[systemd-devel] [PATCH] Reword sentences that contain psuedo-English "resp."

[Dave Reisner]

On Mon, Oct 15, 2012 at 06:15:18PM +0100, Colin Guthrie wrote:
> 'Twas brillig, and Tom Gundersen at 15/10/12 17:57 did gyre and gimble:
> > On Mon, Oct 15, 2012 at 6:14 PM, Andrew Eikum <aeikum at codeweavers.com> wrote:
> >> The trouble is "resp." isn't used in English, ever.
> > 
> > For what it is worth, "resp." is commonly used in mathematics. I don't
> > know about technical writing in general though.
> 
> Yeah I've seen it plenty times while going through university, so while
> it might not be used in prose, I've never had an issue with this kind of
> abbreviation being used in documentation and have always understood it's
> meaning.
> 
> That said, the German abbreviation doesn't necessarily translate
> directly into an English one, so if there is any doubt just don't
> abbreviate it.
> 
> As a general rule, I would be against replacing it with a simple "or" as
> that really can change the meaning. This is technical documentation and
> thus syntax more aligned to common prose is not always desirable.

Sure, that's all well and good, but if the documentation is written in
English, and native English speaking people have to go out of their way
to figure out what it is means, isn't that a sign that perhaps it should
be revised?

Personally, I think its entirely the wrong usage of the word,
abbreviated or not.

"Start showing entries newer or of the specified date, resp. older or of
the specified date"

Perhaps simply be written as:

"Show entries since or until the specified date."

This makes sense to me, because you're reusing well known words that
were picked for the options themselves.

If you wanted to hang onto the word "respectively", write it as:

"Show entries newer or older than the specified date, respectively."

I don't believe that using "respectively" as a conjunction is
grammatically correct.

dave