ToBE #16 : How is the climate outside?

How often do we ask the question, "How is the climate today?"?

Quite often, we suppose. Is something wrong with the sentence?

Yes, unfortunately.

Climate: Climate pertains to the atmospheric conditions that typically prevail in a particular region. It does not capture the conditions prevalent at a specific time (say, today), but talks about it in general.
Examples:-

• Coorg has a cool climate.
• People from a warm climate can adapt well to the Chennai summer.

Climate: 'Climate' also stands for a general prevailing condition of the mind or situation.
Examples:-

• There is a climate of uncertainty in the IT sector.
• The climate of terror forced people to leave the country.

Weather: The atmospheric conditions of a place at a specific time.
Examples:-

• How the weather yesterday in Hyderabad?
• Did you have rainy weather in Mahabaleshwar last week?

Of course, the following statement, though it seems to contradict our earlier definition, is valid in the context:
"In today's climate, getting a job in a courier company is easy".
Here it means that in the current state of affairs and does not refer to time specified by 'today'.

Summary: 'Climate' is general. 'Weather' is with respect to a specific area and time.

ToBE #15 : Have fun with hyphen

The hyphen has come to be the most dispensable and abused of all punctuation marks. On most occasions, it is unceremoniously dropped without wondering what the impact on the meaning is. Sometimes, it is added where it is not necessary.

An interesting situation came to light while reviewing a presentation given to a prospective customer. Part of the slide said:
Purpose

• End User Satisfaction

The presenter meant to say, "We will provide satisfaction to the users". What the sentence meant: "We will end/terminate the user's satisfaction".
The difference :
End user : Finish the user, or terminate the user as in "Please end the call". Here 'end' is used as a verb, an action.
End-user : The user at the end of the process. Here 'end-' qualifies what kind of user we are talking about.

In general, the hyphen is to be used under the following circumstances.

1. To connect parts of compound words.
Son-in-law, president-elect, commander-in-chief, partner-in-crime.

2 (a). To separate a prefix and a word when the prefix can not be used as a word by itself.
Bi-weekly, Multi-tasking.
In the above examples, the hyphen can be omitted.

2 (b). However, when such a prefix ends with a vowel and the word starts with a vowel, a hyphen is necessary to indicate that the two vowels need to be pronounced separately.
Co-operation, pre-eminent.

3. To qualify a subsequent word, two independent words are joined by a hyphen.
He is the well-known philospher. (Here we are qualifying the philosopher as well-known.)
This is my brand-new bike.
The main objective of this ticketing system is to achieve end-user satisfaction.
The steady-state theory is more logical.
The application has reached a steady state. (No hyphen)

4. For numbers.
Ninety-five, twenty-three, one-third, five-eighths.

ToBE #14 : Same words, different meanings - Part 2

In continuation to ToBE #6, we shall discuss some similar sounding but different meaning words that are sometimes used interchangeably.

affect /effect : Note the first letter that differs.

Affect : To have an impact on. Eg.:-

• I did not know that the news would affect him badly.
• The interior parts of the state were not affected by the tsunami.

Effect : As a noun, 'effect' means 'result' or 'impact/influence'. Eg.:-

• See the effect of keeping the magnet near the pins.
• Too much TV can have a bad effect on eyesight.

Effect : As a verb, 'effect' means 'to cause' or 'to result in'. Eg.:-

• The parliamentary election results effected a change in the state government's style of functioning.
• Who would have expected an earthquake in Indonesia to effect so much damage in India?

sink/synch : Pronunciation is the same for both. Some people don't know the spelling of the latter word.

Sink : 'to drown' or 'a place to wash vessels'. Eg.:-

• A stone dropped in a well would sink immediately.
• Can you please keep the unwashed dishes in the sink?

Sync/Synch : Both spellings are correct. Short for 'synchronise(d)' or 'to be in tune/agreement with', sync/synch should not be used in formal communication.

• Are you in synch with me on this design strategy?

reminder/remainder : Please note the 'a' in the second word that makes it different from the first.

Reminder : That which brings back to the mind is reminder. Eg.:-

• I have to set a reminder to publish "ToBE #14" by 7 PM.

Remainder : That which remains is remainder. Eg.:-

• Subtract 4 from 7 and 3 is the remainder.