Tek-Tips is the largest IT community on the Internet today!

Members share and learn making Tek-Tips Forums the best source of peer-reviewed technical information on the Internet!

Register Log in
  • Congratulations IamaSherpa on being selected by the Tek-Tips community for having the most helpful posts in the forums last week. Way to Go!

What words would you want banned? 1

Status
Not open for further replies.
1. Bush
2. Blogejevich
3. Vikings
 
Code: 
Banish                                      Replace With
=========================================== ================
"utilize"                                    "use"
"take advantage of"                        
------------------------------------------------------------
"Like" and "All" (meaning "Said")            "Said"
 (examples: "I'm like, 'I hate him.'"
            "I'm all, 'Ew, that's gross.'")
------------------------------------------------------------
"Honestly", "To tell you the truth",         These phrases
"I won't lie to you...",                     are extraneous;
------------------------------------------------------------
"Irregardless"                               "Regardless"
------------------------------------------------------------
"hosed"                                      "ruined"
------------------------------------------------------------
"Different than"                             "Different from"
------------------------------------------------------------
"a number of"                                "many"
------------------------------------------------------------
"on an hourly basis"                         "hourly"
------------------------------------------------------------
"are able to"                                "can"

[santa]Mufasa
(aka Dave of Sandy, Utah, USA)
[I provide low-cost, remote Database Administration services: www.dasages.com]
“Beware of those that seek to protect you from harm or risk. The cost will be your freedoms and your liberty.”
 
To tell you the truth I kind of like 'hosed' over 'ruined'. I'm also a fan of trashed and fallen in the same (or similar) instance(s).

Having accidentally come to IT from the study of language and the place of language in our philosophy I am a supporter of adding words over taking them away. The more variety we include the more opportunity for mirth over misuse.

Now, in an attempt to go off subject to come back to it, I have to ask why we call something gross (usurping the "ew, that's gross" from above) to mean disgusting? The reason is that sometime around the 1950s kids started using it that way instead of according to traditional definitions. So now we get gross meaning icky, gross meaning total or entire and gross meaning flagrant. I often wonder which meaning my employer is employing when they list my 'gross income'. What will it mean next? Perhaps if we actually were to ban words then we could get down to one word for everything. So, in a wild attempt to get back on topic, I'm, like, all for the annoying in our lexicon as it gives us something to laugh about here in this forum.

Happy New Year.
 
To say nothing of 'gross' meaning 144...

Steve

[small]"Every program can be reduced by one instruction, and every program has at least one bug. Therefore, any program can be reduced to one instruction which doesn't work." (Object::perlDesignPatterns)[/small]
 
[ ]
... or gross meaning "long" as in "gross ton" for "long ton" (2240 pounds).

mmerlinn


"We've found by experience that people who are careless and sloppy writers are usually also careless and sloppy at thinking and coding. Answering questions for careless and sloppy thinkers is not rewarding." - Eric Steven Raymond
 

mmerlin said:
... or gross meaning "long" as in "gross ton" for "long ton" (2240 pounds).
Click to expand...
I don't think even "long" means "long" in "long ton", so, probably, "gross" doesn't mean "long" there, either.
 
>"take advantage of" "use"

Can't agree with this. For example "He took advantage of her naivety" and "He used her naivety" don't have the same meaning. "He used her naivety to his advantage" may get us back to the sense we are looking for, but we might as well use the original ...

Even in less specialised usage, there is a subtlety of meaning encompassed by "take advantage of" that is not conveyed by "used"

>"Honestly", "To tell you the truth", These phrases
"I won't lie to you...", are extraneous

Extraneous? Rubbish! They indicate that the speaker is lying ... ;-)
 
[ ]
Stella740pl said:
mmerlin said:
:
... or gross meaning "long" as in "gross ton" for "long ton" (2240 pounds).
Click to expand...

I don't think even "long" means "long" in "long ton", so, probably, "gross" doesn't mean "long" there, either.
Click to expand...

short ton = 2000 pounds
long ton = 2240 pounds
gross ton = 2240 pounds

as used in the metals industry around here.

mmerlinn


"We've found by experience that people who are careless and sloppy writers are usually also careless and sloppy at thinking and coding. Answering questions for careless and sloppy thinkers is not rewarding." - Eric Steven Raymond
 
mmerlin,
I understand. Literally speaking, it still doesn't mean "short" or "long" to me. I do realize that the word "long" has some 39 (shades of) meanings. ( Still, "heavy" doesn't seem to be one of them. I mean, ton is a measure of mass, and "long" most frequently is referrring to linear or time mesurements. So, I would say, "long" in "long ton" - and so is "gross" in "gross ton" means "heavy ton", or perhaps, "large ton".
 
A short ton and a long ton are the exact same thing: 20 hundredweight. It is the definition of the hundredweight that differs. So, in this instance, long and/or gross could reasonably be defined as using 112 lbs as the standard measurement of a hundredweight.
 
[ ]

Stella

"Long" to me does not equate with "heavy" when used as "long ton" even though the long ton is heavier.

"Long" in this sense is linear, meaning more pounds versus "short" meaning fewer pounds.

mmerlinn


"We've found by experience that people who are careless and sloppy writers are usually also careless and sloppy at thinking and coding. Answering questions for careless and sloppy thinkers is not rewarding." - Eric Steven Raymond
 
mmerlin said:
santamufasa said:
"Honestly", "To tell you the truth", These phrases
"I won't lie to you...", are extraneous
Click to expand...
Extraneous? Rubbish! They indicate that the speaker is lying ...
Click to expand...

Not necessarily. Eg if the host of a tv commercial says: Honestly, I have bought this mayself, it's very probable you are right. But if someone says "To tell you the truth, I hate working here and wouldn't buy this stuff", he's likely saying the truth...

But I see the general point SantaMufasa and you make. You can still leave out this phrase, even if you tell the truth, because you admit, that everything you said so far was a lie.

Bye, Olaf.
 
Code: 
Banish                                      Replace With
=========================================== ================
"lengthy"                                    "long"

If this is not acceptable then I must insist on the replacement of "strong" with "strengthy" with immediate effect. :)

Ed Metcalfe.

Please do not feed the trolls.....
 
as used in the metals industry around here.
Click to expand...

Around it here it means:
short ton = 2000 pounds
long ton = 2240 pounds
gross ton = me without my shirt on.

Sorry, I couldn't resist!


James P. Cottingham
I'm number 1,229!
I'm number 1,229!
 
I would like to see the phrase "on steroids" fall out of use.

--------------
Good Luck
To get the most from your Tek-Tips experience, please read
FAQ181-2886
As a circle of light increases so does the circumference of darkness around it. - Albert Einstein
 
It's already faded from use but "the mother of..." was really getting annoying.

My personal pet peeve is "same differance". If you mean "same thing", say "same thing". It's only the "same differance" if two things both differ from something else in the same way. I've always hated this phrase.

 

I always thought that if two things both differ from something else in the same way, it's "same differ[red]e[/red]nce". ;-)
 
Whatever. Same diff. ;-)

I just returned to work today after spending the last 2 weeks with 2 days on, 5 days off. Most of my time was spent playing video games on the Wii my kids and I got from Santa (Claus, not Mufasa). It's only natural that a few of my brain cells have rotted during this time.
 
Words that I'd like to see abolished:

Ain't
Irregardless
Blamestorming
Uber



Just my 2¢

"What the captain doesn't realize is that we've secretly replaced his Dilithium Crystals with new Folger's Crystals."

--Greg
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Similar threads

Andrzejek
  • Locked
  • Question
Where are you at?
Replies
10
Views
2K
Olaf Doschke
Olaf Doschke
2ffat
  • Locked
  • News
More Words of the Year
Replies
1
Views
175
MasterRacker
MasterRacker
2ffat
  • Locked
  • News
Can you guess what Dictionary.com's Word of the Year is?
Replies
3
Views
711
MakeItSo
MakeItSo
2ffat
  • Locked
  • News
Survey says: Most mispronounced words of 2016
Replies
1
Views
129
IPGuru
IPGuru
2ffat
  • Locked
  • News
Word of the Day, Brought to You by IoT 2
Replies
5
Views
218
carp
carp

Part and Inventory Search

Sponsor

Back
Top