Trying to speak about "logiciel libre"

Tomasz Wegrzanowski taw at users.sourceforge.net
Wed May 15 23:40:59 UTC 2002


On Thu, May 16, 2002 at 12:27:06AM +0100, phil hunt wrote:
> On Wednesday 15 May 2002  7:21 pm, Tomasz Wegrzanowski wrote:
> > On Wed, May 15, 2002 at 05:00:47PM +0100, phil hunt wrote:
> > > Personally, I think "freedom software" would be a good term, since
> > > it loses the ambiguity ...
> >
> > .... and gramatical correctness.
> 
> On the contrary, "freedom software" *is* grammatically correct, even 
> if it is a bit odd-sounding. The grammar-rule in question is something
> like:
> 
>    noun_expression : modifier noun
> 
>    modifier : adjective | noun
> 
> IOW, an ordinary noun can be used as a modifier.
> 
> You can tell whether a modifier is an adjective by seeing if it can 
> be used after "be". Examples:
> 
>    "the red car" > "the car is red"
>  
> Therefore "red" is an adjective 
> 
>    "the image conversion" > *"the conversion is image"
> 
> Therefore "image" is a noun

Your grammar is flawed, as it:
* allows many ungrammatical contructions
* has one rule for different relations

Relation in 'image conversion' is:
image conversion ::= conversion that-acts-on image

Relation in 'red car' is:
red car ::= car is red

So in 'freedom software' it will be:
freedom software ::= software that-acts-on freedom  

What makes no sense.

You can use some nouns as adjectives, for example
noun 'computer' can be used in some contexts as
adjective 'computer' (computer program), but
word 'freedom' can't because it's adjective form is 'free'.
That's why the proper form is 'free software' not 'freedom software'.



More information about the Discussion mailing list