From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Fri Apr 6 11:08:07 2007 Return-Path: X-Original-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [69.147.83.52]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 049ED16A405 for ; Fri, 6 Apr 2007 11:08:07 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from xfb52@dial.pipex.com) Received: from smtp-out3.blueyonder.co.uk (smtp-out3.blueyonder.co.uk [195.188.213.6]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id BD45413C4BB for ; Fri, 6 Apr 2007 11:08:06 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from xfb52@dial.pipex.com) Received: from [172.23.170.146] (helo=anti-virus03-09) by smtp-out3.blueyonder.co.uk with smtp (Exim 4.52) id 1HZmIX-0003Xv-HM; Fri, 06 Apr 2007 12:08:05 +0100 Received: from [62.31.10.181] (helo=[192.168.0.2]) by asmtp-out1.blueyonder.co.uk with esmtp (Exim 4.52) id 1HZmIW-0007VN-US; Fri, 06 Apr 2007 12:08:04 +0100 Message-ID: <46162A14.8030307@dial.pipex.com> Date: Fri, 06 Apr 2007 12:08:04 +0100 From: Alex Zbyslaw User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; FreeBSD i386; en-GB; rv:1.7.13) Gecko/20061205 X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Jerry McAllister References: <7d4f41f50704050142v9c73a17tb1812f218ea4416@mail.gmail.com> <4615030B.5040809@daleco.biz> <20070405191526.GA94631@gizmo.acns.msu.edu> In-Reply-To: <20070405191526.GA94631@gizmo.acns.msu.edu> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Should sudo be used? X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Fri, 06 Apr 2007 11:08:07 -0000 Jerry McAllister wrote: >I noticed one grammatical thing of question. In the first paragraph >under "Use ssh instead of Telnet or rsh/rlogin" it says > > "they should never be used to administrate a machine over a network," > >I think the word should be 'administer' instead of 'administrate' >unless this is some sort of British thing. I know, picky picky, but >it just stood out to me as I was reading. > > 10 years ago you might have been correct. An old dictionary on the shelf does not list "administrate". However both modern dictionaries I tried listed it with the same meaning as administer in it's "oversee" sense. On-line, try, for example, WordNet http://wordnet.princeton.edu/ (web interface: http://wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn). I can find over a dozen references with a google for "administrate meaning". I can't find any etymology for this specific (and I would agree, in some sense wrong) form however it is clearly in common usage. Language evolves, not always in ways that everyone likes. Administer is a perfectly good word, and there's no need for "administrate" to exist. But language skills being what they are, someone looks at "administration" and it's quite understandable how they get to a verb "administrate". C.f compensation, for example. --Alex