On Sat, Dec 04, 2004 at 11:16:32PM +0100, Jens Seidel wrote: > Hi all, > > I checked the website for errors related to the indefinite articles "a" > and "an". > As usual I found again many errors and need your approval before I apply > this patch. I will not commit it when I get no OK! > > A short summary of this rule can be found on > http://www.fortunecity.com/bally/durrus/153/gramch14.html#2
Use "a" if the words pronunciation starts with a consonant sound, "an" if it starts with a vowel sound. > Nevertheless this article doesn't answer all my questions: > > Please check the following: > > A or an FTP|URL|HTML|LDAP? (Both versions are used regularly) Since are pronounced by spelling out at least the initial letter (e.g., "an eff-tee-pee site"), "FTP", "HTML", and "LDAP" should be preceded by "an" and "URL" should be preceded by "a". > Why is "an SSH (key|...)" used so often and not "a SSH"? See above. > Please note that I also attached files "a" and "an" which contain > the grep output of phrases containing a resp. an where I'm not sure and > which contain probably many errors too. The above rule should cover all cases. -- Matt
