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From: tmb@talcott.UUCP (Thomas M. Breuel)
Newsgroups: net.jokes,net.nlang
Subject: Re: German translation of English computer terms
Message-ID: <515@talcott.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 24-Sep-85 13:20:10 EDT
Article-I.D.: talcott.515
Posted: Tue Sep 24 13:20:10 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 28-Sep-85 08:03:33 EDT
References: <312@bcsaic.UUCP>
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Xref: watmath net.jokes:14299 net.nlang:3602

In article <312@bcsaic.UUCP>, stuart@bcsaic.UUCP (stuart gove) writes:
> The following is taken from the _Harper Dictionary of Contemporary
> Usage_:
> The sentence, "He updated the file," translates into German as
> 	"Er hat die Datei upgedated"
> with the "a" in "upgedated" pronounced long.
> Also, the German phrase for "software" is
> 	"immaterielle Ware".

Well, then the dictionary is wrong. Those two translations are the
most ridiculous ones I have ever heard. Correct translations are:
"He updated the file":
	"Er hat die Datei auf den neusten Stand gebracht."
	"Er hat die Datei geschrieben."
"Software":
	"Software" (pronounced as in English, a loanword)
	"Programme"

The German language, like the Japanese and French languages, borrow
many technical terms from the English language. The reason is not
that the languages themselves would be inadequate to express the
same concept (in fact, in German there is a German term for practically
any English technical term), but that most research articles nowadays
are written in English and that the English terms are therefore used
much more frequently.

Sorry for being so sensitive about this, but please realise that
it is the dictionary that is funny, not the language. There are
indeed people who speak like your dictionary, but such people are
usually not taken seriously. The first translation you gave sounds
like a barbaric neologism, the second translation like a sales
representative who doesn't know what he is talking about.

					Thomas.


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