Re: "May", "can", "might" - Mailing list pgsql-hackers

From Andrew Sullivan
Subject Re: "May", "can", "might"
Date
Msg-id 20070202164638.GB11505@phlogiston.dyndns.org
Whole thread Raw
In response to "May", "can", "might"  (Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us>)
List pgsql-hackers
On Tue, Jan 30, 2007 at 12:39:26PM -0500, Bruce Momjian wrote:
> I would like to clean up our documentation to consistently use these
> words.  Objections?

None here, but if you're going to go to the trouble, you might want
to have a look at how others have faced this problem too.

In my line of work, we've taken to adopting the RFC 2119 words for
cases where we want to be super-clear and unambiguous.  I don't think
those formulations would be much use for user manuals, but it's nice
to see that another group of people who work by converging on
consensus can still do that by (for example) agreeing that "MAY" and
"may" are not the same word.

A

-- 
Andrew Sullivan  | ajs@crankycanuck.ca
The whole tendency of modern prose is away from concreteness.    --George Orwell


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