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Re: WOT: "Correct" English



G'day, eh,

Sheesh.  All I did was object to the OP (inadvertantly, I think)
inappropriately laying down a blanket statement about Canadians.

This would be Weally Weally Off Topic (and you thought the W was for Way!),
except for the claim that en_GB should be standard.

At  3:32 AM PST on November 21 Stewart V. Wright sent off:
> G'day Rob,
> 
> * Rob Reid <kepler@xxxxxxx> [031120 23:39]:
> > At 11:40 AM PST on November 20 Stephen sent off:
> > > I've always tried to use proper "English" spelling as I'm a Canadian. Is
> > > there a UK spelling dictionary
> > 
> > I'm Canadian and I prefer American spelling because it makes more sense.
> 
> Huh???  Makes more sense?  In what way?

Americans tend to spell words more like they sound.  No redundant u's, center
instead of centre.  "Centre" only sounds like "centre" in French*.

* Possibly other languages - I don't know them all.  But not English.

> Too much Sesame Street for you me thinks.

It's a fine program, and helps instill a mastery of grammar.  ;-)
(Isn't there a variant of Godwin's Law that relates to grammar?)

> The wrong idea is that US English is "the" version of English.

I wasn't saying it is.

> I suspect (and I'm prepared to be shouted
> down) that is is the MINOR dialect of English and that UK/GB English
> is the wider spread one.  (Take the UK, Ireland, Australia, New
> Zealand, India, Fiji, etc (i.e. ex-colonies and Commonwealth
> countries)).  Looking at the origin of the langauge en_GB should be
> the default, looking at population numbers that use the dialects en_GB
> should be the default...

Consider yourself shouted down.  en_GB spelling* may be used in more
countries, but they are all countries with not nearly as many English
speakers as the U.S..  Off the top of my head I'd guess en_US is used 3 or 2
times as much as en_GB.  (India is the big question mark.  But note that the
previous sentence talks about use, not number of people.) 

* as opposed to spoken language, which is much more fractured, i.e. "British"
English is not even spoken throughout Great Britain.  

> This is in fact reminiscent of the Microsoft "What language do you
> want?  US English?" garbage.

Bashing M$ is fun, but I don't see what the point is here.  They are
American, and it's their software, after all.

> We should have mutt's default language as _proper_ "en" and then
> translate for the ignorant Yanks with an en_US.  Let's regain the
> correct spelling of colour!

Didn't you mean to say "courrect"?  You wouldn't want to go to spelling gaol.
I had to work gaol in somewhere.  How do en_GB users sleep at night?
(Retorical question)

At  3:57 AM PST on November 21 Eugene Lee sent off:
> Although I prefer the spelling of "color" over "colour", I do prefer
> "armour" over "armor"

Aaarrghh. ;-)

> and "grey" over "gray".

That's regional?  My experience has been that grey tends to be used more for
lighter and/or cooler shades, and gray for darker and/or warmer shades.

For the ensuing gray/grey jihad, please try to keep it on topic by discussing
it in terms of how it (and white and black) looks in your mutt terminal.