Re: What so special about PostgreSQL and other RDBMS?

"Noons" <wizofoz2k_at_yahoo.com.au.nospam> wrote in message news:40b81634$0$1586$afc38c87_at_news.optusnet.com.au...
> VC allegedly said,on 29/05/2004 2:00 AM:
>
> > I am not sure why you are trying to be dense here but that's your choice
> > that I cannot argue with.
>
> I find it quite interesting that you consider it "dense" to ask for an
> explanation that so far has not been forthcoming. Of an imbecile line of
> argument.

OK, let me try once more. Apparently, you are trying to speak from the prescriptive grammarian podium, the implication being that you know what's 'right' and what's 'wrong' in English usage (yet your handling of 'imbecile' is quite unorthodox and may convey quite a different meaning than the one you've intended).

[The prescriptive approach is the policy of making judgements about good usage or style in a language. Prescriptivism certainly has a place in education and social life for all the obvious practical reasons: ease of communication, uniform educational system, fostering social unity, et cetera. ]

>
> > 'A vendor of free software', while logically a contradiction in terms,
is a
>
> Amazing. So while "logically a contradiction of terms", it must somehow
> have a meaning because there is a crowd of imbeciles pushing it?
> And a crowd can NEVER be wrong. Is that it?

Yes, probably to your utter surprise the crowd can never be wrong regarding language patterns/usage. In a descriptive language account, an utterance/writing is grammatical if native speakers of a given social circle use it spontaneously or accept it as normal. By extension, a sentence is also grammatical if it accords with all the rules of grammar, as extracted from the observation of native speakers' spontaneous utterances. All serious work in liguistics is, of course, descriptive, but any sane linguist would ceratinly recognize and study social forces causing a certain degree of uniformity in a language.

>
> > convenient shorthand for 'a vendor of services for a piece of free
> > software'. In lingustics, this phenomenon is called ellipsis and can
lead to
> > to some funny expressions.
>
> You know, if there is one thing that drives me nuts is someone
> trying to hoodwink me with linguistic BULLSHIT.

No need to get so emotional. Apparent lack of education can easily be cured by a trip to a nearest library that has a lot of stuff on , as you put it so nicely, 'linguistic bullshit' (for those eager to learn, of course). In simple words, if the 'crowd' has chosen/accepted 'vendors of free software' as the label for those selling services associated with a piece of free software, there is nothing 'bad' or 'wrong' about it since it's apparently adequate for successfull communication. When/if the expression is deemed to be inadequate, then a new one will be invented. It's just a natural process of language development.

> Please explain how you apply ellipsis to the original phrase to derive
> 'a vendor of services for a piece of free software'. In detail, not just
> name dropping.

 Well it's rather simple ain't it : 'a vendor [of services for a piece ] of free software' -> 'a vendor of free software'. The 'crowd' just drops the bracketed part which can easily be deduced from the context since the full expression is both cumbersome and awkward for efficient communication.

Regards.

> Cheers
> Nuno Souto
> wizofoz2k_at_yahoo.com.au.nospam
Received on Mon May 31 2004 - 22:04:20 CDT