[tz] [PATCH] The word "data" is plural.

[Lester Caine]

On 13/08/14 16:03, Paul_Koning at dell.com wrote:
>> English is a fluid language and while datum is the singular and data is
>> > the plural the use of datum has largely fallen out of favour (and favor)
>> > and "data" as both singular and plural (like "sheep" or "fish") is now
>> > the norm.  In many cases "the data are" is as natural sounding as "the
>> > data is", in some cases one or the other sounds stilted.  I often hear
>> > or read "a single data point" rather than "a datum" and it's the latter
>> > that sounds weird, not the former.
> It depends on your background, and where you are.  I suspect the opinions are different in the USA, where English is slaughtered/evolved ( :-) ) rather actively, than they would be in some other parts of the world.  I’m used to seeing “data” treated as singular, but I don’t have the “weird” reaction when I see it constructed as plural.  Having had Latin in high school is probably a contributing factor.

What I find strange here is the rewriting of history ...
That one method of working was adopted 10 years ago is a fact of
history, so re-writing the news file to satisfy someone's objection to
what was and in many cases still is normal practice is something that I
object to. Similarly changing 'timezone' to 'time zone' is another
development that personally I see little logic to and the demand now to
re-write documents because they are 'wrong' is as bad as changing
historic document for political reasons rather than factual ones. They
were factually correct when written ... end of story. In my book they
are still timezones :)

-- 
Lester Caine - G8HFL
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