Re: [Usability] "About" menu items galore...

[Shaun McCance <shaunm gmail com>]

On Thu, 2005-07-21 at 11:52 +0100, Alan Horkan wrote:
> On Thu, 21 Jul 2005, Shaun McCance wrote:
> > 4) Titlepage is a word.
> 
> Or it is is two words, which I think was the original point being made.
> 
> There must be lots of really good German programmers because I cannot
> think why so many developers have a fascination with creating new compound
> words.  Sure it is fine in German and in compound words like website occur
> in common usage a lot but web site is marginally easier to read and keeps
> spellcheckers happy so I tend to split the compound words where the
> spellchecker disagrees with me.

The one-word variant is in Webster.  Whether or not it's the preferred
form to use is another question.  All you have to do is grap a copy of
the Chicago Manual of Style and find its recommendation.  In fact, I'll
bet it even recommends "title page".  But it is in the dictionary.

And please, let's not blame the modern German-speaking programmer for
something English speakers have been doing for centuries.  Sure, German
does it a lot.  A whole lot.  But we've been making new words by putting
together old words for a long time.  They're all over our language, and
you use them all the time.  Here's a small sampling:

airplane
barnyard
bedroom
bookshelf
cannonball
clothesline
fingertip
firearm
fireplace
firewall
foothill
headphones
heartbeat
kneecap
landslide
layman
loudspeaker
mealtime
nobleman
oatmeal
paycheck
pocketbook
racetrack
raindrop
sandpaper
shoelace
toothpaste

--
Shaun