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alexis ridler
Guest
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| Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2004 8:45 pm
Post subject: which vs. that |
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As a native English speaker I like to pride myself on my good English
usage. However, I was helping an Arabic PhD student I know read through
his thesis recently, and he asked me when to use which as opposed to
that. Sadly I was completely unable to help. Any ideas?
And while I'm here, anyone care to explain the difference between a code
and a cipher?
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Don Phillipson
Guest
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| Posted: Thu Oct 14, 2004 2:57 am
Post subject: Re: which vs. that |
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"alexis ridler" <alexis.ridler@durham.ac.uk> wrote in message
news:ckjf34$n5t$2@heffalump.dur.ac.uk...
| Quote: | As a native English speaker I like to pride myself on my good English
usage. However, I was helping an Arabic PhD student I know read through
his thesis recently, and he asked me when to use which as opposed to
that. Sadly I was completely unable to help. Any ideas?
|
Some references discuss this at length, e.g. Fowler,
Gower, Chicago Manual of Style etc.
| Quote: | And while I'm here, anyone care to explain the difference between a code
and a cipher?
|
A cipher can (or could before 64-bit computer
software) be deciphered. A code cannot be
deciphered: you either know the secret meaning
or not.
Both are commonly used together, cf. a notable
American intelligence achievement in 1942, when
smaller US fleets faced larger Japanese fleets in
the Pacific. US intelligence could decipher much
of the enciphered Japanese traffic, but did not know
what the code names for various places signified.
An important place was Midway Island, likely to
be attacked next. Midway was secretly instructed
to add t routine daily radio messages the information
that its water-distillation plant had broken down.
US intelligence deciphered later Japanese signals
reporting AF was short of water. This confirmed
that AF was the code for Midway Island. After
another successful cipher solution, Admiral
Nimitz knew Japan had radioed orders to attack
the Aleutians June 2 and Midway June 3, 1944.
Many books tell this story. The encryption system
the Japanese used for their radio messages was a
cipher and AF=Midway was an item of code.
--
Don Phillipson
Carlsbad Springs
(Ottawa, Canada) |
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Peter Duncanson
Guest
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| Posted: Thu Oct 14, 2004 4:57 am
Post subject: Re: which vs. that |
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On Wed, 13 Oct 2004 16:57:05 -0400, "Don Phillipson"
<d.phillipson@ttrryytteell.com> wrote:
| Quote: | "alexis ridler" <alexis.ridler@durham.ac.uk> wrote in message
news:ckjf34$n5t$2@heffalump.dur.ac.uk...
As a native English speaker I like to pride myself on my good English
usage. However, I was helping an Arabic PhD student I know read through
his thesis recently, and he asked me when to use which as opposed to
that. Sadly I was completely unable to help. Any ideas?
Some references discuss this at length, e.g. Fowler,
Gower, Chicago Manual of Style etc.
And while I'm here, anyone care to explain the difference between a code
and a cipher?
A cipher can (or could before 64-bit computer
software) be deciphered. A code cannot be
deciphered: you either know the secret meaning
or not.
Both are commonly used together, cf. a notable
American intelligence achievement in 1942, when
smaller US fleets faced larger Japanese fleets in
the Pacific. US intelligence could decipher much
of the enciphered Japanese traffic, but did not know
what the code names for various places signified.
An important place was Midway Island, likely to
be attacked next. Midway was secretly instructed
to add t routine daily radio messages the information
that its water-distillation plant had broken down.
US intelligence deciphered later Japanese signals
reporting AF was short of water. This confirmed
that AF was the code for Midway Island. After
another successful cipher solution, Admiral
Nimitz knew Japan had radioed orders to attack
the Aleutians June 2 and Midway June 3, 1944.
Many books tell this story. The encryption system
the Japanese used for their radio messages was a
cipher and AF=Midway was an item of code.
|
That is one example of the usage of the words.
In computing usage a code is simply a means of representing something, as
for example a character code. A code is not necessarily secret.
The TechEncyclopedia at Techweb
http://www.techweb.com/encyclopedia/
<quote>
cipher An encoded character. See ciphertext and cryptography.
ciphertext Data that has been coded (enciphered, encrypted, encoded) for
security purposes. Contrast with plaintext and cleartext. See cryptography.
cryptography The conversion of data into a secret code for transmission
over a public network. The original text, or "plaintext," is converted into
a coded equivalent called "ciphertext" via an encryption algorithm. The
ciphertext is decoded (decrypted) at the receiving end and turned back into
plaintext.
</quote>
--
Peter Duncanson
UK (posting from a.e.u)
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George
Guest
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| Posted: Thu Oct 14, 2004 10:21 am
Post subject: Re: which vs. that |
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alexis ridler <alexis.ridler@durham.ac.uk> wrote:
| Quote: | As a native English speaker I like to pride myself on my good English
usage. However, I was helping an Arabic PhD student I know read through
his thesis recently, and he asked me when to use which as opposed to
that. Sadly I was completely unable to help. Any ideas?
|
That specifies which one.
example:
I have a car. I only have one car and that car is parked in the
driveway.
I would write: My car, which is parked in the driveway, is blue in
color.
However, if I have two cars, one parked in the driveway and the other
one parked in the garage, then I would write:
My car that is parked in the driveway is blue in color.
"Which" introduces an unnecessary clause because I only have one car.
"That" is necessary. Without it you would not know which car I was
talking about.
I think it is more common for people to use "which" when they should
use "that" than the other way around.
| Quote: | And while I'm here, anyone care to explain the difference between a code
and a cipher? |
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Odysseus
Guest
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| Posted: Thu Oct 14, 2004 12:41 pm
Post subject: Re: which vs. that |
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Don Phillipson wrote:
| Quote: |
"alexis ridler" <alexis.ridler@durham.ac.uk> wrote in message
news:ckjf34$n5t$2@heffalump.dur.ac.uk...
As a native English speaker I like to pride myself on my good English
usage. However, I was helping an Arabic PhD student I know read through
his thesis recently, and he asked me when to use which as opposed to
that. Sadly I was completely unable to help. Any ideas?
Some references discuss this at length, e.g. Fowler,
Gower, Chicago Manual of Style etc.
Here are a couple of the articles that turned up in a quick search |
from the AUE FAQ page:
<http://alt-usage-english.org/excerpts/fxthatvs.html>
<http://www-personal.umich.edu/~jlawler/aue/xmasthat.html>
| Quote: | And while I'm here, anyone care to explain the difference between a code
and a cipher?
A cipher can (or could before 64-bit computer
software) be deciphered. A code cannot be
deciphered: you either know the secret meaning
or not.
[snip illustration] |
At least loosely speaking, one might say that deciphering is to
decoding as transliteration is to translation.
--
Odysseus |
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