Re: CHAT: browsers

En réponse à Tristan <kesuari@...>:

>
> I think you're being overly hard on Windows there. A well-kept Windows
> XP installation isn't all that crashable.
>
It's not what a few Windows XP users told me lately. And I've seen quite a few
people going to XP from ME and then reverting to ME because XP was unusable...

>
> I think to classify as a browser, it has to come with its own
> rendering
> engine. Otherwise it's merely a browsing interface.
>
It's a way of seeing it...

>
> Then you misunderstood me. If BloggsBrowse was 1.45 MB, but if you
> could
> remove the options dialog it would be 1.37 MB, and SmithBrowse was 1.2
> MB, and suchlike they would largely fit.
But if you need to get rid of a feature to make it fit, isn't that
cheating? ;)))

>
> I use it. I'm not a great fan of ambiguity or misuse of prefixes,
> remember?
>
No ;)) . Are you understood when you use it? ;)

>
> We're talking about fifty kilobits here. That's about six bytes.
Please give me again the definition of "byte" and then explain me how fifty
kilobits can make about six bytes ;))) .

 Give
> it
> some credit!
>
I happen to use it. It makes it difficult to give it some credit... ;)

>
> Well, maybe it was in the latex-for-conlangers list, and I can't
> convince either Mozilla or Yahoo! Groups to search with whole word
> only,
> so a search for 'Mo' gives me anything with, say, 'more' or 'movie',
> which is incredibly useless.
>
Just checked all my posts to [latex-for-conlangers], and the only post I could
find where I talked about some file size, I used Gb (instead of the correct
GB). No 'o' there either ;)) .

>
> If there's one US spelling I can't stand (and there is), it's 'liter'.
> I
> always read it as 'lighter'.
>
Agreed. But I'm used to the US spelling of -er/-re (if only because I'm often
afraid that writing -re will be wrong and influenced by my French...) and it's
difficult to change this use.

>
> Yeah, and the French always obey the Acadamie Franczais?
>
Yep! (when they don't, it's only because they don't know the orders of the
Academie ;)) ) I am an exception in knowing very well how the latest spelling
reform works and completely refusing to use it. But then, I'm not a normal
French guy ;)) .

>
> Well, it's defined at <http://www.dictionary.com/search?q=molar>,*
> which
> is American, so if it is a quirk, it's a quirk of English. (It's
> called
> an adjective, but I don't know what part of speech you'd call a
> measurement.)
Oh! I see now what you mean! It's indeed an adjective, *not* a measurement
unit. It's an adjective used to refer to a solution containing one mol/L of the
interesting product. You *can't* refer to *"one molar" (which you could if it
was a unit). You say "a solution at one mol/L" or "a molar solution". It's a
qualificative adjective, not a measurement (a solution at 2 mol/L is bimolar,
not "two molar"). As for its abbreviation as M, it's an unofficial one (it's
even disencouraged in France).

 And most of one lesson and bits and pieces of some
> others
> were devoted to getting the difference between molar, M, mole, and mol
> right. I never understood why you'd bother having 'mol' when you could
> just as well have 'mole'.
>
If you are taught that "molar" is a unit, then I can understand that you are
confused!

By the way, measurement units are nouns.

> *And at
> <http://www.macnet.mq.edu.au:8008/anonymous3864438891+2/-/macshowrecord/1/2>
> (I hope; if not <http://www.macquariedictionary.com.au>, search for
> 'molar', it's the second one. An incredibly apalling interface) which
> is
> less ambiguous in its Chemistry definition, but it's Australian, so it
> doesn't count.
>
Well, it describes exactly the same thing: that "molar" is an adjective
describing a certain kind of things, not a measurement unit.

>
> Tell that to the new generation of IM-ing, SMS-ing writers. They don't
> have capitalisation unless the phone they're using defaults to it for
> the first character entered (like mine).
>
But that's a fault of the technology, not otherwise.

>
> I have nothing against capitalisation, but each letter is only in the
> alphabet once, so it should only have one meaning.
Why? We're talking about abbreviations here. We have got out of the realm of
the alphabet and into the realm of the logograph. And in this realm, capitals
and small letters are different glyphs.

Christophe.

http://rainbow.conlang.free.fr

Take your life as a movie: do not let anybody else play the leading role.

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