J
John W. Kennedy
Sabine said:
No, the plural of "person" is "persons". But "people" is often used as a
substitute, despite the fact that "people" has its own plural: "peoples".
No, the plural of "person" is "persons". But "people" is often used as a
substitute, despite the fact that "people" has its own plural: "peoples".
W
Wojtek
Bent C Dalager wrote :
What a wonderful way to hide functionality. You could write the first
method to do something, and the second to undo what the first does, yet
the second does not get executed.
Yes, yes I know....
I worked in IT security for a while, and you get this mindset to always
look for how something could get subverted.
What a wonderful way to hide functionality. You could write the first
method to do something, and the second to undo what the first does, yet
the second does not get executed.
Yes, yes I know....
I worked in IT security for a while, and you get this mindset to always
look for how something could get subverted.
L
Lew
Bent C Dalager wrote :
A similar matter pertains to Unicode escapes in Java source, which are
converted prior to lexical parsing.
A similar matter pertains to Unicode escapes in Java source, which are
converted prior to lexical parsing.
D
Daniel Pitts
One more reason to have proper grammar and punctuation in comments. IfBent said:Are. In fact, the following code is a semi-famous use of trigraphs to
write code that is difficult to read (I use C++ here for its "//"
comments):
#include <stdio.h>
int main()
{
printf("First line\n"); // WHAT is going on here ??/
printf("Stealth line\n");
}
When compiled and run, the output of the above is just
First line
when most people would expect
First line
Stealth line
This is because the ??/ trigraph expands to the backslash very early
on, and the backslash causes the next line to the appended to the
current line. The second printf is therefore part of the comment on
the first line.
Fun and games all around
(It varies a bit however as to whether trigraphs default to being
enabled or not in different compilers. When I compile the above code
with Sun C++ 5.8, the trigraph is substituted. When I compile it with
gcc 2.95.4, I need to add the "-trigraphs" option for the same to
happen - gcc defaults to having both lines of text printed.)
Cheers,
Bent D.
the comment only had the appropriate number of question marks, this
couldn't have happened.
D
Daniel Pitts
Actually, I think the other way would be more useful.Wojtek said:
Have an "return if security fails" be commented out in the
less-than-obvious way, and the NEXT line does something privileged.
W
Wojtek
Daniel Pitts wrote :
LOL
LOL
N
nebulous99
Is this meant to be some sort of an insult directed against me?
It better not be.
D
Daniel Pitts
See what I mean about perceived threats?
Imagine this scenario... Two people have business to conduct at a police
station. One thinks that everyone with a gun is threatening him, so he
brings his own weapon to "defend" himself. The other guy doesn't really
care... Guess what? The first guy *causes* his own fear to come true.
Less people would "flame" you if you didn't accuse so many people of
flamming you.
?
=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Arne_Vajh=F8j?=
Or you will make a fool out of yourself in yet another thread ?
Arne
L
Lew
Arne said:
Perhaps it was actually a reference to the Crowther and Woods /Adventure/
game, in which there are several rooms described only as, "You are in a maze
of twisty little passages, all alike." The implication I took was that I was
taking myself far too seriously and getting lost in the maze of
self-importance. There are also trolls in that game, so another reading I
took from the comment was that I should avoid being trollish.
It might have been called criticism, or a warning, but I see it as
well-intentioned, a metaphor advising me to participate in a gentle and
friendly way for my benefit, but more importantly, to empower all the
participants in this group. No matter; my reputation is not important as long
as we are learning the ways of Java and how to make ourselves comfortable
exploiting our skills therein.
N
nebulous99
**** you.
N
nebulous99
And you, Arne, Mike Schilling, Owen, and several other people I could
name could definitely use more such advice.
N
nebulous99
No. You are not going to succeed in tricking me into letting down my
guard.
If you think this analogy at all appropriate then you're even more
deluded than I'd feared. This newsgroup is in no way comparable to a
police station, and my attackers to police officers granted some
special authority over me. This newsgroup seems much better compared
to a battlefield, and on a battlefield you are well advised to a) come
armed and b) react quickly and decisively to anything that looks like
someone drawing a weapon and aiming it in your general direction. The
more so if they seem to be wearing the other side's uniform, but even
if not.
Your attention to detail, such as spelling and grammar, certainly
helps to make your case more credible. Eheh heh heh.
D
Daniel Pitts
Remember, context is key to valid arguments. If you remove context, no
one will understand what you're talking about.
S
Sabine Dinis Blochberger
Since when is this valid? The above was drilled into me so much it makesLew said:
me cringe when people say "many persons"... I'm open to change my
perception of course.
L
Lew
The reference, and Merriam-Webster is pretty reliable, makes it sound like
"people" is an alternate plural for "person", not even the preferred one.
There is no, repeat, no special note under "person" on m-w.com that it has an
irregular plural, much less a date for when it acquired a regular plural. It
lists "person" as being from the 13th century, so one must conclude that's
when "persons" became the plural.
B
Bent C Dalager
It could be a difference between British and American English.
Non-native English speakers are often, I expect, taught rather strict
Oxford English in school, and in this variant of the language the "one
person, many people" rule might hold?
Any Oxford Englishmen around?
Cheers,
Bent D
G
Gordon Beaton
Consensus seems to be lacking:
http://www.worldwidewords.org/articles/people.htm
http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/002487.html
http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/002488.html
/gordon
--
L
Lew
Gordon said:
All three of those sources agree that "persons" is a valid plural, but
disagree as to whether "people" is a valid plural. This answers the question
as asked, when and whether "persons" is a valid plural - not only is it valid,
since the 13th century (i.e., the development of modern English), but by some
standards it is preferred.
W
Wildemar Wildenburger
I can definitely back this up. I was drilled as much as Sabine was.Bent said:
Well, I have my Oxford Dictionary if that counts ...Any Oxford Englishmen around?
Says right there:
per·son, /noun/ (pl. people or, esp. in formal use, per·sons)
That /kind of/ settles that.
/W