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I just see your side note now, and this non-English speaker is curious: I thought this was correct. You start with 'a downgrade of the UI'. Then you shorten

I just see your side note now, and this non-English speaker is curious: I thought this was correct. You start with 'a downgrade of the UI'. Then you shorten to 'a UI downgrade'. Now you you have 2 vowels 'a' and 'U' next to each other, so you must drop an 'n' in between to ease pronouncing it..

Sohcahtoa82 3y ago
Whether it's "a" or "an" is not about the letters, it's about the sound. When saying letters, in English, "U" is pronounced "yoo". The Y sound, being a consonant, will mean the correct indefinite article is "a". Contrasted with German, I know they just pronounce it like "oo" with no y-sound preceding it. If you pronounce the letter "U" like that, then using "an" would be correct. a/an being about the sound and not the letter is also why "an hour" is correct, despite H being a consonant, because the H is silent. That all being said, you'll find people argue over whether "an historical event" or "a historical event" is correct.