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Have to vs must

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  • Sander RosselS Sander Rossel

    I'm writing some stuff in Word and Word thinks it's necessary to improve my writing. Mostly, that's true, but it has one suggestion that I followed until I found out it's not right. Every time I write "have to" or some form of it, Word says "use 'must' for concise language." Now, as I understand it, that's perfectly fine in American English, but not so much in British English where "have to" indicates an external incentive while "must" comes from an internal incentive. For example, "I have to use the Azure cloud at work" (dictated by your boss) and "I must work out more often" (something you wish to do because it's healthy). Of course, if your doctor or wife tells you to work out more often "or else" it becomes "I have to work out more often." Anyway, I must now change "must" to "have to" or my readers will make fun of me for not understanding the English language :sigh: The issue is pretty much un-Googleable, but does anyone know how I can turn off this very specific "have to" to "must" rule?

    Best, Sander sanderrossel.com Migrating Applications to the Cloud with Azure arrgh.js - Bringing LINQ to JavaScript Object-Oriented Programming in C# Succinctly

    D Offline
    D Offline
    Dan Neely
    wrote on last edited by
    #33

    Have you checked which version of English is driving the spelling/grammar checkers? If you're right to be blaming it on a US vs UK difference I'm wondering if you ended up with the American rules turned on by mistake. If so: Options - Language - Office authoring languages and proofing. Change from English (United States) to English (United Kingdom).

    Did you ever see history portrayed as an old man with a wise brow and pulseless heart, weighing all things in the balance of reason? Is not rather the genius of history like an eternal, imploring maiden, full of fire, with a burning heart and flaming soul, humanly warm and humanly beautiful? --Zachris Topelius Training a telescope on one’s own belly button will only reveal lint. You like that? You go right on staring at it. I prefer looking at galaxies. -- Sarah Hoyt

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    • M Mark_Wallace

      Be very careful with "have to", because it implies a higher power. Good examples: - You have to obey the speed limit (because the law says so). - You have to do your homework (because your teacher says so). - You have to charge your phone battery (because the laws of Physics say so). - You have to fill in fields marked with asterisks (because the form won't work if you don't). Only one bad example is needed: - You have to do what I want (because I am a higher power, and am far more important than you). If you are not a higher power, the reaction will be along the lines of "He's an arrogant little shite, that one!" i.e. don't tell customers (or anyone else) that they "have to" do something that's for your benefit. "Must", as you say, implies "for your benefit": - You must book your flight early (because it fills up pretty quickly). However, we also have a "gentle" imperative, which can be used for either case, but is less pushy: - You need to get that finished by the end of the week (because I/you/we/they need it). But if you want to be really co-operative, go reflexive: - I need you to help me peeling these grapes.

      I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!

      K Offline
      K Offline
      kalberts
      wrote on last edited by
      #34

      These kinds of concern are important. But, they are highly language and culture dependent. For this discussion, we certainly must (/have to) treat British and American English as distinct languages. Even within the Norwegian language, native to about 5 mill people, you see large variations among dialects. The are cases of word pairs that swaps meanings from one dialect to the other ("brød" is "bread" in one dialect, "cake" in another, while "kake" is the other way around, same with "kirsebær" and "moreller" - which is the sweet cherry, which is the sour kind). Sometimes, a single word in one dialect takes a sentence to represent in other dialects: In Trøndelag, where I live now, I could ask if you know some person, and you might answer "Æ vætt'a 'n, ja", which says "I know who he is, but I have never have any personal contact with him". In my own south Norway dialect, there is no single term (literally: "I know of him") that expresses that kind of relationship. One of my language books has illustration of where different European languages (as determined by gallups from speakers of those languages) sets the limits between yellow and orange, red, green, blue, violet, ... The differences are surprisingly large, even within Europe (which you might think is reasonably homogenous from a cultural point of view). Another case study in the same book is personal relations: How close is a "friend"? A "buddy"? An "acquaintance"? The dictionary provides translations, but on closer inspection it turns out that, say, the Norwegian terms "venn", "kamerat" and "bekjent" cover significantly different sectors of the social scale than the Amerian terms. When I first visited the USA as a teenager, of course I was familiar with "girlfriend"s and "boyfriend"s, and was confused when my host family referred to my buddies as my boyfriends. When I asked, they explained that the boyfriend of a girl is quite different from a boyfriend of a boy. But, I asked, what do you then call it when two boys are sweethearts? That shocked my Catholic, Midwestern host family deeply. The reaction was like Russian: We do not have such perverts in our society! It wasn't phrased exactly that way, but the meaning was the same. So I learned not to take lightly on taking words from one cultural context to another.

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      • M Mark_Wallace

        Ravi Bhavnani wrote:

        IMHO

        Well, I'm glad it's a humble opinion, because it's incorrect. I think almost everyone here is well aware that verbosity is not a sign of professionalism.

        I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!

        K Offline
        K Offline
        kalberts
        wrote on last edited by
        #35

        Verbosity depens on which verbs (and nouns, and adjectives) are used. If they are of "current buzzword" kind, they could signify "professionalism". Noone would arrest you today for using the term "agile" in statements where it could just as well have been left out. Same with "open source". Same with a lot of buzzwords. They contribute nothing to the informtion value, except telling that the author knows which are the current buzzwords. Also, an important aspect of professionalism is precision. If you tell that "I am required to" use a given tool, then there is an explicitly stated requirement. If you tell "I must" use some tool, it could be that anything else is too slow on given hardware, that your colleagues are not familiar with other tools, that alternatives are too expensive, ... it could be anything, maybe formal and maybe not. If there is a stated requirement (from the customer, or from the management) to use a given tool, then that is essential. You can't blur it, smear it out, by reducing it to a diffuse "must".

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        • Sander RosselS Sander Rossel

          I'm writing some stuff in Word and Word thinks it's necessary to improve my writing. Mostly, that's true, but it has one suggestion that I followed until I found out it's not right. Every time I write "have to" or some form of it, Word says "use 'must' for concise language." Now, as I understand it, that's perfectly fine in American English, but not so much in British English where "have to" indicates an external incentive while "must" comes from an internal incentive. For example, "I have to use the Azure cloud at work" (dictated by your boss) and "I must work out more often" (something you wish to do because it's healthy). Of course, if your doctor or wife tells you to work out more often "or else" it becomes "I have to work out more often." Anyway, I must now change "must" to "have to" or my readers will make fun of me for not understanding the English language :sigh: The issue is pretty much un-Googleable, but does anyone know how I can turn off this very specific "have to" to "must" rule?

          Best, Sander sanderrossel.com Migrating Applications to the Cloud with Azure arrgh.js - Bringing LINQ to JavaScript Object-Oriented Programming in C# Succinctly

          W Offline
          W Offline
          W Balboos GHB
          wrote on last edited by
          #36

          There are other considerations whereby, aside for nuance of source (internal vs. external) they are just not interchangeable.

          • I do not have to go to work vs. I do not must go to work ?
          • What about a context such as "Must I?" vs. "Do I have to?", both of which are suggesting an external source.

          Other breakage of these rules could be constructed but I prefer, if at all possible, writing as I speak (excessive commas and all).

          Ravings en masse^

          "The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein

          "If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010

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          • K kalberts

            Verbosity depens on which verbs (and nouns, and adjectives) are used. If they are of "current buzzword" kind, they could signify "professionalism". Noone would arrest you today for using the term "agile" in statements where it could just as well have been left out. Same with "open source". Same with a lot of buzzwords. They contribute nothing to the informtion value, except telling that the author knows which are the current buzzwords. Also, an important aspect of professionalism is precision. If you tell that "I am required to" use a given tool, then there is an explicitly stated requirement. If you tell "I must" use some tool, it could be that anything else is too slow on given hardware, that your colleagues are not familiar with other tools, that alternatives are too expensive, ... it could be anything, maybe formal and maybe not. If there is a stated requirement (from the customer, or from the management) to use a given tool, then that is essential. You can't blur it, smear it out, by reducing it to a diffuse "must".

            R Offline
            R Offline
            Ravi Bhavnani
            wrote on last edited by
            #37

            Well put. :thumbsup: /ravi

            My new year resolution: 2048 x 1536 Home | Articles | My .NET bits | Freeware ravib(at)ravib(dot)com

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            • D dandy72

              I have to use the Azure cloud at work
              I am required to use the Azure cloud at work

              To me, both suggest a sense of disgust in being made/forced to use Azure against one's wishes. :-) Whereas "...we're using Azure cloud at work" is as neutral a statement as can be, IMNSHO...but the tone of voice used when saying this out loud would indicate what you think of that situation. That might be lost when written down, but that could be a good thing...

              R Offline
              R Offline
              Ravi Bhavnani
              wrote on last edited by
              #38

              dandy72 wrote:

              To me, both suggest a sense of disgust in being made/forced to use Azure against one's wishes.

              :laugh: /ravi

              My new year resolution: 2048 x 1536 Home | Articles | My .NET bits | Freeware ravib(at)ravib(dot)com

              1 Reply Last reply
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              • K kalberts

                Verbosity depens on which verbs (and nouns, and adjectives) are used. If they are of "current buzzword" kind, they could signify "professionalism". Noone would arrest you today for using the term "agile" in statements where it could just as well have been left out. Same with "open source". Same with a lot of buzzwords. They contribute nothing to the informtion value, except telling that the author knows which are the current buzzwords. Also, an important aspect of professionalism is precision. If you tell that "I am required to" use a given tool, then there is an explicitly stated requirement. If you tell "I must" use some tool, it could be that anything else is too slow on given hardware, that your colleagues are not familiar with other tools, that alternatives are too expensive, ... it could be anything, maybe formal and maybe not. If there is a stated requirement (from the customer, or from the management) to use a given tool, then that is essential. You can't blur it, smear it out, by reducing it to a diffuse "must".

                M Offline
                M Offline
                Mark_Wallace
                wrote on last edited by
                #39

                If you say "I have to use whatever", then it is clear that it is imposed on you by a higher power. Verbosity for the sake of it is not a sign of professionalism; it's a sign of self-importance. Clear, precise language is professional; trying to sound cool or important isn't.

                I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!

                1 Reply Last reply
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                • D dandy72

                  Interesting examples. I and a couple of coworkers do support for our software (answering email when we have time and such). I'm not a native English speaker; my coworkers are, but I always go out of my way in my responses to customers to discuss "the problem", whereas my coworkers might use "your problem". I've always thought "your problem" had a rather strong undertone suggesting a customer was having problems because of his own doing...whereas "the problem" is more neutral. I've mentioned it to my coworkers, but they don't see it that way at all. I'm concluded maybe it's just me and my French background (in French, "ton probleme" is very informal and infers "you're the only one seeing that"), but I still avoid using "your problem" in correspondence with customers...

                  M Offline
                  M Offline
                  Mark_Wallace
                  wrote on last edited by
                  #40

                  Well, tell your cow-orkers that an expert has said that they have to say it your way. I'd be horrified to see support messages insultingly talking of "your problem" to customers, as if it were their fault.

                  I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!

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                  • K kalberts

                    Even professional writers make the same mistake: Pamela McCorduck: Machines Who Think[^]

                    M Offline
                    M Offline
                    Mark_Wallace
                    wrote on last edited by
                    #41

                    I've got to be really careful, here, because even I'm not above Skitt's Law, but book titles are like headlines, so she's either anthropomorphising computers as an attention grabber, or to press the "smart device" aspect.  Probably the former.

                    I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!

                    1 Reply Last reply
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                    • K kalberts

                      These kinds of concern are important. But, they are highly language and culture dependent. For this discussion, we certainly must (/have to) treat British and American English as distinct languages. Even within the Norwegian language, native to about 5 mill people, you see large variations among dialects. The are cases of word pairs that swaps meanings from one dialect to the other ("brød" is "bread" in one dialect, "cake" in another, while "kake" is the other way around, same with "kirsebær" and "moreller" - which is the sweet cherry, which is the sour kind). Sometimes, a single word in one dialect takes a sentence to represent in other dialects: In Trøndelag, where I live now, I could ask if you know some person, and you might answer "Æ vætt'a 'n, ja", which says "I know who he is, but I have never have any personal contact with him". In my own south Norway dialect, there is no single term (literally: "I know of him") that expresses that kind of relationship. One of my language books has illustration of where different European languages (as determined by gallups from speakers of those languages) sets the limits between yellow and orange, red, green, blue, violet, ... The differences are surprisingly large, even within Europe (which you might think is reasonably homogenous from a cultural point of view). Another case study in the same book is personal relations: How close is a "friend"? A "buddy"? An "acquaintance"? The dictionary provides translations, but on closer inspection it turns out that, say, the Norwegian terms "venn", "kamerat" and "bekjent" cover significantly different sectors of the social scale than the Amerian terms. When I first visited the USA as a teenager, of course I was familiar with "girlfriend"s and "boyfriend"s, and was confused when my host family referred to my buddies as my boyfriends. When I asked, they explained that the boyfriend of a girl is quite different from a boyfriend of a boy. But, I asked, what do you then call it when two boys are sweethearts? That shocked my Catholic, Midwestern host family deeply. The reaction was like Russian: We do not have such perverts in our society! It wasn't phrased exactly that way, but the meaning was the same. So I learned not to take lightly on taking words from one cultural context to another.

                      M Offline
                      M Offline
                      Mark_Wallace
                      wrote on last edited by
                      #42

                      No argument here.  Things like the partial role reversal of "horrible" and "terrible" in English and US English are what I use to highlight the problem (English "I feel terrible" = US English "I feel horrible", but the nuance is wrong if you say them in the wrong place). Here, have some practice with perfect English[^]. The only major English/US English difference in the have to/need to/must phrases, though, is that US English tends to use "have got to" in place of "have to" more frequently, because US English has more of an emphasis on "got" being used for unwanted or negative things.

                      I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!

                      1 Reply Last reply
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                      • L Lost User

                        would/could autocorrect not be set alter ss to ß for you? (I don't have DE language pack to test)

                        after many otherwise intelligent sounding suggestions that achieved nothing the nice folks at Technet said the only solution was to low level format my hard disk then reinstall my signature. Sadly, this still didn't fix the issue!

                        S Offline
                        S Offline
                        Stefan_Lang
                        wrote on last edited by
                        #43

                        It does, but it shouldn't.

                        GOTOs are a bit like wire coat hangers: they tend to breed in the darkness, such that where there once were few, eventually there are many, and the program's architecture collapses beneath them. (Fran Poretto)

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                        • L Lost User

                          It gets worse in case you use this with "not" :laugh:

                          It does not solve my Problem, but it answers my question

                          S Offline
                          S Offline
                          Stefan_Lang
                          wrote on last edited by
                          #44

                          The interesting thing with 'not' is that in case of 'must', 'not' does not apply to 'must', but the thing it is referring to. E. g. in 'You must not do' the 'not' applies to 'do', not 'must' Whereas in case of 'have to', using 'not' results in a logical negation of 'have to': 'You don't have to' means the same as 'Its not true that you have to' Therefore you could say that in case you want to forbid something, you should always use 'must' and 'not', because 'have to' and 'not' doesn't express the same. Unless, of course, you choose to be precise on what to negate: 'You have to not do' would work syntactically and semantically. But I don't think I've ever seen or heard such a phrase in english. ;)

                          GOTOs are a bit like wire coat hangers: they tend to breed in the darkness, such that where there once were few, eventually there are many, and the program's architecture collapses beneath them. (Fran Poretto)

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                          • K Kaladin

                            Does changing your language to English (U.K.) not work? (Click on the language down on the status bar.)

                            S Offline
                            S Offline
                            Stefan_Lang
                            wrote on last edited by
                            #45

                            That's what I thought, but when I checked the list of languages, there was only one selection for English - no English(UK) or similar. MSDN didn't indicate it exists either.

                            GOTOs are a bit like wire coat hangers: they tend to breed in the darkness, such that where there once were few, eventually there are many, and the program's architecture collapses beneath them. (Fran Poretto)

                            K 1 Reply Last reply
                            0
                            • D dandy72

                              Interesting examples. I and a couple of coworkers do support for our software (answering email when we have time and such). I'm not a native English speaker; my coworkers are, but I always go out of my way in my responses to customers to discuss "the problem", whereas my coworkers might use "your problem". I've always thought "your problem" had a rather strong undertone suggesting a customer was having problems because of his own doing...whereas "the problem" is more neutral. I've mentioned it to my coworkers, but they don't see it that way at all. I'm concluded maybe it's just me and my French background (in French, "ton probleme" is very informal and infers "you're the only one seeing that"), but I still avoid using "your problem" in correspondence with customers...

                              S Offline
                              S Offline
                              Stefan_Lang
                              wrote on last edited by
                              #46

                              Good point. As a german I'd see it the same as you do. 'Your' implies that it's not the same for 'me'. Moreover, when a client reports a problem, and they have a maintenance contract, then it becomes 'our problem' too! That said, assuming you're talking about your software, it may suffer from many problems, so you still might want to say 'your problem' in order to clarify that you're talking about the problem of the client, rather than your problem to get all those bugs fixed, or whatever ;)

                              GOTOs are a bit like wire coat hangers: they tend to breed in the darkness, such that where there once were few, eventually there are many, and the program's architecture collapses beneath them. (Fran Poretto)

                              1 Reply Last reply
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                              • S Stefan_Lang

                                The interesting thing with 'not' is that in case of 'must', 'not' does not apply to 'must', but the thing it is referring to. E. g. in 'You must not do' the 'not' applies to 'do', not 'must' Whereas in case of 'have to', using 'not' results in a logical negation of 'have to': 'You don't have to' means the same as 'Its not true that you have to' Therefore you could say that in case you want to forbid something, you should always use 'must' and 'not', because 'have to' and 'not' doesn't express the same. Unless, of course, you choose to be precise on what to negate: 'You have to not do' would work syntactically and semantically. But I don't think I've ever seen or heard such a phrase in english. ;)

                                GOTOs are a bit like wire coat hangers: they tend to breed in the darkness, such that where there once were few, eventually there are many, and the program's architecture collapses beneath them. (Fran Poretto)

                                K Offline
                                K Offline
                                kalberts
                                wrote on last edited by
                                #47

                                In Norwegian, it depends on where you put the stress: You must not do it ("Du må ikke gjøre det") vs. You must not do it ("Du må ikke gjøre det") - I guess the difference in meaning is approximately the same in English as in Norwegian. In writing, highlighting with italics, underlining or boldface may, for a variety of reasons be undesirable, so you may be missing a way to indicate your intetion. We have other cases similar to your example. You need not do it ("Du trenger ikke gjøre det") would never be considered a negation of "do it", but of "need" (so it behaves differently from "must"). Moving on to "can", you can have a whole series of meanings depending on the stress, and the "not" ("Du kan [ikke] gjøre det"): You can climb that wall. (maybe the others can't) You can climb that wall (if you just do your best) You can climb that wall (wow! I didn't know that) You can not climb that wall (you are not old enough) You can not climb that wall (stop pretending that you can) You can not climb that wall (I do not allow you to do it) You can not climb that wall (that would be just crazy) and so on. (Depending on context, the interpretation may be somewhat different.) I have met immigrants who have learned to speak Norwegian almost completely free of accent, but they reveal themselves as non-native speakers by not mastering the meaning of all stress patterns, or by the word order: Two alternatives may both be valid, but with somewhat different meanings, often when "not" is involved: I am not planning to go to London, vs. I am planning not to go to London. I heard Vera Henriksen, author of Viking age novels and prominent translator of old Norse litterature to modern Norwegian, talk about the problems of translating the poetry: The Norse language (like modern German) made use of seveal cases, i.e. inflected forms to indicate e.g. the role of an actor. We have got a few traces of it left: He hit him, or Him he hit. In the Norse poetry, you have great freedom in the word order, and the poetic rythm depends on it. But in a direct translation to modern Norwegian, the same word order is illegal, meaningless or has a different meaning. If you reorder it according to modern grammatical rules, the rythm is completely ruined. It takes a skilled author to do an honest translation, rather than to re-invent the text!

                                S 1 Reply Last reply
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                                • M Mark_Wallace

                                  Well, tell your cow-orkers that an expert has said that they have to say it your way. I'd be horrified to see support messages insultingly talking of "your problem" to customers, as if it were their fault.

                                  I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!

                                  K Offline
                                  K Offline
                                  kalberts
                                  wrote on last edited by
                                  #48

                                  I was working in a team where one guy was born of a scottish mother (but he had grown up in Norway), and one Norwegian lady who had for thirty years been working as a top level secretary of international French companies with a high reputation. The American in the team once remarked to me that you could easily hear that Ellen is not a native English speaker: She speaks (/writes) perfect English! Robert, a (semi-)native English speaker, makes those small slips and grammatical errors "natural" for a native speaker. Not perfect, the way Ellen spoke. Then, for the question of what is "perfect": The team with Robert and Ellen also included an English lady, the American lady and an Australian guy - all grown up with English as their primary language. I was going to give a presentation in English, and was unsure about my choice of preposition in one of the slides, so I asked the English lady. No, no - that is not the right one, you must write ...". The Australian overheard that, but didn't accept Linda's correction, he made a different suggestion. That made the American lady stand up: Don't listen to Linda or Alex, it should be ... (unfortunately, I can't remember the different proposals). The three went into a verbal dogfight, all of insisting that the other two proposals were just wrong. The only thing they could agree on is that my first suggestion coudn't be used. I just let them fight (neither of them ever gave in), but silently selected the proposal from the English lady, as the company at that time officially did their documentation in British English.

                                  M 1 Reply Last reply
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                                  • Sander RosselS Sander Rossel

                                    I'm writing some stuff in Word and Word thinks it's necessary to improve my writing. Mostly, that's true, but it has one suggestion that I followed until I found out it's not right. Every time I write "have to" or some form of it, Word says "use 'must' for concise language." Now, as I understand it, that's perfectly fine in American English, but not so much in British English where "have to" indicates an external incentive while "must" comes from an internal incentive. For example, "I have to use the Azure cloud at work" (dictated by your boss) and "I must work out more often" (something you wish to do because it's healthy). Of course, if your doctor or wife tells you to work out more often "or else" it becomes "I have to work out more often." Anyway, I must now change "must" to "have to" or my readers will make fun of me for not understanding the English language :sigh: The issue is pretty much un-Googleable, but does anyone know how I can turn off this very specific "have to" to "must" rule?

                                    Best, Sander sanderrossel.com Migrating Applications to the Cloud with Azure arrgh.js - Bringing LINQ to JavaScript Object-Oriented Programming in C# Succinctly

                                    J Offline
                                    J Offline
                                    jsc42
                                    wrote on last edited by
                                    #49

                                    I admit that I haven't read through all of the replies so if someone else has made the same comment as I am about to make, then I apologise. Look at almost any of the RFC for the Internet standards (sorry, memory has gone it's something like IETF). They start with a section about the use of words like SHOULD, CAN and MUST. It is a good staring point. Re your samples

                                    "I have to use the Azure cloud at work"

                                    , I agree; but for

                                    "I must work out more often"

                                    I'd have suggested

                                    "I ought to work out more often"

                                    or

                                    "I should work out more often"

                                    to indicate that it is something that the general consensus is that there is pressure on you to do it but you can refuse.

                                    K 1 Reply Last reply
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                                    • K kalberts

                                      I was working in a team where one guy was born of a scottish mother (but he had grown up in Norway), and one Norwegian lady who had for thirty years been working as a top level secretary of international French companies with a high reputation. The American in the team once remarked to me that you could easily hear that Ellen is not a native English speaker: She speaks (/writes) perfect English! Robert, a (semi-)native English speaker, makes those small slips and grammatical errors "natural" for a native speaker. Not perfect, the way Ellen spoke. Then, for the question of what is "perfect": The team with Robert and Ellen also included an English lady, the American lady and an Australian guy - all grown up with English as their primary language. I was going to give a presentation in English, and was unsure about my choice of preposition in one of the slides, so I asked the English lady. No, no - that is not the right one, you must write ...". The Australian overheard that, but didn't accept Linda's correction, he made a different suggestion. That made the American lady stand up: Don't listen to Linda or Alex, it should be ... (unfortunately, I can't remember the different proposals). The three went into a verbal dogfight, all of insisting that the other two proposals were just wrong. The only thing they could agree on is that my first suggestion coudn't be used. I just let them fight (neither of them ever gave in), but silently selected the proposal from the English lady, as the company at that time officially did their documentation in British English.

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                                      Mark_Wallace
                                      wrote on last edited by
                                      #50

                                      So pretty much a normal day, then. :laugh:

                                      I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!

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                                      • K kalberts

                                        In Norwegian, it depends on where you put the stress: You must not do it ("Du må ikke gjøre det") vs. You must not do it ("Du må ikke gjøre det") - I guess the difference in meaning is approximately the same in English as in Norwegian. In writing, highlighting with italics, underlining or boldface may, for a variety of reasons be undesirable, so you may be missing a way to indicate your intetion. We have other cases similar to your example. You need not do it ("Du trenger ikke gjøre det") would never be considered a negation of "do it", but of "need" (so it behaves differently from "must"). Moving on to "can", you can have a whole series of meanings depending on the stress, and the "not" ("Du kan [ikke] gjøre det"): You can climb that wall. (maybe the others can't) You can climb that wall (if you just do your best) You can climb that wall (wow! I didn't know that) You can not climb that wall (you are not old enough) You can not climb that wall (stop pretending that you can) You can not climb that wall (I do not allow you to do it) You can not climb that wall (that would be just crazy) and so on. (Depending on context, the interpretation may be somewhat different.) I have met immigrants who have learned to speak Norwegian almost completely free of accent, but they reveal themselves as non-native speakers by not mastering the meaning of all stress patterns, or by the word order: Two alternatives may both be valid, but with somewhat different meanings, often when "not" is involved: I am not planning to go to London, vs. I am planning not to go to London. I heard Vera Henriksen, author of Viking age novels and prominent translator of old Norse litterature to modern Norwegian, talk about the problems of translating the poetry: The Norse language (like modern German) made use of seveal cases, i.e. inflected forms to indicate e.g. the role of an actor. We have got a few traces of it left: He hit him, or Him he hit. In the Norse poetry, you have great freedom in the word order, and the poetic rythm depends on it. But in a direct translation to modern Norwegian, the same word order is illegal, meaningless or has a different meaning. If you reorder it according to modern grammatical rules, the rythm is completely ruined. It takes a skilled author to do an honest translation, rather than to re-invent the text!

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                                        Stefan_Lang
                                        wrote on last edited by
                                        #51

                                        Great example. But you shouldn't forget: You can not climb that wall (maybe another one?) :-D At least, sometimes interpunctuation comes to the rescue when you need to resolve an ambiguity: "Let's eat, grandpa" is fine, but "Let's eat grandpa" is cannibalistic :omg:

                                        GOTOs are a bit like wire coat hangers: they tend to breed in the darkness, such that where there once were few, eventually there are many, and the program's architecture collapses beneath them. (Fran Poretto)

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                                        • S Stefan_Lang

                                          That's what I thought, but when I checked the list of languages, there was only one selection for English - no English(UK) or similar. MSDN didn't indicate it exists either.

                                          GOTOs are a bit like wire coat hangers: they tend to breed in the darkness, such that where there once were few, eventually there are many, and the program's architecture collapses beneath them. (Fran Poretto)

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                                          Kaladin
                                          wrote on last edited by
                                          #52

                                          Really? Mine has 18 different kinds of English. Weird

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