Skip site navigation (1)Skip section navigation (2)
Date:      Sat, 29 Apr 2006 18:40:09 +0100
From:      Daniel Bye <freebsd-questions@slightlystrange.org>
To:        freebsd-questions@freebsd.org
Subject:   Re: Antivirus to scan files before going onto a Windows machine: clamav?
Message-ID:  <20060429174009.GB11648@catflap.slightlystrange.org>
In-Reply-To: <6.2.3.4.2.20060429100823.02eaf628@mailsvr.xxiii.com>
References:  <80f4f2b20604290606h64e259d5w3d3c21891779eb06@mail.gmail.com> <44536775.7090306@firebadger.net> <80f4f2b20604290625l57405cd2r3f56382e0a42e546@mail.gmail.com> <6.2.3.4.2.20060429100823.02eaf628@mailsvr.xxiii.com>

next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help

--qlTNgmc+xy1dBmNv
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Disposition: inline
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable

On Sat, Apr 29, 2006 at 10:12:02AM -0400, wmc20@xxiii.com wrote:
> At 09:25 AM 4/29/2006, Jim Stapleton wrote:
> >Virii would be the correct spelling we biologists use, but viruses=20
> >is standard in normal-people-speak, and gets the meaing across.
>=20
> Actually I was reading up on correct vs. common plurals after a=20
> little debate around the office.  It would appear the 'ii plural or=20
> virus is NOT correct.  See:
>=20
> http://linuxmafia.com/~rick/faq/plural-of-virus.html
> http://dictionary.reference.com/help/faq/language/g63.html

I think virus is a second declension masculine noun, so its nominative
plural would be 'viri', but a plural form is not known from the extant
cannon of Classical Latin.  A complication would be that 'viri' is
already known as the nominative plural of 'vir' (man), also of the
second declension (I believe - my Latin was never up to much anyway, and
what with no Cardinals or Popes to practise conversational Latin, I have
forgotten most of it!).  Which is why the other form 'virii' is
occasionally seen, but again without precedent from Classical Latin, and
with no attestation in any dictionary.

This article at Wikipedia is pretty informative, if you like that kind
of thing!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plural_of_virus

Dan

--=20
Daniel Bye

PGP Key: ftp://ftp.slightlystrange.org/pgpkey/dan.asc
PGP Key fingerprint: D349 B109 0EB8 2554 4D75  B79A 8B17 F97C 1622 166A
                                                                     _
                                              ASCII ribbon campaign ( )
                                         - against HTML, vCards and  X
                                - proprietary attachments in e-mail / \

--qlTNgmc+xy1dBmNv
Content-Type: application/pgp-signature
Content-Disposition: inline

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.3 (FreeBSD)

iD8DBQFEU6T5ixf5fBYiFmoRAgGeAJ4mSDDQew4uE7fZ7zk1edQl369/+wCdHgas
IEkVoLtaNdbZF4Bu393dah4=
=fjkI
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

--qlTNgmc+xy1dBmNv--



Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?20060429174009.GB11648>