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I’m not stupid, but: how do semicolons work?

Sep 23rd, 2011
by Rich.
4 comments

Punctuation lovers are always complaining about the decline of the semicolon. It seems to be gradually disappearing from the printed word entirely, being replaced by the comma, which serves a related but different purpose.

Sadly, the distinction between the comma and the semicolon is a really useful one for comprehending sentences correctly the first time.

The rule for when to use a semicolon is actually really straightforward; once you know it, you’ll probably never confuse it and the comma again.

Use a semicolon when you want to connect two strongly related phrases that could stand on their own as sentences.

Here’s an example I saw on the Manchester Metrolink tram the other day. When a stop is announced, an LED marquee displays something like the following:

This is an Altrincham service, the next stop will be Cornbrook.

Here a comma is used when a semicolon would be much better. Reading this sentence with a comma causes the reader to double-back and try to work out how the second part fits with the first part. A semicolon would break the sentence up properly and alert the reader to there being two separate phrases in the sentence.

This is an Altrincham service; the next stop will be Cornbrook.

The stop system gives us four “levels” of stop and, in most cases, the rules are pretty simple:

  • Comma [,]: Most of the time the comma is used to delimit non-defining clauses, like “in most cases” above. A non-defining clause is a piece of the sentence that can be removed but cannot stand on its own as a sentence. Commas are also used to separate items in a list.
  • Semicolon [;]: As above, the semicolon is used to join two phrases that could stand alone as sentences but are strongly related to one another.
  • Colon [:]: The colon does the same thing as the semicolon, except it usually ties together one phrase with an explanation of that phrase. For example, “Rich is a blogger: someone who writes pedantic articles on the web.”
  • Full stop [.]: Separates entire sentences, as I’m sure you know.

Join me in reclaiming the semicolon and making long sentences easier to read!

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I’m not stupid, but: what’s with “and I”?

Jul 15th, 2011
by Rich.
3 comments

Did you ever have an exchange like this with your parents when you were growing up?

Me: “Me and Mark had a great idea.”

Parent: “You mean, Mark and I had a great idea.”

This “and I” meme is stuck in the heads of many of our generation, and all over the place I see people applying it as though it’s a hard and fast rule. It’s not.

First, let’s deal with the order. Why is it “Mark and I” and not “I and Mark”? There’s no grammatical reason for this order at all, except that it sounds better to put the nouns before the pronouns.

But here’s the awkward bit. Sometimes it’s “Mark and I” and sometimes it’s “Mark and me”.

In fact, the grammatical reason is to do with the nominative and objective1 cases, which are to do with whether the thing in question is the subject or object of the sentence. Although these sound really complicated, most of us are actually very good at determining the case.

Try this trick: replace the people in your sentence with we or us and see which sounds right. If it’s we then you’re in the nominative (Mark and I) and if it’s us then you’re in the objective (Mark and me).

  • Mark and me had a great idea. ? Us had a great idea. (Sounds wrong!)
  • Mark and I had a great idea. ? We had a great idea. (Sounds right!)
  • You should join Mark and me for dinner. ? You should join us for dinner. (Sounds right!)
  • You should join Mark and I for dinner. ? You should join we for dinner. (Sounds wrong!)

In fact, if you’re having trouble remembering which is we and which is us, you can usually work out which is right by simply dropping the other person from the sentence:2

  • Mark and me had a great idea. ? Me had a great idea. (Sounds wrong!)
  • Mark and I had a great idea. ? I had a great idea. (Sounds right!)
  • You should join Mark and me for dinner. ? You should join me for dinner. (Sounds right!)
  • You should join Mark and I for dinner. ? You should join I for dinner. (Sounds wrong!)

I’m afraid once you know this rule you’ll start seeing mistakes being made everywhere!

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  1. OK; there’s not really a single objective case, but the distinction between accusative and dative is irrelevant here. [↩]
  2. Often the verb will sound wrong here so you have to go with which sentence sounds better rather than which sentence sounds right. [↩]

I’m not stupid, but: what is https about?

May 15th, 2011
by Rich.
No comments yet

Any tech-geek followers of my blog will probably know this inside out, so this one is for the rest of you.

My next entry in the I’m not stupid, but… series is about the difference between http and https in web URLs. We’re all told https is more secure, but there’s a shroud of mystery about what this actually means.

In a nutshell:

  • https prevents anyone but you and the owner of the web site reading your communications.
  • At a public internet connection, not using https means anyone in that same location can steal your login sessions at any sites you visit while there.
  • The certificate proves the owner of the site you are visiting is who they say they are.

When you visit a web site, you are communicating with a computer somewhere else in the world in a language called HTTP. This communication, like all internet traffic, is a bit like sending a letter in the post. The data you send travels from router to router much like a letter travels from sorting office to sorting office until it arrives at its destination.

Just like in the mail, anyone in between you and the destination can open the envelope and read the data contained within. This data could be your username and password when filling in a form, or it could be data coming back from the site with, for example, your bank balance. Moreover, in order that you not have to log in to every page on a site, your browser will usually send something with each communication called an authentication cookie which proves you are already logged in.

The most dangerous place for this kind of information free-for-all is a shared internet connection, such as in a coffee shop. This is a bit like everyone sharing the same post box – when someone goes to put a letter in, they can reach out and grab yours along with it and read anything in it. This type of security breach is easily demonstrated with something called Firesheep, which displays the secret authentication cookies of anyone using non-https sites at the same location as the user and allows that person to steal these login sessions.

A URL beginning https means the HTTP is placed inside something called SSL. SSL is encrypted data: in the mail analogy it is like a special armoured envelope that can only be opened by the recipient to whom you have addressed it. The recipient can still do what he/she likes with the data but no one in between has access to it.

If the site has https for the login form, this will prevent people stealing your password, but if it then redirects you to a plain http site once you are logged in, you are still at risk because your browser is still sending the authentication cookie with every request and other users can use this to “prove” they are you.

Example of certificate information

The final piece of this puzzle is the certificate.

When you visit a web site using https, the browser will look for proof that the site is who it is supposed to be (and not, for example, someone who has stolen the domain name or a rogue internet provider re-routing the traffic). The proof comes in the form of a digital certificate signed by a company that has done a quick background check on the company supposedly in charge of the site.

In the example illustrated, Twitter’s certificate is signed by VeriSign. Because your browser is pre-programmed to trust VeriSign (with its own signed certificate!), the chain of trust is complete.

If you visit a site with https that does not present a certificate, or the certificate is signed by someone your browser does not trust, you will be presented with a large warning advising you to be cautious before proceeding. When this happens, what your browser is telling you is that your data is still unable to be read by anyone except you and the owner of the site, but it can’t verify the owner of the site is who they say they are.

The warning is a bit scary, considering it is still safer than visiting a site using only http, where anyone can read your data and no background checks are done on the owner at all.

The moral of this tale is:

If you are ever logging into a service, and you value the data you are providing to that service, please ensure that service is using https URLs throughout.

Some sites, such as Twitter and Facebook, require you to enable this option in your settings, and it is very wise to do so. Many other sites simply do not support this. If you consider your data valuable, please write to the provider of the service, requesting that they enable this feature!

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The Yes vote needs you!

May 1st, 2011
by Rich.
No comments yet

The opinion polls are showing the “No” vote in the upcoming referendum on whether to adopt AV for parliamentary elections as being a dead cert. The “Yes” campaign needs as many votes as it can possibly get!

Please get to a polling station on 5th May and cast your vote. Don’t waste it because you think the voting system doesn’t matter.

Here are the reasons you should vote “Yes”, in a nutshell:

  • Under the current system, an MP can be elected when a huge majority of the voting population votes against that candidate. Here’s a perfect example using beer and coffee to illustrate this. In a real decision-making situation like this, people would say “well, 70% of us want beer so let’s pick the pub we most agree on”.
  • Under the current system, a vote for the candidate of your choice can be considered a “wasted” vote, because by voting for your favourite candidate from a non-major political party you are surrendering your right to decide which of the major political parties you prefer. This illustration of someone going out to buy you sweets is perfect.
  • The BNP are opposing the “Yes” campaign because it would likely not give them an advantage. But if it does give the will of the people the chance to elect BNP representatives, shouldn’t that be allowed? This is supposed to be a democracy, after all.

Please, please, please, get out and vote on 5th May. This is important and it will change politics for the better if it happens!

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