The use of 'next' in parsing

[Grant]

Just to see what others think....and maybe change someday in MLO...

I find that using 'next Monday'  does not parse to the coming Monday, but the one after the coming Monday.

There is always a debate around the use of 'this'  vs 'next'  when referring dates, so there is no one answer.

My PoV is that MLO should use the strict interpretation, and next should refer to the 'next in the order of things',  eg 'next monday'  means the one that occurs next, after today.  All other interpretations are based on a regional, or cultural 'common use'  interpretation of the English language and are prone to introducing confusion... 

What is your PoV?

(have fun)

[Stéph]

I agree completely.

[Dwight Arthur]

Just a question: the issue is simplest when discussing Mondays and gets tougher later in the week. On Thursday, your proposal would make "next Friday" synonymous with "tomorrow". Are you really comfortable with this?

-Dwight

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "MyLifeOrganized" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to mylifeorganiz...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/mylifeorganized/1ed788fd-9032-4057-a325-51122ed94cb8n%40googlegroups.com.

[Grant]

Ah, good point.  No, I am not totally comfortable with my PoV.  I found this good summary of the issue https://englishlessonsbrighton.co.uk/this-next-day-week/. 

The best way to match with common usage would be for 'This' to refer to days in the current week, and 'Next' to refer to days in the next week.  This would require MLO to also take note of which day a user starts their week on (Sunday or Monday), or better yet, to separately ask the user when they want their 'parsing week'  to start (eg my work week start on Monday, but my cultural week starts on Sunday - and this is likely to vary per religion/culture/language).

Alas, I suspect there where still be exceptions where someone would complain.   Thus, maybe it still is best to use 'next' for the next day in the sequence, and to document that in the Help text.  Then it works one (most logical)  way for everyone.

In closing, I finally looked in the HELP file for how MLO implements this, and they have chosen their own logical approach, which is consistent, if also not fully adapted to actual usage:

        Friday        (nearest Friday in future)

        next Friday        (next Friday after nearest Friday in future)

This I can live with, and I am sure its easier to program around ;-)

-Grant

[Dwight Arthur]

Your proposed scenario with this week, next week works pretty well most of the time. But it's not perfect. If a Christian American, whose weeks start Sunday, says "this Sunday" when today is Saturday, common sense would parse it as "tomorrow" but your algorithm would yield "six days ago"

I believe that "this" and "next" are inherently ambiguous. Avoiding ambiguity requires syntax like "this coming Sunday" 

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/mylifeorganized/6ba5ff4b-273d-4086-bd70-883b3de03b1fn%40googlegroups.com.

[imajeff]

Dwight now I'm confused because no post I see on this thread forgot to specify that the parser should never assume a day already completed. They say, "after today" and "future".

I think in the parser, "next" should not assume whether it should mean next week or two from now, but there should be a quick way to say how many Fridays from now. 

Still the most important thing is that I know what the language means to the recipient, so I'll accept whatever if well documented.

I used to prefer that people not say "it will be next Friday" but "it will be Friday next" because I would be sure they meant "next week" but that feels wierd these days so I just try to say "this week" or "next week" if I want them to be sure, or say just tell me the date.

[Grant]

I failed to mention that I am sensitive to this topic because I grew up in North America, but have lived in Europe for 35 years now. I regularly have a miss communication with people here for just this reason…. So indeed I try to double check when someone says “next” .. I don’t think there is on answer for international use, so best to always confirm with a date when sharing with others.

[Dwight Arthur]

I agree with the "always confirm" advice. Here's another concern: is 3/11/21 the third of November or the 11th of Mar?  I would like too see more use of this unambiguous format: 11Mar21

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/mylifeorganized/322206d2-5130-40ad-8623-ab645580fc81n%40googlegroups.com.