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00:50
> Thus, you reduce the risk of any software changes by apprehending the possible cause.
http://ell.stackexchange.com/q/44797/3281
It's a bit strange choice of words: any software changes but the possible cause
(Not that I think it's ungrammatical, but my non-nativedar was alerted.)
01:36
> I used to run with them, and had great fun; we used to gallop all together round and round the field as hard as we could go. Sometimes we had rather rough play, for they would frequently bite and kick as well as gallop.
> –The Black Beauty (via ell.stackexchange.com/questions/44856/…)
> Sometimes we had rather rough play, for they would frequently bite and kick as well as gallop.
> Sometimes we had rather rough play, for they used to frequently bite and kick as well as gallop.
I think both alternatives are possible. I don't know why I like would better in this case. Most grammar references seem to have only warnings against some uses of would in place of used to, but none against used to in place of would.
02:00
Paradigm reads "pair-a-dime", but I also remember another reading "pa-ra-dij-m", just for the spelling. :-)
Word of the day: globetrotter
02:18
I guess would is better since it reflects better their willingness to bite and kick.
In 200_success's answer: "Used to implies that the biting and kicking happened habitually in the past, but was no longer going on." I think they made a great point!
It explains my intuitive preference quite well.
Oh, so used to would occur before we had rather rough play..
That paragraph starts with used to. To me, it gives the feeling of reminiscent.
The narrator (I the horse) is recalling his past.
nods
But taken as a standalone sentence, would really this sentence be wrong: "Sometimes we had rather rough play, for they used to frequently bite and kick as well as gallop."
To me, the had and the used to seem concurrent.
By the way, good morning, @DamkerngT. (0:
@CopperKettle Good morning! (I have a problem with my browser (again)!)
02:28
I see. Too many tabs to keep tabs on! (0:
@CopperKettle In a small corner of my mind, I still think used to is possible.
@CopperKettle Yep!
(It crashed not just twice, but thrice, after your nods!)
Partly, I think my old HDD is developing some bad sectors.
Besides my DRAM memory is a little problematic, which I fixed the problem by overclocking my mainboard.
That's too bad.. I have an ancient HDD bit it is blissfully okay
Lucky you!
02:32
(0:
There's a line in a poem in which I think there's a grammar glitch
"Till Doom espy my towers and scatter them" - why not "espies" and "scatters", I wonder..
"Doom" should be singular, I guess..
Indeed. Perhaps subjunctive.
Hmm... perhaps..
She also has "Music my rampart, and my only one." (not "Music is my rampart" or Music's my rampart)
But I guess it is okay to omit in poetry
Dropping be sounds okay to me, but maybe it's because Thai has no be. :-)
(0:
In Russian, there's such thing as "zero copula", marked by a dash
"Music -- my rampart, and my only one"
02:37
(a dash instead of "is")
Yes, nice, used for expressive purposes.
I think I've seen some examples of English poems drop copula-be before.
Amateur translators very often carry it out into their English translation.
Like "Moscow - the capital of Russia. Its population is 10 mn people."
Oh, I think if they used commas instead, it would be just fine.
Hmm... "Its population" might need to be reworded.
02:40
Reworded?
"It has a 10 million population", probably. I'm sleepy..
"The population of Moscow, the capital of Russia, is 10 mn people."
Sorry, I meant rephrase.
Yes, I get you.
But the use of the "zero copula" in Russian is for introductions.
"Vladimir - idiot".
(or descriptions)
That's why you would often see it used in the beginning of Wikipedia articles written by Russians.
"Vyatka - a town in the Vladimir Oblast" etc
02:43
How can Thai have no be?
English: The sun is bright.
Thai: [sun] [bright]
English: Today is a good day.
Thai: [this-day] [day] [good]
:D
English: The sun was bright.
Thai: ?
Thai: [sun] [เคย] [bright]
@DamkerngT. This is okay Russian too, but it would be considered a "zero copula" I guess.
เคย is a word that suggests something happened in the past.
@CopperKettle nods
02:46
@DamkerngT. But it is not an independent word, it has no meaning like "was"?
@CopperKettle It's not just for the verb be. It can be used for do and other verbs, too.
Oh, I see.
English: They went there before.
Thai: [they] [เคย] [go] [there] [before].
It's hard to translate this word!
02:48
When I put this เคย word in Google and click "images" I get images of fish (0:
However, [not] [เคย] (or ไม่เคย) is usually translated to "never" in English.
@CopperKettle Oh, that's a different เคย. That's a noun เคย. :D
@DamkerngT. Oh, I see. (0:
Maybe [เคย] could be approximately translated to "ever".
English: They went there before.
Thai: [they] [ever] [go] [there] [before].
English: The sun was bright.
Thai: [sun] [used to] [bright]
Ah, I know now why I can use "used to" rather well. :D
02:52
(0:
I think in narratives in the past in Thai, we can simply drop the word [เคย], because it's clear in the context that the time frame is in the past.
English: Yesterday, the sun was bright.
Thai: [yesterday] [sun] [bright]
Oh, I see. No such thing in Russian.
Adding [เคย] would do no harm, but it's kinda adding a bit of emphasis.
By the way, เคย the noun is quite delicious! :D
02:57
(0:
Some kind of shrimp?
Google says "marine shrimp"
Yep. They make good sauce. Very popular in the south.
03:09
@CopperKettle I take it that in Russian, to refer to "Moscow - the capital of Russia" in the past, the word for "was" must be added.
@DamkerngT. Yes: "Moscow was the capital of Russia"
But if you put is in "Moscow is the capital of Russia" it would sound like something spoken in about AD 1613
(0:
the present-tense есть is rarely used.
03:13
nods
It's used in "There is.." sentences like "There is a city named Moscow" : "Есть такой город, называется Москва"
Oh, Есть is at the beginning of the sentence.
It's also used in the military service as order acknowledgment. "Scale that wall, soldier!" - "Есть!" (Affirmative! or "Yes Sir!")
Laters!
Interesting! See you later!
03:50
> Which one is correct? (A query to a wholesaler)
1) How many iPhone 5s do you have?
2) How many iPhone 5s' do you have?
3) How many iPhone 5ss do you have?
4) How many iPhone 5s's do you have?
 
2 hours later…
06:11
Good morning, @snailboat!
06:46
@snailboat I think, her hands are hot but I read the first sentence in a novel so I asked.
@DamkerngT. (3) seems correct, but it doesn't look good!
Anonymous
07:38
@Freddy Using apostrophes in plurals is okay sometimes.
Anonymous
@user62015 Was it a complete sentence?
Anonymous
@CopperKettle In English, be is largely necessary to bear tense
Anonymous
In Japanese, for example, adjectives can be predicates without anything like be
But I guess there should be a verb meaning "to exist" in Japanese and in Thai
Anonymous
"Exist" is supposed to be mii in Thai
Anonymous
07:44
Japanese does have verbs of existence
Anonymous
They aren't used directly as copulae, though
Anonymous
For that matter, be in English is grammaticalized more often than not and doesn't usually really mean 'exist'
I wonder if predicative nominals in Japanese need a verb.
Anonymous
They have a copula
Anonymous
07:46
But the copula is not a verb
Anonymous
In some other languages, nouns can serve as predicates directly
" A verb that is a copula is sometimes called a copulative or copular verb."
In linguistics, a copula (plural: copulas or copulae) is a word used to link the subject of a sentence with a predicate (a subject complement), such as the word is in the sentence "The sky is blue." The word copula derives from the Latin noun for a "link" or "tie" that connects two different things. A copula is often a verb or a verb-like word, though this is not universally the case. A verb that is a copula is sometimes called a copulative or copular verb. In English primary education grammar courses, a copula is often called a linking verb. In other languages, copulas show more resemblances to...
Anonymous
In English, the copula be is clearly a verb (I say, despite knowing there is a minority view in which be is not considered a true verb)
@snailboat That's right! มี = have, exist, there is, there was
Anonymous
07:48
@DamkerngT. Japanese verbs of existence are also used to mean have! That's a common pattern for expressing possession cross-language
It seems so!
Anonymous
Sometimes people try to translate Japanese to English literally and come up with things like "For me, there is a dream" instead of "I have a dream"
Interesting!
Yes, interesting.. I bet Russian poses no such problem.
Anonymous
So มี is ม + ◌ี
07:53
@user62015 It could've been a direct speech sentence, something said in a colloquial manner.
Anonymous
That looks similar to ◌ิ
@snailboat They have the same sound /i/, ◌ิ is the short vowel one, and ◌ี is the long vowel one.
> กาลครั้งหนึ่งนานมาแล้ว มีเด็กชายคนหนึ่งชื่อมานะ
Google Translate: Once Upon a Time A boy named Mana
Google Translate drops มี!
It's supposed to be: Once upon a time, there was a boy named Mana.
Anonymous
An existential construction!
Anonymous
Oh, I can't use this Thai keyboard very well at all! :-)
07:59
@snailboat I guess you can type Thai faster than I can type kanji. :-)
Anonymous
Hee
Anonymous
I don't know enough of the Thai alphabet yet
The one in Google Translate is friendly enough, I think. (I use it sometimes when I have only the mouse.)
Anonymous
I'm trying to type pen and khuu
Ah, I see.
Anonymous
08:01
I'm not sure which vowel the second word is supposed to use
Conventionally, we are taught that is = เป็น / อยู่ / คือ.
Anonymous
อยู่
Anonymous
คือ
เป็น (reads "pen", approx. meaning: "be") / อยู่ (reads "yu", approx. meaning: "stay") / คือ (reads "kheu", appox. meaning: "be")
Anonymous
I put those into Google Translate and it came up with ある, ある, and すなわち! :-)
08:03
Google Translate for ある, ある, and すなわち: It is, there is, and that is!
Anonymous
Hah
Anonymous
I'm . . . somewhat impressed it came up with different translations for ある and ある
Me too!
Anonymous
すなわち is used if you're restating something, like, "In other words," or "i.e.,"
@snailboat Were they on the spot?
08:05
Oh, when I tried to translate ある, ある, and すなわち into Thai, it gave me มันเป็นสิ่งที่มีและที่เป็น. Sounds like a good sentence!
Anonymous
@CopperKettle Well, as you may have noticed, ある and ある are the same word!
oh
ある: "Is there"
Anonymous
ある (aru) is an verb of inanimate existence
Anonymous
But it's been grammaticalized and is used in all sorts of constructions without its 'exist' meaning
Anonymous
08:08
It would take a long time to explain all the ways it can be used
I see
I wonder if "long gone" is an adjective phrase
Anonymous
Seems like. There's an adjectival head, gone, and an adverb modifying it, long
Thanks!
(I like มันเป็นสิ่งที่มีและที่เป็น. It sounds poetic! ~ "It is there exists and there is.")
Anonymous
08:11
CGEL p.1586: "Plurals with 's: An apostrophe may be used to separate the plural suffix from the base with letters, numbers (notably dates), symbols, abbreviations, and words used metalinguistically: (i) p's and q's, 1960's, &'s, Ph.D.'s, if's and but's (ii) She got four A's and two B's. This practice is less common than it used to be; with dates and abbreviations ending in an upper case letter, the form without the apostrophe is now more usual: in the 1960s, two candidates with Ph.D.s."
2
@DamkerngT. It's several words? I see no spaces.
Ah, I guess that this is about iPhone 5s's.
@CopperKettle We don't use spaces between words. We use spaces the way English uses commas.
@DamkerngT. oh, never knew that!
Breaking the words down: มัน เป็น สิ่ง ที่ มี และ ที่ เป็น
08:15
I remember 1960s, but for iPhone 5s, I think "iPhone 5ss" looks really weird.
Anonymous
Yeah, that's no good.
Anonymous
iPhone 5s's would be better, although I suspect many people would rewrite to avoid the plural
Anonymous
"The iPhone 5s is..."
I recall U.S.S. Essess
Anonymous
"I have more than iPhone 5s"
08:16
@CopperKettle Oh, that sounds familiar.
Anonymous
@CopperKettle Someone has a sense of humor :-)
Hot Shots! is a 1991 comedy spoof which starred Charlie Sheen, Cary Elwes, Valeria Golino, Lloyd Bridges, Jon Cryer, Kevin Dunn, Kristy Swanson, and Bill Irwin. It was directed by Jim Abrahams, co-director of Airplane!, and was written by Abrahams and Pat Proft. It was followed by a sequel, Hot Shots! Part Deux. == Plot summary == The film begins at Flemner Air Base 20 years prior. A pilot named Leland "Buzz" Harley (Bill Irwin) loses control of his plane and ejects, leaving his co-pilot Dominic "Mailman" Farnum (Ryan Stiles) to crash alone; although Mailman survives, he's mistaken for a deer owing...
A-ha! That makes sense!
Anonymous
So Thai does have something kind of like be.
Anonymous
08:17
Not the same, though.
Anonymous
But then, when it comes to thingies like that, they seldom are
Anonymous
Even across different varieties of English, be varies significantly
nods -- The real usage is overlapping with have, too, and the three words (เป็น / อยู่ / คือ) have their own usage.
Hmm... Looks like it's quite challenging for me to explain how to use them!
Anonymous
Japanese does have verbs that directly mean 'exist', like sonzai-suru
Anonymous
Of course, that's a much weightier verb than aru :-)
08:20
aru sounds nice and concise. :-)
Anonymous
aru can mean sonzai-suru 'exists', taizai-suru 'stays', shoyuu-suru 'possesses'
Anonymous
But it's very often used as part of a copular construction de aru, which is usually contracted to da
Anonymous
Which has polite forms like desu (<? de arimasu)
Ah, desu again!
Anonymous
da and desu don't inflect the way verbs do
08:23
It seems like desu is probably the most common word in Japanese.
Anonymous
And they can't appear as main verbs
Anonymous
@DamkerngT. It seems like no is
Anonymous
Although in the Tsukuba Web Corpus, iru is
Anonymous
That's an aspectual marker, like English -ing
Oh, they count it as word.
Anonymous
There are many different ways of dividing things into words
Anonymous
However, I think it makes the most sense to consider subsidiaries like iru separate words because other words can intervene
Anonymous
> 少々手間どっていますが ← the focus particle intervenes between て and いる
Anonymous
08:26
On the other hand, I'm considering います an inflected form of いる here, because ます can't be separated from い
Anonymous
In Japanese computational linguistics, it's common to use multiple definitions of word
Anonymous
And for "short words", you'd find ます listed as a separate word!
Anonymous
I think it's just more convenient for processing
Anonymous
08:28
Needless to say, there is no single definition of "word" that works all the time
Anonymous
Linguists sometimes write wakatteiru as though it's a single word
Oh, this time, -iru is absorbed into the word.
4
Q: pronunciations: copy

Listenever The copy machine is broken. (related audios are linked) The linked audios have three persons’ pronunciation for ‘copy.’ Which are the materials for TOEIC test that is consisted of three national pronunciations: American, British, and Australian. But I don’t acknowledge which is which. Can yo...

Hey it's got a bounty!
I think it's interesting to see different speakers giving different opinions on the dialects in the sample.
Anonymous
It's probably better to call them accents rather than dialects
Oh, right.
I think I thought of dialects because of this comment:
None of them are Australian! Australians would call it a photocopier instead. ;) — curiousdannii Nov 19 '14 at 7:32
Anonymous
Araucaria makes a good point
Anonymous
08:33
@DamkerngT. Hee
Anonymous
Eep
Anonymous
I started playing sample 1
Anonymous
Then after they stopped talking, I clicked play on sample 2
Anonymous
But sample 1 was still repeating!
Anonymous
So there was this kind of creepy chorus of people telling me the copy machine was broken
08:34
!
LOL
Anonymous
The TOEIC doesn't actually ask you to identify which of these is from which place, do they??
I guess not.
Anonymous
I doubt most native speakers could do that
Anonymous
#1 is American! :-)
Definitely!
(Though I'm not sure which accent.)
I'm rather sure that #3 is BrE.
Anonymous
08:38
Sure, I guess AmE AuE BrE
Given the three choices, I'd guess #2 is AuE too. But if I didn't know the choice, I might guess #2 is also some BrE accent.
Anonymous
There's a lot of variety in BrE, though, so I'd be hard-pressed to say that #2 isn't BrE
I play all the three at once. This sounds funny!
Anonymous
Ahh! :-)
Anonymous
It's scary!
08:40
Exactly!
I feel like my copy machine must be really broken!
Phew! (I stopped it.)
Anonymous
Maybe your copy machine is working now!
Hehe!
Hmm... I think my HDD is really the problem. I pointed my TEMP/TMP directories to another drive and Firefox runs much more smoothly now.
I will give it a day or two before I can be sure.
Anonymous
Could it be that that directory was really large, and the new one is starting from scratch so it's faster?
@snailboat I deleted all the files I could in the old TEMP dir, and Firefox still kept crashing.
Anonymous
D'oh!
08:50
Note: My old HDD is 6-7yo Hitachi. The other HDD I'm using for the TEMP dir is about 3yo Western.
Anonymous
I don't know the brands of hard drives I have.
Anonymous
dmesg does, though. It says Hitachi and Western Digital
Anonymous
That makes us hard drive buddies!
Ah, we use the same brands!
Hello, my HDD buddy!
09:13
1
Q: a length of vs the length of

ZoieIn patent English, I sometimes encounter 'a length of the surface', 'a length of the surface' or 'the length of the surface,' for example. I think that you use 'a length of' when you are talking about a specific unit of a measurement. And you use 'a length of' to indicate 'a length of an object(...

This is a great question.
At first, I thought "a length of the surface" is very likely ungrammatical.
Anonymous
It's at the very least unusual
nods -- And there are only a few patents that use that.
collecting evidence...
Anonymous
But it does appear to be grammatical
Anonymous
However, I wouldn't be surprised if it turned out these examples were non-native English and that the authors intended to express something else
Anonymous
Although you could refer to (say) a rectangle as having two lengths, it's not something people often do
09:16
I found 6 patents (compared to 97 hits for the version).
@snailboat That's what I thought.
But not all of the patents I found were written by non-native speakers.
Anonymous
It could also occur as part of a larger phrase
> US3659713 METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR RECOVERING IMPURITIES FROM THE SURFACE OF A LIQUID
Inventor: Frederick N. Mueller, Dallas, Tex.
Impurities are removed from the surface of a liquid by impinging an elongated fluid stream, preferably a gaseous stream, along a length of the surface and moving he impinging stream relative to the surface causing the impurities to move and concentrate in advance of the impinging action of the stream, and thereafter isolating the concentrated mass of impurities.
Anonymous
That seems okay
> US005627630A DEVELOPING APPARATUS HAVING A TONER SUPPORTING ROLLER WITH AN INNER LAYER AND SURFACE LAYER
Inventors: Iwao Matsumae. Tokyo; Yoshiaki Tanaka; Shigekazu Enoki. both of
Kawasaki; Hiroshi Hosokawa. Yokohama. all of Japan
Moreover. a length of the surface layer may be equal to or larger than a length of the inner layer in a longitudinal direction.
Anonymous
It looks like I may have misread
Anonymous
09:22
I thought we were discussing "a length of a surface" as well! :-)
Anonymous
That would also be grammatical, but less common
Nope. It's only all about "a length of the surface".
Anonymous
Still, I think "a length of the surface" isn't especially common-sounding
Anonymous
But it seems grammatical
Anonymous
So luckily my mistake doesn't change anything! :-)
Anonymous
09:23
I think I see now
> US6580802 Waved/corrugated and stepped surface design for speaker box, and method of standardization of speaker box assemblies for television of different screen sizes
Inventors: Ryoji Naito, Ada Saulai Choi
The speaker cover has an elliptical frustum surface having steps that create an increasing circumference at fixed intervals along a length of the speaker box, and includes grooves that run along the length of the speaker box, perpendicular to the steps. The speaker baffle has corrugations formed along a length of the surface.
Anonymous
"A length" in these examples could just mean "a stretch, a span"
Anonymous
Does that seem to make sense?
Probably. (Reviewing the three patents...)
They are all heavily technical.
Anonymous
09:28
I think that when I see "length of the surface", I automatically think of the other meaning, though, "the linear extent or measurement of something from end to end, usually being the longest dimension or, for something fixed, the longest horizontal dimension"
Anonymous
So I didn't think of the alternative until I saw it in context
I think your suggestion makes sense!
Anonymous
Contextualization is hard!
I still doubt "along a length of the speaker box".
Anonymous
It's probably not something I've ever seen before, but it seems possible
09:36
Macmillan: length 3. [countable] a piece of something that is long and thin - a length of pipe/rope/string
hello
I'm happy that Macmillan has it, too.
@JavaFan Hello!
Hi JavaFan!
can someone corrects me if the following English statements
?
I had a nice friend in my past, we was joking together , spending our times in making noise
"we were"
09:38
"our time"
"The Old English þreo "three" formed þrid "thrid" and þreotene "thriteen". These underwent metathesis to forms which became Modern English third and thirteen." (the letter R moved ahead)
okay two mistakes
I'd recommend this site for proofreading, @JavaFan.
Anonymous
@CopperKettle Yep!
Neat (0:
Anonymous
09:41
Wikipedia has a number of other examples of metathesis in English, if you're interested
Yes, I'm reading Wikipedia's article at the moment
Anonymous
The question of ten versus teen is interesting, too
Started readin up terminology for "long gone", and winded up god knows where..
Anonymous
Thirteen is literally three-ten
Anonymous
But so is thirty!
09:42
hm
but it's easy to distinguish them
Anonymous
Ten, -teen and -ty all literally mean "ten" :-)
Anonymous
@CopperKettle Yes!
In Russian, 13 is tri-na-dzat' and 30 is tri-dzat'
Anonymous
Also interesting are eleven and twelve, which don't fit the series
Anonymous
Thir-teen through nine-teen are clearly composed of numerals plus -teen
09:44
I think a length of the surface is uncommon, and probably will need appropriate context. In any case, this could be the case that a "length" (of the surface) means a "piece" of some parts of the mentioned surface, not the length of the surface. See Macmillan length "3. [countable] a piece of something that is long and thin - a length of pipe/rope/string". — Damkerng T. 47 secs ago
13 is "three-on-ten" and 30 is "three-ten"
Anonymous
@DamkerngT. Yay
Anonymous
@CopperKettle Ah, I see!
@CopperKettle Makes perfect sense!
Anonymous
09:46
Japanese numbers are fairly regular. 13 is "ten-three" and 30 is "three-ten"
Anonymous
French 13 and 30 are both "three-ten"
Anonymous
Treize < tre-decim and trente < tri-ginta
Anonymous
Japanese 13 and 30 are jū-saɴ and saɴ-jū
Anonymous
Very transparent! :-)
09:48
(0:
In Thai, 13 สิบสาม is like "three and ten" and 30 สามสิบ is like "ten ten ten". :-)
Anonymous
Spanish 13 and 30 are just like French
Anonymous
@DamkerngT. Oh, I like that!
Anonymous
I like French 70s and 80s
09:49
I guess that it's not very different from Japanese. :-)
@snailboat curious
Anonymous
In French, you count like 67, 68, 69, sixty-ten, sixty-(and)-eleven, sixty-twelve, sixty-thirteen...
Eh? sixty-twelve?!
That's really interesting!
Anonymous
And when you get to the 80s, you say four-twenties, four-twenties-one, four-twenties-two...
interesting!
Oh, that's quite unique, I think!
09:51
like "four-score years ago.." in Lincoln's speech
Anonymous
You could say that French doesn't have dedicated words for 70 and 80. It wouldn't really be true, because all of these can be viewed as lexical compounds, and they're all in the vocabulary of any French speaker, not put together on the fly
Anonymous
But when you translate very literally it seems to be the case :-)
nods
@CopperKettle Oh, I learned a new word! Thanks!
@DamkerngT. You're welcome!
Anonymous
So in the 70s and 80s French numbers are quite different from Spanish numbers
09:53
I guess that 70s and 80s in Spanish are regular.
Anonymous
Yes, that's right
Anonymous
Setenta 'seven-ten' and ochenta 'eight-ten'
Anonymous
They would be septante and huitante in French, but they were lost (why? I don't know)
Anonymous
I think those two words are retained in some dialects

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