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In the interest of making the page the best version of itself, the following phrase makes a mistake often made by native US English speakers: > But, you might

In the interest of making the page the best version of itself, the following phrase makes a mistake often made by native US English speakers: > But, you might wonder how does a Tree-sitter grammar look like, How does $thing look? or What does $thing look like? Similarly, one often hears "Where are we at?" It is common enough to be seen as a regionalism. -- Your friendly tree-sitting grammarian

lawn 3y ago
Huh, I'm not a native English speaker, but I changed it to "what does a Tree-sitter grammar look like". It does sound better.
Joker_vD 3y ago
Interestingly enough, in German and Polish the analogous expression is in fact "how does X look like?" So maybe it's an interference from those two languages? Or maybe it's even a relict of the older English expression, displaced in England by "what does X look like" after the Am/Br language split had happened.
- VyseofArcadia 3y ago
  Anecdotally, I hear the how/what confusion from nearly every non-native English speaker I've ever met, regardless of native language. I wonder if it's one of those little things that's surprisingly rare, like the th sound.
ngai_aku 3y ago
> Similarly, one often hears "Where are we at?" It is common enough to be seen as a regionalism. I’m a native English speaker who says “Where are we at”. I think it’s informal, but I never considered it to be wrong or awkward like the first example. Perhaps I’m in the region where it’s common.
samatman 3y ago
> "Where are we at?" Often elided to "Where we at?". It's dialect, I wouldn't use either in formal/technical writing, but I would unselfconsciously say the latter, as in "ok, moving down the agenda, where we at with item 3?".
airstrike 3y ago
I don't think that's necessarily better... The two alternatives I think parse best are: 1. But you might wonder: what does a Tree-sitter grammar look like, and how do you create one for a language? 2. But you might wonder what a Tree-sitter looks like and how to create one for a language. In either case, I agree the right word is "what" not "how". The comma after "but" bugs me tremendously. The colon can be replaced by an em dash (—) if the writer prefers it—but I would not use a question mark for the second clause without separating it from the first "but you might wonder" in some way. The comma left in alternative #1 is to needed (recommended?) because the "and" is joining two clauses with different subjects. I think it's not strictly needed in alternative #2 because it's really "(but you might wonder (what a tree sitter looks like and how to create one for a language))" where the inner term is a list of things the reader might wonder, and lists with only two items do not take a comma before "and" I would also prefer "Where are we?" over "Where are we at?" Not an English speaker, so just my $0.02.

lawn 3y ago

Huh, I'm not a native English speaker, but I changed it to "what does a Tree-sitter grammar look like". It does sound better.

Joker_vD 3y ago

Interestingly enough, in German and Polish the analogous expression is in fact "how does X look like?" So maybe it's an interference from those two languages? Or maybe it's even a relict of the older English expression, displaced in England by "what does X look like" after the Am/Br language split had happened.

VyseofArcadia 3y ago
Anecdotally, I hear the how/what confusion from nearly every non-native English speaker I've ever met, regardless of native language. I wonder if it's one of those little things that's surprisingly rare, like the th sound.

ngai_aku 3y ago

> Similarly, one often hears "Where are we at?" It is common enough to be seen as a regionalism. I’m a native English speaker who says “Where are we at”. I think it’s informal, but I never considered it to be wrong or awkward like the first example. Perhaps I’m in the region where it’s common.

samatman 3y ago

> "Where are we at?" Often elided to "Where we at?". It's dialect, I wouldn't use either in formal/technical writing, but I would unselfconsciously say the latter, as in "ok, moving down the agenda, where we at with item 3?".

airstrike 3y ago

I don't think that's necessarily better... The two alternatives I think parse best are: 1. But you might wonder: what does a Tree-sitter grammar look like, and how do you create one for a language? 2. But you might wonder what a Tree-sitter looks like and how to create one for a language. In either case, I agree the right word is "what" not "how". The comma after "but" bugs me tremendously. The colon can be replaced by an em dash (—) if the writer prefers it—but I would not use a question mark for the second clause without separating it from the first "but you might wonder" in some way. The comma left in alternative #1 is to needed (recommended?) because the "and" is joining two clauses with different subjects. I think it's not strictly needed in alternative #2 because it's really "(but you might wonder (what a tree sitter looks like and how to create one for a language))" where the inner term is a list of things the reader might wonder, and lists with only two items do not take a comma before "and" I would also prefer "Where are we?" over "Where are we at?" Not an English speaker, so just my $0.02.