Have noted an increase in the use of "age" (as in signage) where I would've thought a good old fashioned "s" would have sufficed for the plural form. Is this simply psuedo-academism or are there valid circumstances?
Heard a beauty this morning - "10% of the world's cranage was operating in Shanghai"!! ("craneS WERE" not good enough??)
stales
Been thinking further on this one...
I think the "age" suffix does imply some sort of charge - postage, trackage and (or so my Dad tells me) wharfage.
Still struggling with signage - but understand it's an essential part of any marketing campaign - ie as in "publicity and signage are key ingredients to the campaign".
HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!!!!!!!!
>I think the "age" suffix does imply some sort of charge...
for an obscure one, try lastage.
for an obscure one, try lastage.And for a gutter one, try pubage. I've heard it used in conversation - I swear - Austin Powers influenced, I think.
Faldage (or foldage) is, of course, the right of the lord of the manor to tell his tenants where to pasture their sheep for the purpose of controling the manurage.
Faldage smoozes: Faldage (or foldage) is, of course, the right of the lord of the manor to tell his tenants where to pasture their sheep for the purpose of controling the manurage.
And, no doubt, exercise droit de seigneur?
I have to admit I use 'functionality' at work. I had thought about it and decided that, although it sounds like an empty jargon word, in fact it succinctly fills a place. It means 'the way it works' or more precisely 'all the different things it does' or 'the collective of its functions'. Any suggestions for better one-word ways of saying this?
Hmmm. We use "functionality" to describe the functions of software objects. Probably a bit twee, but, as NicholasW of the puzzled "what else?" in relation to nuking food in a microwave has pointed out, it fulfils a definite purpose.
Not trying to be a smart*ss, but how about good old "use" (the noun) instead of functionality?
'Use' is too general to be a synonym. If someone said they had a product and wanted to increase its use, that could mean:
-- sell it to more users
-- make it go faster
-- use it more times a day
-- create new ways to use it (increase its functionality)
You're going to get a lot of these words that seem at first blush to be empty neologisms but which fulfill a definite need. Proactive is one. You could say active but that doesn't stress the idea that you are taking an action with the specific intent of forestalling some undesired condition that reactive has to wait for before it gets to be used.
Shame on you CapK!Answer the question!
Answer the question! No.
Faldage wrote : You're going to get a lot of these words
Harumph. Does it bother anyone else when perfetly good words are lengthened for no apparent reason or purpose?
Ex : UPcoming and ONgoing
Why not just comimg and continuing?
Doesn't anyone read Strunk and White anymore ?
wow
wow:
I use these terms in place of coming and continuing because they convey a message that is otherwise lost.
To me an "upcoming" election is one that is close at hand; definitely closer at hand than is the coming election, but of course I can't tell you when a coming election becomes an upcoming election. (notice how I used the "l" so cleverly to avoid the gutter police???)
Ongoing to me implies that it's happening right now: the ongoing trial. If I susbstitute continuing I lose the immediacy of the event that I "feel" when I use ongoing. It might also be ambiguous for trial if you infer the use of the transitive verb continue.
This is to me why English has a million or more words, so we can include these subtle nuances and make our writing and speaking as rich as possible.
TEd
Okay, I accept that some of you don't like the use of "functionality". I spent an hour this morning painting cupboard doors and thinking about alternatives. (Yes, I have a very sad life. [Boo-hoo emoticon])
No alternatives came to mind which sum up the concept of "the tasks which this software object is capable of carrying out" as succinctly and meaningfully to all concerned. Yes, it's jargon. No, it's not just jargon for the sake of it.
I would strenuously argue against its use with, say, reference to toasters or electric jugs. And I have seen it used in this kind of context.
Cap Kiwi - Perhaps you used it in less than complete seriousness, but I must know - what is an electric jug? What is its functionality?
wow complains: perfectly good words are lengthened for no apparent reason and compares ONgoing (bad) with continuing (good)
A ten letter word is lengthened and becomes a seven letter word?
Hyla seeks translation: Cap Kiwi - Perhaps you used it in less than complete seriousness, but I must know - what is an electric jug? What is its functionality?
Read "electric kettle", I guess. You know, thingy with an element for boiling water. Didn't realise "jug" was less than universal ...
I use upcoming when I want to create a feeling immediacy. “I will run in the upcoming election” sounds like your will run in the election coming up next, not the one after; and that there are no elections between now and that one.
In some circumstances I prefer ongoing to continuing. Ongoing gives the impression that the thing (trial for example) has been happening and will continue to happen, whereas continuing can mean it stopped and is now starting over. I realize that in the second case resuming would be the appropriate word but it is not always used. Look at all televised mini-series. They “continue from yesterday,” never resume.
Oh jug is pretty unversal--
but its usually a little brown jug-- ..
and back a-ways, we had this silly digression on to cooking and food-- and realized
Everyone in America has (or at least knows about) toaster ovens-- but very few of us have electric kettles
and most of the rest of the english speaking world has electric kettles, and hasn't a clue what a toaster oven is...
I haven't checked the profile-- but i'll bet Hyla is American, or English is not first language. (or not the language of home land)-- so even the idea of an electric kettle might be strange...
As I think I've said before, and MaxQ will have if I haven't, NZ and the Strine are caught between the British/European culture and the American culture. Although there have been attempts to keep the American cultural wolf from the gate, they have never been particularly successful. We often have two words for the same thing where there are distinct British and American terms. And even three, where there is a Zild term which is distinct from either of the others, although nothing really comes to mind.
Any NZer would understand either electric kettle or electric jug without the need for explanation. And toaster ovens, for that matter!
Yes, it's jargon. No, it's not just jargon for the sake of it.
Yes, this is the key. The reason technical jargon gets a bad name is when it's overused or needlessly extended. Often, 'functionality' should be crossed out and replaced by 'function' or 'use' whenever someone intelligent gets to read the manager's/salesperson's first draft. (This seldom ever happens.) But there is a good niche for the word when it's genuinely needed.
I thought maybe electric jugs had to do with the German Stopsemfromfloppenelektrifizierung.
> I thought maybe electric jugs had to do with the German Stopsemfromfloppenelektrifizierung.
Shocking. You won't have any support from the rest of us when the gutter police see this one!!!
As for moi, I'm still tittering
at CapK's and Faldage's ovine quid-pro-quo...
I've got all I can do to keep abreast
of this exchange.
What Faldage means is ... droit de seigneur
age on his manor is limited to sheep?! In a manor of speaking, of course.
It's interesting that "proactive" has been used as an example for functionality. According to the New York Times Everyday Dictionary of 1982, the word means "favoring the first learned -- inhibition". Obviously, that is just the opposite of how the word is popularly used. The word now has no function because the meaning must be determined by the context. "Pro-active" might be a proper spelling for the current usage, but that doesn't help in an oral presentation.
Wish I could have known of that one for words learned in genealogy.Now I must go wash the garbage off my bandage (residue of lunch) and hope I may achieve second nonage since I may not become a nonagenarian.
Ted R wrote : I use these terms in place of coming and continuing because they convey a message that is otherwise lost.
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You have made very good points in your Posted reasonings. So good, in fact that I shall re-think my "Harumph!" Thank you TEd.
wow
belM wrote : continuing can mean it stopped and is now starting over.
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An interesting and cogent observation. You and Ted may yet drag me into the 21st century kick and scream tho I may.
wow
The bane of my existence right now is 'verbiage,' which I'm constrained to use at work.
Can't we just say 'words?'
Seems to me "verbiage" has a pejorative tone often enough to make it useful at times.
At the website developer where I occasionally am taken on to cast an editorial eye, what I'm paid to look at is the "verbage." "Verbiage" almost looks good compared to that.
Granted, the verbage is often garbage.
This is one word that is misused a good bit. Verbiage means (in its usual sense) overly wordy, saying something in ten words when two would do. My now-retired boss used to send me notes about changing the verbiage of something I had written and I used to turn purple with rage because I was trying hard to write just the two words.
not only that, but (from dictionary.com):
Note on pronunciation: Verbiage is sometimes pronounced with two syllables, as \VUR-bij\. Charles Harrington Elster, in The Big Book of Beastly Mispronunciations, calls this a ``thoroughly beastly mispronunciation that unfortunately has become so common that two current dictionaries recognize it.'' He continues, ``Marriage and carriage have two syllables, but, traditionally and properly, foliage and verbiage have three.''
...which leads, of course, to
verbage.