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Falsehoods programmers believe about languages (www.lexiconista.com)
submitted 1 year ago by to c/programming@programming.dev
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I can’t believe nobody has done this list yet. I mean, there is one about names, one about time and many others on other topics, but not one about languages yet (except one honorable mention that comes close). So, here’s my attempt to list all the misconceptions and prejudices I’ve come across in the course of my long and illustrious career in software localisation and language technology. Enjoy – and send me your own ones!

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[–] 6 points 1 year ago (1 child)

@TrickDacy @rimu but use them much more restrictively. As an example in Thai, "yes" is "chai", but is used only in a few situations, like if a question is ended with "chai mai" (yes followed by word forming polar question).

In interfaces you can't usually put this as yes/no buttons, but rather usually one is a verb like "khao" ("come/go in") and the other is the same word prefixed with mai ("not", different tone from the other "mai" i mentioned).

Chinese is similar but I don't know it as well.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    @TrickDacy @rimu another example is Irish, which I've heard claim as an explanation for Irish English also contains more of "it is/isn't" and such constructs in favour of yes no.

    Another European example is Finnish which has yes but not no. You want me to go on?

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  • [–] 2 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    Another European example is Finnish which has yes but not no.

    No in Finnish is ei, similar to Estonian ei or Swedish nej.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 year ago

    @cgtjsiwy sorry, was a bit simplistic there. Finish is instead an example of a language where while there _is_ a word for "logical" no that's not the usual way to answer yes/no questions.

    If we're being pedantic this means it's not similar to Swedish "nej" for most uses of the latter.

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