atw: Re: What do dialog boxes do?

Howard.Silcock@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
Someone asked me recently whether I thought we should say 'a dialog box displays', 'a dialog box is displayed', or something else. I told her what I thought, but I'd be interested to see what terminology others on this list use.

I said I objected to 'a dialog box displays', because if you look in a dictionary you'll see that 'display' is shown as 'verb (t)' [Macquarie Online], meaning that it's a *transitive* verb. (If you're not familiar with this terminology, a transitive verb is one that must have a direct object. An example is the verb 'hit': you can't just say 'I hit', because you have to hit SOMETHING. ) So a dialog box can only display SOMETHING. I suppose you could say 'a dialog box displays itself', but that sounds too weird to me. 


Our style guide recommends against saying "a dialog box
displays" for a different reason: "display" is often used
as a noun in technical documentation so using it as a verb
as well can cause confusion. We use what you favour: "a
dialog box appears." We accept "a dialog is displayed" but
prefer to avoid passive voice.

***********************************************************
Janice Gelb          | The only connection Sun has with
janice.gelb@xxxxxxx  | this message is the return address.

"These are my opinions.  If they were the Biblical
truth, your bushes would be burning -- Randy Lander


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