From owner-freebsd-current@FreeBSD.ORG Mon Oct 18 07:10:48 2004 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-current@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id A012116A4CE for ; Mon, 18 Oct 2004 07:10:48 +0000 (GMT) Received: from n33.kp.t-systems-sfr.com (n33.kp.t-systems-sfr.com [129.247.16.33]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id C671E43D2D for ; Mon, 18 Oct 2004 07:10:47 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from harti@freebsd.org) Received: from n81.sp.op.dlr.de (n81g.sp.op.dlr.de [129.247.163.1]) i9I7AeU506260; Mon, 18 Oct 2004 09:10:41 +0200 Received: from zeus.nt.op.dlr.de (zeus.nt.op.dlr.de [129.247.173.3]) i9I7AdI41908; Mon, 18 Oct 2004 09:10:39 +0200 Received: from beagle.kn.op.dlr.de (opkndnwsbsd178 [129.247.173.178]) by zeus.nt.op.dlr.de (8.11.7+Sun/8.9.1) with ESMTP id i9I7Afe16169; Mon, 18 Oct 2004 09:10:42 +0200 (MET DST) Date: Mon, 18 Oct 2004 09:10:39 +0200 (CEST) From: Harti Brandt X-X-Sender: brandt@beagle.kn.op.dlr.de To: David Syphers In-Reply-To: <200410161208.32381.dsyphers@u.washington.edu> Message-ID: <20041018090607.C11579@beagle.kn.op.dlr.de> References: <1097916792.1810.4.camel@kaiser.sig11.org> <200410161208.32381.dsyphers@u.washington.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII cc: freebsd-current@freebsd.org cc: rionda@gufi.org Subject: Re: UPDATING readability X-BeenThere: freebsd-current@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list Reply-To: Harti Brandt List-Id: Discussions about the use of FreeBSD-current List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 18 Oct 2004 07:10:48 -0000 On Sat, 16 Oct 2004, David Syphers wrote: DS>On Saturday 16 October 2004 01:53 am, Matteo Riondato wrote: DS>> Could we change an entry from: DS>> DS>> 20041007: DS>> One of the syscalls the 1:1 threading library libthr uses has DS>> changed, thus breaking ABI compatibility. Make sure you rebuild DS>> this library with the kernel. DS>> DS>> to: DS>> DS>> 20041007: DS>> One of the syscalls used by the 1:1 threading library libthr DS>> has changed, thus breaking ABI compatibility. Make sure you rebuild DS>> this library with the kernel. DS>> DS>> I think this will improve the readability and the comprension of the DS>> entry by the non-native english speakers. DS> DS>I hate to be pedantic, but the original entry is preferable. In English it is DS>correct to avoid the passive voice when possible (though not nearly to the DS>extent that, say, French does). The active voice is quite appropriate here, DS>where the subject is clearly defined. Is there a particular reason why DS>non-native speakers would prefer the passive voice? The verbs are coming very late in the sentence. That's not a problem for german speakers :-) but from experience I know that speakers from languages where the verb must come near the beginning of the sentence have a problem with this. The omission of the 'that' makes that even harder, because you can't parse the sentence into grammatical units until you see the 'uses' at the end of the line. That forces you to roll back and re-parse. harti