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16:00
@ΜετάEd that too
@ΜετάEd how can I not see your messages?
user19161
@Noah Er, you should consider using the right arrow.
@WillHunting means?
user19161
@Noah Use the arrow on the right to reply, otherwise nobody knows what you are replying to.
oh, okay
@WillHunting thanks
@WillHunting but I cant see ΜετάEd's messages anymore?
@Robusto It was all I could do to turn it over, to demonstrate my point.
The not-so-rectangular triangle apologises in my name.
user19161
16:03
@Noah What do you mean you can't see? Did you accidentally "ignore" him?
@ΜετάEd That too
@WillHunting I think so
user19161
@Noah Then just change the setting now.
How?
user19161
@Noah Go to your chat profile and look for "preferences".
Okay
user19161
16:05
It's time SE awards me the chat-education badge.
Okay, got it thanks
Fixed it
user19161
Educating chat users since 9000 years ago
@WillHunting I dont trust that
@WillHunting I have a feeling- everything I type seems wrong to me...
user19161
@Noah You made the same mistake again...
user19161
Sometimes I have no idea what you are replying to...
user19161
16:07
Arrow, arrow, arrow!
okay
@WillHunting I dont trust that
user19161
@Noah I think you must be a purely-keyboard user.
@Robusto ... No! ... the "addiction" was only the premise of the answer I posted! ... please, see the specific-my-meta-question on this issue ... — Xavier Vidal Hernández 7 mins ago
@WillHunting I think I am more a mouser than a keyboarder
He has a specific-my-meta question on addiction?
user19161
16:09
@Robusto The ... are getting excessive in his comments.
@simchona You should use your powers sporadically for actual problems. That comment is so well below the problem threshold and there are so many more comments closer to the threshold that you'd be wasting multiple lifetimes of deleting comments before you got to XHV's.
He still doesn't understand the issue.
@Robusto Why are you so after this poor fella?
@Noah I'm not after him. I just think he is amusing.
user19161
@Noah I am having difficulty trying to divine XVH's personality.
16:11
@Robusto You're making the mistake of thinking his words are supposed to be coherent even with a replacement of each word.
@WillHunting you meant define?
user19161
@Noah No, you may look up a dictionary of your choice first.
no...he's means that XVH is so divine.
user19161
@Mitch Let's not confuse the ark owner.
you know, s'wonderful
16:12
You see, it's funny when people who repeatedly make egregious gaffes in English present themselves as authorities on the language.
s'magical
... hello @Andrew! ... it need a good sense of humor to understand your comment! Sorry, but I have still not developed it! ... — Xavier Vidal Hernández 2 mins ago
@WillHunting is that like a cow orker?
How many ... ellipses ... can we fit ... in one sentence?
Mahl ... zeit!
16:13
@simchona 9000
user19161
@Noah OVER 9000.
@simchona (n^2 + n -2)/2 where n is the length in chars of the sentence
user19161
It must be at least 9001 then.
@WillHunting I experience no such difficulty at all.
@WillHunting Nope, that number is not your copyright...
user19161
16:14
@Cerberus So can you summarize in one short sentence then?
No: I just don't try.
@WillHunting Unless yu have patented it recently...
user19161
@Noah I see you are finally using the arrow after OVER 9000 years.
Argh. No more ellipses in chat.
@Mitch Fix a comment, and the site will be better. Fix a user, and the site will stay better.
16:16
I can summarize his -behavior- easily but not his personality. His behavior is educated but incoherent. It could come from a personality disorder or from just a poor command of the meaning of English words. In his attempt at fluency he's picking English words from his lexicon, to fit a word for word translation from Spanish.
The real knee slapper
@ΜετάEd set a man on fire and he'll burn for the rest of his life.
@Mitch Love that guy.
@Mitch Agree.
16:17
@simchona argh....I live for ellipses... much more breathing space.
@ΜετάEd that's a guy? I picked it up from the local kids.
@Mitch But seriously, maybe @simchona is gonna fix a user.
@Mitch How do you know he is spanish?
@ΜετάEd I can neuter him?
4
@ΜετάEd but it has the smell of both caprice and directed conspiracy against one user.
user19161
I was just looking up the correct spacing to use for ellipses. It is SO complicated.
16:19
@Noah I don't know, I just guess from his name.
@Mitch “Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set fire to him and he's warm for the rest of his life.” ―Terry Pratchett
@Mitch Don't let it fool you
@ΜετάEd excellent...trickle down from the best.
@ΜετάEd And you seem to be getting better at it...
@simchona he ain't a native speaker, so there's that.
16:20
@Mitch Whatever's good for the site, I say. Generally (hypothetically?) speaking, it's not capricious or directed behavior if you'd do the same to any user who is creating a problem.
@Mitch He could be from another planet. It's not good to guess from someones name
user19161
@Noah Did you take any drugs?
user19161
@ΜετάEd I can't believe that is the actual quote.
@WillHunting why?
user19161
@Noah Never mind.
16:23
@WillHunting I guess you are right
@WillHunting I dont know what I am typing...
@ΜετάEd Sure, but I don't think Simchona is (or should be) willing to take the path I mentioned of deleting the copious comments of much more annoying and irrelevant comments first, before deleting XVH's.
@Mitch And I say once you attract the attention of a mod you're fair game. Because if you've broken "X", maybe you have a habit of breaking things that way and your history should be scrutinized to see if there's a "Y" and a "Z". If you think there are more annoying comments out there by more annoying users, flag them for @simchona and turn 'er loose.
I find it personally annoying when someone dislikes something I do and then starts scrutinizing everything else I do, but I'm only annoyed because I disagree with them. The scrutiny itself seems perfectly reasonable.
That's complex.
@Mitch It's simple. It's like "follow the money". If you see bad actions, be sure to check out the actor.
So you'd prefer to be annoyed?
16:32
Another word for it is "user repair". It's good for the site.
..by having people target you personally?
Really, really good, because when you set a user on the right track, they not only do better work on the site, but they also influence others to do the same.
(if you are behaving out of line)
I'm just saying it's perfectly reasonable. I'm not saying I'd enjoy it.
ok
I see your point. But...
16:34
@ΜετάEd Dont pee on my shoes and tell me it's raining :)
there's little perceptible difference to the user between constructive directed action (deleting/modifying lots of their work in a targeted fashion) and singling that person out for intrusive modification.
@Noah what if it's raining pee?
@Mitch I dont think that's possible unless you have been to a pee raining party ;)
frat initiation hazing
havent got there yet...
Will tell you when I get there...
Alright guys gotta watch some TV
See you
@Mitch You were the one who pointed out I had posted a comment as an answer on the Iron Ring Event question. I have no idea why you scrutinized that but you were right. It was a minor annoyance but it was also an opportunity for me to correct a mistake on my part. And wouldn't you naturally think to check a few more answers of mine to see if I had been making a habit of it?
16:39
bye
@Noah Someone have a gun to your head? :P
@ΜετάEd touche. I saw that question on the main list and visited it. I saw that reg had deleted a bad answer. while looking through that I saw yours. You're right, I didn't then go look for others of your answers because I already know them to be of good quality. And yes, when XVH posts his usual stuff, I tend to go to his profile to see his activity and see if he has a lot more crazy stuff I haven't seen.
(I didn't scrutinize yours, but I do tend to do that to XVH, both by general reputation)
@Mitch It's true that reputation is a factor in who I scrutinize as well. And that's how it should be. By the way, by "reputation" I don't mean I look at a person's rep numbers: I mean my opinion of the person.
This sort of directed scrutiny is actually built in to the site: the "review" option deliberately casts scrutiny on new users. Is that unfair?
@Noah I think @simchona deleted my comment that @Noah is quoting here. irony
@ΜετάEd I didn't, actually.
@simchona Well, whoever did deserves a star for it. Credit where credit is due. That interaction really belonged in chat.
16:53
@ΜετάEd Yes, that's the way I was using 'reputation'.
I'd like to make more use of chat instead of comments. Will any @ mention of a user here in chat ping them? Or do they have to be a mod or a chat regular?
I am not sure, but I think they need to be regulars.
But given that I (and probably I guess you and Simchona and others likewise) scrutinize directly the 'problem' people, I would still tend to give the benefit of the doubt. So he's incoherent to me (and most everybody else). He does have -some- good answers (at least upvoted ones). What about the zillions of meh answers? Are we going to track them down and admonish them to have more snappy prose?
That is, they need to have visited chat recently. I'm not entirely sure, though.
Mods can superping anyone.
17:03
Mods can also bend space and time to make toast burn shortly after it has been removed from the toaster. Some moderator abilities are, frankly, designed purely for griefing.
4
So we're Chuck Norris?
@ΜετάEd I'm pretty sure that was me.
There was a whole argument I deleted, as I recall.
@ΜετάEd They have to have visited the room before, I think. Or at least they have to have a chat account.
Recently?
And hi.
Hi.
I don't think it has to be a recent visit, but there's something about priority for names in common, for the partial pings, or something. Maybe. waves hands vaguely
@KitFox Yes, there was. It would be nice if I could manually direct a comment thread to chat when it's obvious that it'll be chatty. That way it can be preserved but doesn't have to distract from the question (or the answer).
17:12
@ΜετάEd ...you mean like the "Do you want to move this to chat?" prompt?
@KitFox Yes. That comes much too late sometimes.
@KitFox Oh, yes, there was something about that too. brains grinding
@ΜετάEd Yeah. That conversation was probably just best started over anyway.
How come Turkish gitme can be translated as "go", but also as "do not go"?
@Cerberus I regret that I am unable to assist you in this matter. Care for some toffee? Or taffy?
17:21
Is taffy like nougat?
In that case, I will gladly accept your offering.
> Yes, you're right: gitme means "dont go" and it's also "the going" (a verbal noun). You can distinguish them only from context.
@Cerberus Just be thankful that there isn't a stoplight color that has both meanings. Oh, wait, there is one: red!
Only for some people.
Green means go, yellow means go faster, red means go like hell.
That's the American colour system, probably.
What, you don't have those colors in Dutchland?
I wonder how many more calouries BrE users burn typing the extra "u" in words like "colour" and "odour" ...
17:23
But seriously: we Dutchmen drive through red lights when there are no other cars in sight and it seems perfectly safe, and pedestrians and cyclists do so all the time, whenever they can; in Germany, however, people are noticeable more law abiding in this regard.
@Cerberus Da herrscht Ordnung!
Na klar.
And Italians are just colour blind.
Nah. Italians just don't bother to look at traffic lights.
Oh, it could be that.
Like the "deaf" cat that doesn't obey one's commands.
Hi.
Have a minute @Kit?
17:27
@Gigili Yes.
@Cerberus Yes. It's a corollary of the rule, "Never attribute to malice what may be adequately explained by handicap, ignorance or stupidity."
@KitFox When someone professes something, doesn't that mean they are lying?
@Gigili It usually means that they are vigorously confessing something that they have previously hidden. Sort of.
Oh. Wait. It depends on context.
First thing that comes to mind is "professing your love"
Umm, I was confused because the definition says " to claim that something is true or correct, especially when it is not".
17:31
If I profess to be profoundly upset that that Peterson guy was convicted of killing his wife, that "profess" would imply that I was pretending that I was upset.
@Robusto Haha yes.
But if I profess my love for you, that implies that I am desperately in love with you and have finally pronounced it.
Yeah, it can mean "declare".
So Gigi, do you have any context?
It is more than declare, really.
It means what rappers mean when they say "represent" :)
17:33
And to lie means to give a false impression, I see no difference between the two.
@KitFox Hawt. Also true.
@KitFox Stronger, but not qualitatively so, don't you think?
@Gigili You can profess an untruth as easily as a truth. That has nothing to do with it.
@Cerberus Huh? Is it quantitatively stronger?
17:34
@KitFox Yeah, I mean as in a strong declaration.
@Cerberus Those are different senses and should not be inline. There should be a profess1 and a profess2, I think.
I think Dictionary.com gives all the right definitions.
@KitFox You are or you are pretending that you are?
@Cerberus Umm, no.
@Robusto Well, they are etymologically the same word...?
17:35
@Gigili It is a fervent declaration of something. Like Rob said, it may or may not be a true thing. That depends on context.
@Cerberus Your dictionary is just silly.
@Robusto How is this better?
It puts the most likely meaning first.
0
Q: Is a smiley at the end of a sentence like a period?

chamaHow do you treat an emoticon at the end of a sentence? He probably caught his cold from the kids at school :( Should there be a period after the :(, or should I go straight into the next sentence (capitalizing the next word?)

@Gigili Could be either, but, in the classical example, the love is true.
Wow.
17:36
@Robusto Fair enough.
OK, thank you.
In fact, absent context I would assume no deceit.
Exactly.
And confessing strongly implies truthfulness.
You almost have to read it as "pretended to confess" if a character in a book "confessed" something that was a lie.
That is not the case with "professed".
Otherwise all professors would be liars. Hey, wait a minute!
4 mins ago, by Robusto
0
Q: Is a smiley at the end of a sentence like a period?

chamaHow do you treat an emoticon at the end of a sentence? He probably caught his cold from the kids at school :( Should there be a period after the :(, or should I go straight into the next sentence (capitalizing the next word?)

Seriously? This is worthy of ELU?
Doubtful.
I guess very informal English is still English?
17:45
I answered it.
I find emoticons generally distasteful and the irony of asking how to punctuate a sentence that includes them does not escape me, but well, I think it's legit.
0
Q: Intrumentation / Instrument

essarhane BrahimWhich is correct to say? 1) Instrumentation Engineer or Instrument Engineer 2) Instrumentation Technician or Instrument Technician

This, however, is NARQ.
@KitFox I thought it went quite well, considering what I had to work with. Restarted it could have been a whole lot worse.
@ΜετάEd nods I'll grant you that. It's all water under the bridge anyhow.
So I've started writing the last part of my story for Tuesday.
water under the dam, like pissing in a violin
17:54
I have a feeling it's going to get really long.
@KitFox I don't think the "profess" has a connotation of lying. It's the context that does it. If I say "Kit was profoundly upset", I am reporting the upset as fact. If I say "Kit professed to be profoundly upset", I am reporting the declaration as fact, which has implications. I could make the same implication by saying "Kit declared herself to be profoundly upset".
@KitFox Agreed.
@ΜετάEd I agree.
@Cerberus How come English 'I understand' sometimes means 'I don't understand but I want to end this meeting now' but sometimes 'I understand the rules fully, but I will never follow them except at the point of a gun'
But the contrast with confess is clear: where you can profess a false bit of information, you can't normally confess false information.
unless you're a good liar.
18:01
Of course anything is possible in the right context, but you know what I mean.
'confess' sounds like you've been tortured
So I think that's why the dictionaries emphasise the possibility that the profession is false.
'profess' sounds like you're pontificating
@Mitch Because humans are fickle?
@Mitch Yeah.
There is more to it than just the possibility or impossibility of falsehood.
@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 What's it about?
18:03
@Gigili It's a writer's chat exercise. It's about two neighbouring families getting to know each other and stuff.
@Cerberus becasue ostensible literal meanings of a word/phrase aren't the only things one gets from an utterance. I don't know Turkish, it could be that it has two literal meanings, the opposite of each other. Or it could just be a common trope that it works in both megative and positive sense in their culture.
@Cerberus I think it is a pragmatic 'implicature' (contextual inference)
Help, help, I'm being professed!
@Mitch No, this appears to be a hard-wired pair of homonymic suffixes, unless I am mistaken.
As in, perhaps -me can be a negative and an infinitive suffix.
@simchona professes you kindly
@Mitch But I am not 100 % sure.
@Cerberus OK. could be. I'm sure English has something closer to that, like autoantonyms, e.g.
An auto-antonym (sometimes spelled autantonym), or contronym (also spelled contranym), is a word with a homograph (a word of the same spelling) that is also an antonym (a word with the opposite meaning). Variant names include antagonym, Janus word (after the Roman god), enantiodrome, self-antonym, antilogy, addad (Arabic, singular didd). It is a word with multiple meanings, one of which is defined as the reverse of one of its other meanings. This phenomenon is also called "enantionymy" or "antilogy." Origins The terms "autantonym" and "contronym" were originally coined by Joseph T. ...
Yes, all these things happen.
18:08
@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Ah interesting, and there's no word limit?
@Cerberus grice's maxims of conversation
Irony alone is enough.
Implicature is a technical term in the pragmatics subfield of linguistics, coined by H. P. Grice, which refers to what is suggested in an utterance, even though neither expressed nor strictly implied (that is, entailed) by the utterance. For example, the sentence "Mary had a baby and got married" strongly suggests that Mary had the baby before the wedding, but the sentence would still be strictly true if Mary had her baby after she got married. Further, if we add the qualification "— not necessarily in that order" to the original sentence, then the implicature is cancelled even though...
Yes, yes.
But none of that seemed to be the case with gitme.
@Gigili No, but the first two parts had clear descriptions: "a couple discussing the new neighbour's weird possessions", "the couple meeting the neighbours at some kind of social event"
18:10
48 mins ago, by Cerberus
> Yes, you're right: gitme means "dont go" and it's also "the going" (a verbal noun). You can distinguish them only from context.
but you're saying that the particular example in Turkish the suffix could go either way pos or neg.
Not exactly.
They aren't opposites.
ok. but it's something.
Infinitive v. negated imperative.
Apparently.
It seems to be more like inflammable.
If you know what I mean.
@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Oh, it was last decade's exercise. I see you've done nothing in my absence.
18:12
@Gigili well, we've done more... we just never finished that one.
I see.
@XavierVidalHernández: How can you be sure that you've understood their contribution correctly and can apply it correctly? From the details it seems that reference (about animacy) just doesn't apply in the OP's case. I think you also have difficulty understanding English, not just the literal meaning but also the intention. Read slowly, and then hesitate and think before replying (and maybe don't reply at all). — Mitch 47 secs ago
18:30
Nice edit!
Ouch.
18:46
If a question is favorited by one user only, that's the OP. There's no doubt about it.
@Gigili Or a balrog. They are evil like that.
@Mitch I would like to delete all the comments on this question (just the question).
...and I did.
@KitFox You are bold and stern, Your Foxness.
I'm getting mighty tired of the perpetuation of long comment answers.
Plus discussion.
@sevensideddie Thanks for the notice. I wanted to make sure you knew that the poster did not have sufficient rep to comment.
19:03
@Mitch +1 to you, sir
@Zairja ... the OED give both, but 'eerie' is clearly more common ... I hope this help! — Xavier Vidal Hernández 1 hour ago
Also, can we have a discussion about comments like this?
... general reference! -1 ... — Xavier Vidal Hernández 2 hours ago
@simchona I'll stick my oar in.
On the one hand, yes, it tells an OP why there's a downvote. But, on the other, it doesn't tell the OP how to improve.
What's the question?
A pointer to the faq is always good.
Should the comments exist, especially on longer threads of "discussion"?
I'm going to get stoned for this, but I don't think they're constructive.
19:07
@simchona woo! party!! oh...
2
Comments are for indicating constructively what is wrong with a post, and for asking for more information.
The appropriate way to respond to a comment is to edit the post.
Or ask a clarifying question or whatever.
Or tell a joke. Or a personal attack. Whatever.
Especially a joke.
All that being said, English.SE does have a collective wit and sense of humor, and I don't think we should sanitize the fuck out of it.
Exactly!
> SQL Server, SQL, SSRS, and Access
This just screams "I don't know squat about actual programming."
19:10
If we look humourless and stuff, we won't attract an expert audience, whatever that may be.
@Cerberus But with a lot of restraint. Too much of that is just going to scroll the Q&A.
The comment I posted, though, is neither witty nor constructive
6 mins ago, by simchona
... general reference! -1 ... — Xavier Vidal Hernández 2 hours ago
@ΜετάEd Scroll the Q&A?
It's constructive. Just not as constructive as it could be.
@simchona I may agree with you there.
19:11
@Cerberus Yeah, add a lot of junk on that question page.
> Too much of that is just going to scroll the Q&A.
I don't understand this.
"That" = humour?
Ohh I get it.
Too many humorous comments will clutter up the page.
@Cerberus That.
Yes.
@tchrist Do you know the name of a decent algorithm to score a fuzzy match between two strings?
Your middle-with-object use of "scroll" confused me. Or whatever we should call it.
sighs A friggin PhD applying for a coding job. Just what I need. rolls eyes
That bad?
19:15
@Cerberus Thee shalt it call lordly, and that presently.
As thou sayest.
What is the correct form?
Sayst?
Dammit. I always get the familiar wrong.
@ΜετάEd That is (perhaps, or not) better.
But wait.
Thee shalt it?
Isn't it thou shalt or it shall?
19:27
@KitFox raises hand
Thou sayest. Thou shalt.
If you want the unsubstantiated opinion of an amateur :-)
@cornbreadninja You want a coding job, or you are a PhD with a coding job?
BTW, he's not a PhD in any sort of even vaguely related discipline.
But it means he knows how to apply himself. He might be really good.
Maybe. I can't say that I was impressed by his resume, despite his wealth of experience.
He did a good job of being vague.
Maybe he wasn't sure what the job would entail. Could be a bad thing.
19:31
@KitFox the first one. :D
> I've worked with clients to determine their needs and to design database, user interfaces, and programs to meet their needs.
Sounds like boilerplate to me.
ah, 'database', the uncountable noun. :P
@cornbreadninja I can email you the link to the job opening if you want.
@KitFox I'm rather far away. Does that matter?
@cornbreadninja It's lovely here in the dead of winter.
I think they'd want you on site.
Personally, I don't see why that's necessary.
19:32
Darn.
Bother! I was about to apply too!
And you'd have to sort of report to me.
I would love reporting to you!
I'm a seasoned reporter.
> I designed a database of [something] for [some group]. I programmed a web-based user interface and imported existing data from multiple sources. The database is being used to [do these things].
OK...what languages? What back-end? How many users? What kinds of data sources?
19:35
Questions you can ask him when/if you interview him.
Sounds like a resume.
It specifies right in the job description what languages we're looking for.
And what database systems.
So he must have used different ones.
So my assumption is already that he has done these things, or he ought not to be applying.
Umm, this is kind of too broad. Rhetorical ellipsis and punctuation ellipsis are not the same thing.
19:38
So we have two different tags? Is that what you are suggesting?
Do other punctuation marks have their own tags?
I dunno.
But if I am looking for examples of one, I don't really want to get examples of the other.
True dat.
Haha, so I'm not the only person who finds that particular person irritating then?
No, you're not.
19:49
Far from it.
Interesting. Chat messages have a history.
You only just noticed?
Yes. I figured that removed messages were removed for a reason.
But you're a mod.
Moderators can see removed messages, right?
19:51
I take it you can view the history?
@cornbreadninja So? I'm busy overexerting my mod powers on the main site to within an inch of its life.
@simchona I didn't mean to point paws. See my next message. :)
Paws for effect

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