Gavin,
Grab a dictionary.
In the olden days, they  were books that listed words.  Lots of 'em --
along with their plurals etc.

Nowadays, try http://www.onelook.com/?w=virus&ls=a

Although your meaning was clear, Ben is correct.  His (and my)
pedantry aside, using cutesy variations for common words in a forum of
professionals it at best, well, unprofessional.  At worst, you look
like a dweeb.

If you can find even *one* dictionary that lists "virii" I'll apologize.
Before you spend a lot of time looking, though, I'll give you a hint.
No dictionary referenced by OneLook even lists the word "virii".
There are two entries returned by the search, though.
One contains the phrase, "generally considered incorrect" and the other is:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plural_of_virus  Check it out.

Regards,
--BM



On Thu, May 14, 2009 at 3:38 PM, Gavin Wilby <[email protected]> wrote:
> Ben,
> Wind down your pedant filter slightly hey! There's a good lad.
> G.
>
> On Thu, May 14, 2009 at 11:17 PM, Ben Scott <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>> On Thu, May 14, 2009 at 5:40 PM, Gavin Wilby <[email protected]>
>> wrote:
>> > I dunno - a word that I made up - its obvious that it used to denote
>> > multiple virus's.
>>
>>  What does the virus own?
>>
>>  To form a plural in English, on a word that ends in an "s", use
>> "es"; thus, "viruses".  As one wag once put it:
>>
>>                An apostrophe does not mean, "Look out!  Here comes an
>> 's'!"
>>
>>  ;-)
>>
>>  I've heard it argued that there is no Latin word "virus", and as
>> such, one should follow the English pluralization rules, not Latin.
>>
>> -- Ben
>>
>> ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~
>> ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/>  ~
>
>
>
> --
> Gavin Wilby,
> Twitter: http://twitter.com/gavin_wilby
> GSXR Blog: http://www.stoof.co.uk
> Sent from Isle Of Man
>
>
>
>

~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~
~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/>  ~

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