yes he is correct" >> "he" is the author of this thread."I hope it is corrected" >> "it" refers to the name of this board.

author: rs20
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 10, 2015, 01:15:30 am
content: Quote from: donotdespisethesnake on July 09, 2015, 06:20:15 pmIt's an interesting point, evidently some people read text as sounds, and then hear+interpret the words in their head, so they can deal with it.Me, on the other hand, if I read, e.g., "The oscilloscope displays the signal onit'sscreen", my brain reads it as "The oscilloscope displays the signal onit isscreen", and I kinda blank out and have to explicitly re-read the sentence. Obviously for my simplified example sentence it's not a big deal, but when it happens over and over again on longer sentences, it can really start to interrupt the flow and annoy me. It sucks to have grammatical incompetence by the author spoiling his/her content like this.I'm perfectly willing to accept the claim that this is a failing on my part; my brain is broken and overly sensitive to grammatical errors, like a C++ compiler saying "did you mean '->' instead of '.' ?". But I can't change that. Feel free to confuse "it's" with "its", but just know that you're antagonizing a fraction of the population that can't really help it. </first world problems>

author: DTJ
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 10, 2015, 07:47:02 am
content: I see quite a few people using the word 'forums'. Perhaps 'fora' would be more appropriate?

author: Jeroen3
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 10, 2015, 08:20:21 am
content: Forums is used by so many people that it has become an accepted plural. Language is dynamic.

author: xrunner
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 10, 2015, 11:04:51 am
content: I wish all these member's would stop complaining.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 10, 2015, 11:13:18 am
content: Quote from: edavid on July 09, 2015, 02:54:00 pmUnfortunately the smartest people are often the ones with the poorest communication skills.

author: edavid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 10, 2015, 02:20:33 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on July 10, 2015, 11:13:18 amI'd say that's wrong by definition, since communication skills are a large component of "smartness"...

author: miguelvp
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 10, 2015, 02:25:43 pm
content: Quote from: edavid on July 10, 2015, 02:20:33 pmActually, listening is a large component of "smartness"And that includes getting past the grammatical errors of others because if you only listen to the grammatically correct statements, then you are not getting the full picture.

author: edavid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 10, 2015, 02:39:49 pm
content: Quote from: miguelvp on July 10, 2015, 02:25:43 pmYes, but what is the reason for the speaker's errors? If it's just due to laziness or passive aggression (as some of the anti-grammatical posters here have expressed), I don't see a need to put my effort into decoding. If it's due to lack of language knowledge or a disability, sure, that should be considered.

author: miguelvp
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 10, 2015, 02:49:51 pm
content: It doesn't matter why, the more you filter information out, the less knowledge you obtain.And actually, knowledge is not the same as smart. Someone with communication problems can be smarter than someone that is not. Hawking comes to mind.You can't learn smart, you might be able to exercise it but not acquire it.

author: edavid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 10, 2015, 03:05:43 pm
content: Quote from: miguelvp on July 10, 2015, 02:49:51 pmThen I guess you read every post on this forum?QuoteI don't think Hawking ever said: "This is a technical forum as long as the meanning is clear whats the big deal." Hawking's papers are very carefully written.

author: miguelvp
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 10, 2015, 03:32:45 pm
content: I pretty much do read every post, doesn't everyone? But that's beside the point.Maybe a piece of knowledge that would help you is inside a badly written post or paper or blog, or even on an abbreviated text messages with a lot of LOLs and OMGs or even LOL's and OMG'sAs for Stephen Hawking, what I said is that he has communication problems. But regarding his papers, he uses assistants FWIW.Anyways, you can decide what you want to filter out based on grammar, others don't mind, and if you think someone with bad grammar has nothing to contribute, well, that's your problem not mine

author: Bassman59
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 10, 2015, 07:09:06 pm
content: Quote from: AcHmed99 on July 09, 2015, 01:19:07 pmI'm quite sure that your compiler will know what you mean when you screw up that annoying punctuation and syntax.

author: Mark Hennessy
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 10, 2015, 08:18:09 pm
content: To return to the original question, yes, there is no doubt that the apostrophe should be removed.I help to run a forum, and I know from experience that it takes all of 10 seconds to change board titles. Admittedly, I'm not using SMF, but if someone tells me that it's more difficult to do that within SMF, then that's simply yet another reasons why I'm glad I'm not using itSo, who do we speak to? Is Dave the only admin? Let's go straight to the source rather than go round in circles in threads that are easily missed by a busy support team - send him e-mail! Keep it polite and constructive, and I'm sure he'll oblige.Like I say, literally 10 seconds. That's really all it should take once the message has landed at the right person.

author: xrunner
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 10, 2015, 11:16:22 pm
content: The forum owner's are probably working on project's, schedule's, and tear-down's and don't have a lot of break's to help member's with such trivial request's ...

author: Psi
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 11, 2015, 12:50:34 am
content: The solution is to rewrite the English language so it makes sense.

author: Psi
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 11, 2015, 01:15:08 am
content: I tend to use commas whenever i want the person reading the text to add a pause, not necessarily where there should be one grammatically

author: c4757p
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 11, 2015, 02:35:35 am
content: ESL doesn't matter. The forum is managed by a native English speaker. Native English speakers who can't figure out things like apostrophes are justembarrassing.

author: amyk
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 11, 2015, 02:49:41 am
content: It appears to have been fixed. I couldn't stop seeing that extra apostrophe once this thread came into existence. Thanks.

author: JoeN
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 11, 2015, 08:10:31 pm
content: GODDAMN IT, YOU BROKE MY SCRIPT!

author: Andy Watson
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 11, 2015, 08:36:08 pm
content: Never mind. There's still a typo on the "Jobs" board description.

author: rs20
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 12, 2015, 01:22:19 am
content: Quote from: AcHmed99 on July 12, 2015, 01:14:16 amWooooooow, now that is holding a grudge. Yikes.

author: ez24
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 16, 2015, 01:37:22 am
content: Quote from: funkathustra on July 08, 2015, 07:04:31 amNo country flag's drive's me nut's so's we are even. ie you have no flag and I do not know where to put the 's (flunked this subject)Flunked as in a F in the 5th or 6th grade, and never learned where to put the damn " ' ", so I always' put them after the s

author: edavid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 16, 2015, 02:28:54 am
content: Quote from: blueskull on July 12, 2015, 01:30:40 amSpeaking of syntax errors, do you mean "inevitable", or is this a joke I didn't get

author: funkathustra
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: July 21, 2015, 08:50:26 am
content: First of all, thanks to Dave for addressing my request and fixing it.To the haters on this thread: my request had nothing to do with messages that people send back and forth on here -- I was only suggesting that the board's name (not "forum's name" -- thanks for the clarification, xrunner!) be spelled correctly.But there's an interesting discussion going on about writing quality -- why should we care? What if someone doesn't speak English as her first language? We're engineers, not poets, damnit! Do we really need to sound like John Updike when discussing how to double-buffer SERDES data on FPGA's?My problem with sloppy writing has nothing to do with pretentiousness or blind adherence to rules -- I've got no problem with people who "could care less" about grammar. And, if you want to start a sentence with a contraction, that's fine by me. And irregardless that your posts contain made-up words, I'll try to parse them, infer meaning, and reply accordingly.But when we're online, we're all writers -- and the more clearly we write, the better we'll be able to understand each other. I understand that writing well puts a slight amount of strain on your body compared to simply mashing the keys and hitting "Post" -- but I think it's well worth it.Case in point, from this very thread:Quote from: AcHmed99 on July 09, 2015, 01:19:07 pmSee what AcHmed99 did there? When I read that sentence for the first time, this is the meaning that I inferred: "I know that proper grammar is considered a sign of intelligence, but proper grammar could also be because English is not the person's first language, or because it's not the person's first pure laziness."It follows no logical train-of-thought.Before you say it, I know: I can step back, re-read the sentence a few times, and figure out that that AcHmed99 meant to say: "I know that proper grammar is considered to be a sign of intelligence, but for a lot of people, English is not their first language. And for many others -- myself included -- we're downright lazy."But why not just write that way in the first place?I don't mean to pick on AcHmed99, but that post perfectly illustrates my view: for some reason, as soon as people sit down in front of a computer, they just blurt out their stream-of-conscious thoughts, and then leave us all in the dust to try to parse the derailed-freight-train-of-thought logic. I've found that technical discussions are particularly unforgiving -- proper grammar helps remove ambiguity, which is always a good thing when talking about complex shit.I've never corrected someone's grammar on here (I'm sorry, but requesting that the official title of a board be spelled correctly is not the same thing as correcting bad grammar on someone's post), and I totally understand -- and admire -- people who come on here who don't speak English as a first language (I couldn't imagine going on a Japanese or Polish forum and trying to make sense of anything, so major props to you non-native English speakers!).But I think we could all be a little more clear when we communicate on here -- and I, for one, could learn some pith while I'm at it, as this post has gone far beyond the length I anticipated!

author: deephaven
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 21, 2015, 09:03:37 am
content: Is "--" valid punctuation?

author: ElektroQuark
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: July 21, 2015, 09:06:19 am
content: Thank you funkathustra!Non native English "speaker" here. Look at my signature.Thank you again.

author: mathsquid
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 21, 2015, 12:16:34 pm
content: Quote from: deephaven on July 21, 2015, 09:03:37 amYes. It's equivalent to a dash. Seehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dash#Encoding_and_keyboard_shortcuts.

author: deephaven
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 21, 2015, 12:19:45 pm
content: Quote from: mathsquid on July 21, 2015, 12:16:34 pmThat's something I've learnt today, thank you.

author: Bassman59
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 22, 2015, 11:41:24 pm
content: Quote from: mathsquid on July 21, 2015, 12:16:34 pmTo add even more pedantry to this thread, it's an en-dash, which is longer than the standard hyphen, but shorter than an em-dash (---).Clarification can be found atCMOS, an acronym which has a different meaning from the one with which we are all familiar!