Haecceity - 3:08 pm on Jan 6, 2007 (gmt 0)

Slightly off topic here, but perhaps related, is the puzzlement I experience that so many people who write slovenly English, with seemingly no ability to distinguish between there and their, or it's and its, or right and write, and who think that an algorithm is an algorhythm (or worse), and that a website is a websight or webcite, are somehow able to be be completely fluent in php.

Obviously the attention to detail that you develop when writing code doesn't translate into writing prose.

Maybe it happens because when you misplace a semicolon in php your entire site (okay, I know there's no such thing as a "site") falls down and so you go fix your syntax, whereas even with egregious flaws in your use of English people can still more or less figure out what you mean.

I suppose it would be unkind to reply to an ungrammatical post by writing something like "Parse error: syntax error, unexpected apostrophe in the word 'its' in post #3906666 on line 2." But it might lead to better writing! ;)