From owner-freebsd-doc@FreeBSD.ORG Wed Jul 25 00:00:02 2012 Return-Path: Delivered-To: doc@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [69.147.83.52]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id B3E18106564A for ; Wed, 25 Jul 2012 00:00:02 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from wblock@wonkity.com) Received: from wonkity.com (wonkity.com [67.158.26.137]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 4A7C88FC16 for ; Wed, 25 Jul 2012 00:00:02 +0000 (UTC) Received: from wonkity.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by wonkity.com (8.14.5/8.14.5) with ESMTP id q6P001c9063134 for ; Tue, 24 Jul 2012 18:00:01 -0600 (MDT) (envelope-from wblock@wonkity.com) Received: from localhost (wblock@localhost) by wonkity.com (8.14.5/8.14.5/Submit) with ESMTP id q6P0012U063131 for ; Tue, 24 Jul 2012 18:00:01 -0600 (MDT) (envelope-from wblock@wonkity.com) Date: Tue, 24 Jul 2012 18:00:01 -0600 (MDT) From: Warren Block To: doc@freebsd.org Message-ID: User-Agent: Alpine 2.00 (BSF 1167 2008-08-23) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: MULTIPART/MIXED; BOUNDARY="-902635197-1427711892-1343174311=:63105" Content-ID: X-Greylist: Sender IP whitelisted, not delayed by milter-greylist-4.2.7 (wonkity.com [127.0.0.1]); Tue, 24 Jul 2012 18:00:01 -0600 (MDT) Cc: Subject: FDP and compound words X-BeenThere: freebsd-doc@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Documentation project List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Wed, 25 Jul 2012 00:00:02 -0000 This message is in MIME format. The first part should be readable text, while the remaining parts are likely unreadable without MIME-aware tools. ---902635197-1427711892-1343174311=:63105 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=ISO-8859-15; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8BIT Content-ID: The FDP word list at http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/fdp-primer/writing-style-word-list.html specifies the formats for several words that are often used as a single compound word in our documentation. For example: file system disk label mail server name server web server Actually, I think the single-word versions of at least the first two are more correct. Some searching found this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compound_noun_and_adjective There's an excellent example: "darkroom". A darkroom is a different thing than a dark room. To me, filesystem and disklabel are singular. A filesystem is a thing, a single object, while a file system is a group of files and directories. I'm sure there's a name for the difference between the single- and double-word versions, but don't know it. Many one-word versions are enshrined in code, like the use of "nameserver" in resolv.conf. I propose changing the FDP recommendations for the two-word versions above to the single-word versions. Statistics from SGML files in /usr/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1: 628 "file system", 513 "filesystem" 28 "disk label", 65 "disklabel" 50 "mail server", 3 "mailserver" 56 "name server", 21 "nameserver" 74 "web server", 13 "webserver" Some two-word instances separated by line breaks were probably missed. After the changes to the FDP, textproc/igor can be updated to detect the two-word versions. Note: no changes are planned to "cabaņa de bicicletas", "Fahrradraum", or "Fahrradschuppen". ---902635197-1427711892-1343174311=:63105--