"Many of the specs from the UK also say equipments and informations."

cite?

Cheers

Greg Locock

SIG:Please see FAQ731-376: Eng-Tips.com Forum Policies for tips on how to make the best use of Eng-Tips.

Where do you think the MS help text is written?

Tell him "I have an information for you:  the fact that a mistake is made often does not make it less of a mistake."
 

I understood that 'informations' was a legal term.

I suppose that if it was used in the sense of "notifications" then it could be.
 

I think I've seen equipments, can't cite a ref though.

KENAT, probably the least qualified checker you'll ever meet...

Tenpenny,

re: "I understood that 'informations' was a legal term. "

You would think with all that education that lawyers would learn to speak english properly.

Source http://support.microsoft.com/kb/196648/en-us

Quote:

For additional informations, click the article number about troubleshooting problems withAddFontResource() below to view the article about troubleshooting problems withAddFontResource() in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

There are lots of similar ones on the MSDN website.  Can't cite a ref for equipments as it is in the internal company documentation.

Found some for equipments.  Most tend to be in India

http://www.engineeringtalk.com/news/eel/eel000.html
http://www.hemcmedical.com/
http://www.elgi.com/

 

The Oxford English Dictionary refers to the use of "equipments" back in 1793.......so it HAS to be OK...... doesn't it?!?!?!

Stego1,

Once a word is published in the OED, then the word has been accepted by its fellow words and us mere mortals should never (and I mean NEVER) question its validity again.

'Course there are no hard and fast rules about how we use (/misuse) the new word (ref any web page)......

Kev

PS I'd love to be present at whatever conference there is where all the words in the OED get together to vote on whether a new word is accepted. Bet it's something like the EU, just more efficient!

Kevin

"It is a mathematical fact that fifty percent of all doctors graduate in the bottom half of their class." ~Author Unknown

"If two wrongs don't make a right, try three." ~Author Unknown
 

I found equipments in the online Merriam Webster dictionary too.  Never seen the word in print until two years ago.  Must be reading the wrong documents.

"Its not the equipments fault", makes sense to me. Human nature to bring equipment "to life".
Informations......."Please be giving me informations", heard this before, and I think its when a direct translation is done from the native language into English.
"Im sitting here beside myself".
"Im sitting here, beside myself".
Does anyone agree? I think my English is failing!

But that would be, "It's not the equipment's fault," with an apostrophe.

Hg

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Does the OED give an example of how "equipments" was used in 1793?

One usage I can get my brain around would be as a plural of the meaning "the act of equipping".  So multiple acts of equipping would be equipments.

Not that I'd go there myself.

Hg

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like my notifications / informations guess above...  it just doesn't sound right to me.  Is there a catchy word like "engrish" for mistranslations that happen on the indian subcontinent?
 

Indglish?

In this case I agree, informations and equipments do not sound right and is incorrect use.  I also agree with MintJulep's comment.

If a change is desired,  it should be pointed out to the publishers who do that.

As everything else nothing in the world is perfect or static and things will keep changing/evolving. Not every change may be likeable or correct. Yes, it is true that repeated misuse/misspelliing of a word, do make it accepted overtime.

Heck, americans changed many spellings just to be different from british..so who says english is untouchable?
 

for those interested in how Collins decide on useage for their dictionaries - check the following link for a brief description.

http://www.collins.co.uk/books.aspx?group=140

HgTX

the OED 1793 citation is...

<SMEATON Edystone L. §275 To forward our equipments for rendering the house habitable.>

It's from some book about building a lighthouse....

Stego--how far back is their earliest cite for "equipment", singular?

Hg

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HgTX

1717!!

Here is the definition anyway which mentions the plural...

2. concr. Anything used in equipping; furniture; outfit; warlike apparatus; necessaries for an expedition or voyage. Used in the pl. to indicate the articles severally, in the sing. collectively.

 

I was going to suggest that armament(s) has a somewhat similar usage.

 

Cheers

Greg Locock

SIG:Please see FAQ731-376: Eng-Tips.com Forum Policies for tips on how to make the best use of Eng-Tips.

I didn't see informations, so far, being used in India. Equipment being plural is taught in secondary school under Common errors in english usage, but this is generally in use. MS Word always corrects my equipment to equipments.

 

So it looks like in the 18th century two Nautilus weight machines were "equipments" but a whole gym would be "equipment".

At some point it settled into just being a mass noun, and now the count noun is coming back from the East.

Fascinating.

Hg

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HgTX, I think the UK military have always had equipments, I think where I saw it was UK Aircraft Publications, or maybe contract docs.

KENAT, probably the least qualified checker you'll ever meet...

Informations is a bit of a strange one - I hear it a lot (eg send the informations to the satellite) and see it quite often in internal documentation.

The problem is that it has normally been cast in concrete before I get to see it so there is no way that the author will change it without problem reports being raised and meetings as to whether one word ought to be changed.
 

I think we're looking for logic or a rule here where there isn't any. The French say "équipements" and "informations"; these words obviously have the same root as their English equivalents, which is the proto-FrEnglish spoken around the time of William the Conqueror (or so ).

The fact that the English dropped an s or the French added one is just a matter of habit, and I can imagine that in relatively closed "circles" like the UK Military habits can be different.

True nuff; military language is quite often its own thing.

Hg

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The French may append an s but they don't seem to pronounce it.  Never seen the logic in that.

Military language is so strange, I don't even try to understand it.  The squaddies seem to be talking jargonese all the time.

There is no logic! sometimes it's worse than just an absence of logic, the rule seems to be deliberately illogical

the bone = l'os : the s is pronounced
the bones = les os : the s is not pronounced

the egg = l'oeuf : the f is pronounced
the eggs = les oeufs : neither the f nor the s is pronounced!

And so forth, it's completely insane...

French is still less insane than English; the rules are mostly consistent, with a relatively small numbers of exceptions. English has the least rule-governed spelling of any language I've run into, because it inherited the insanity of every other language it ever brushed up against, and because there were different phases of spelling standardization that occurred at different phases of prounciation shifts.

Hg

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Isn't the use of the word 'softwares' in the same category?

Haven't seen that one before.  Maybe it is back to basics - add an s to anything to make it plural.

process simulations softwares (name of the thread) (Chemical Process engineering forum)
http://www.eng-tips.com/viewthread.cfm?qid=205631&amp;page=2

Simulation softwares (name of thread) (Petroleum refining forum)
http://www.eng-tips.com/viewthread.cfm?qid=202856&amp;page=4

"xwb (Computer) 20 Jul 08 19:02  
Haven't seen that one before.  Maybe it is back to basics - add an s to anything to make it plural. "

Provided it is a countable noun. ie Rice, fish, water, fruit are singular  - rice, fish, water, fruit - are plural.

As it is English there are of course exceptions ie, Taking the waters at the Bath Pump House.

But fruits and fishes are also plural.  Yet another anomaly.

Fish and fishes are both plural for similar vague reasons to catenate and concatenate.

My wife likes saying "one rice" to annoy me. (eg you left one rice on your plate)

How do you count water?

What is the plural for gnu?  Is it gnu or gnus?

I think it's gnoi.  But, then, the plural would be gnoise?

And they say those of us from the US East coast talk strange because we say things along the lines of "pahk the cah in Havahd Yahd"...

cacti:cactus...gni:gnu?  

Jeff Mirisola, CSWP, Certified DriveWorks AE
http://designsmarter.typepad.com/jeffs_blog