Bloody smartphone user comprehension

[AnthonyL]

Otherwise intelligent people appear not to comprehend clearly written
messages and it seems clear that this is because they are using their
smartphones. Either they are not concentrating when they deal with
the message, maybe because they are crossing the road at the time or
watching TV, or they simply miss sentences because the screens are too
small.

When they respond their messages are littered with grammatical
mistakes and spelling errors that they would never commit in a letter
plus failing to deal with the subject matter.

Do I have to write:

"Please read ALL this email on a proper computer" at the top of every
email I send out or do I have to rephrase everything to no more than
two syllables and one sentence?

aaaaarrrrrrgggggggghhhhhhh!!!


--
AnthonyL

Why ever wait to finish a job before starting the next?

[Woody]

The biggest cause of many of these 'issues' is that they have the spell
checker on all the time and as they cannot spell themselves they rely
upon whatever the spell checker offers. Unfortunately they have never
bothered to check (if they even know how) that the phone is set up for
UK English and not the default US English!

This response was typed on a desktop machine without the use of a spell
checker even though said facility is set to UK English!

[MB]

On 25/08/2021 20:28, AnthonyL wrote:
> "Please read ALL this email on a proper computer" at the top of every
> email I send out or do I have to rephrase everything to no more than
> two syllables and one sentence?

Some never seem to use a proper computer now.

[Abandoned_Trolley]

>
> Some never seem to use a proper computer now.
>
>

It’s a question of definition I suppose.

Long ago and far away, when the DEC PDP8 was introduced, I believe it
was defined as a "mini-computer" on the grounds that you could plug it
in to a "wall outlet" - so no need to plumb it in to a 3 phase supply.

So I guess my Ford Focus is fitted with an improper computer

I know somebody who has a rather expensive smartphone (possibly a HTC
model) fitted with a mini HDMI port which is connected to a massive
monitor. There’s another connection to a USB hub, and a keyboard and
mouse hanging off that.

He runs an Android application from Microsoft which provides some sort
of virtual desktop (hosted by some box in his garage) and the end result
is that it all looks "proper" to me.

We have already seen a massive migration of applications in to web
interfaces and as more and more stuff moves to "The Cloud" there might
be almost no need for native applications at all.

There’s already a whole generation of people out there who have never
owned a desktop, so you might say that the move away from "proper
computers" is well under way.


--
random signature text inserted here

[David Rance]

Whether or not I'm reading on a phone, tablet or desktop computer, I
find that I miss things that I would normally have no problem with had
it been written with a pen and paper. I don't know why this is. Perhaps
my eyes find a screen more tiring than paper.

Regarding spelling, I agree with you. Even though I check my spelling as
I go along, nevertheless, when I've finished, I still read through what
I've written at least once, more if it's quite long, and it's surprising
just how many mistakes are still there. My guess is that most people
never go back and check what they've written - or *think* they've
written!

One of my daughters has a spell checker and she never checks what her
spell checker has changed, thus some of her messages are quite
incomprehensible and I have to ask her to explain!

("Incomprehensible" - was that too long?) ;-)

More than twenty years ago, when I ran a bulletin board, I had an
American user who often used to summon me to chat. He would type very
fast but full of mistakes. He noticed the mistakes very quickly and
backspaced to correct them, so his typing, in the long run, was slower
than if he'd typed slower with fewer mistakes in the first place. Very
tedious! (He was a research scholar at Oxford - or so he told me!
Something to do with social psychology.)

David

--
David Rance writing from Caversham, Reading, UK

[Adrian Caspersz]

On 25/08/2021 20:28, AnthonyL wrote:

> Otherwise intelligent people appear not to comprehend clearly written
> messages and it seems clear that this is because they are using their
> smartphones.

Some intelligent people plainly make decisions about what is truly
important and de-prioritise the less important tasks.

If they had to be spelling perfect (if their job depended on it), their
writing would be as such. Everything else is trivial and is dealt with
accordingly.

Maybe understanding the proper use of their mobile phone is beneath them.

--
Adrian C

[notya...@gmail.com]

I have found that if I am riding in a bus, tram or train, the movement of the train results in different letters being selected on a touch screen. The spell checker then corrects these to something else [or not]. Even when not travelling my "fat fingers" result in many more typos on a phone or tablet than a proper keyboard.

Still hardly mind bending.

Leonid Brezhnev's joke: -

A prominent radical had been seized by the Okhranka and the Tsar was asked what to do with him, so he sent a cable "Pardon, impossible execute.". Unfortunately the telegraphist mistyped the message so it read "Pardon impossible, execute." so the man was shot.

[Abandoned_Trolley]

is this another version of the "doctors handwriting" theory ?

[AnthonyL]

On Thu, 26 Aug 2021 02:34:51 -0700 (PDT), "notya...@gmail.com"
<notya...@gmail.com> wrote:

>On Wednesday, 25 August 2021 at 20:28:31 UTC+1, AnthonyL wrote:

>> Otherwise intelligent people appear not to comprehend clearly written=20
>> messages and it seems clear that this is because they are using their=20
>> smartphones. Either they are not concentrating when they deal with=20
>> the message, maybe because they are crossing the road at the time or=20
>> watching TV, or they simply miss sentences because the screens are too=20
>> small.=20
>>=20
>> When they respond their messages are littered with grammatical=20
>> mistakes and spelling errors that they would never commit in a letter=20
>> plus failing to deal with the subject matter.=20
>>=20
>> Do I have to write:=20
>>=20
>> "Please read ALL this email on a proper computer" at the top of every=20
>> email I send out or do I have to rephrase everything to no more than=20
>> two syllables and one sentence?=20
>>=20
>> aaaaarrrrrrgggggggghhhhhhh!!!=20
>>=20
>>=20
>> --=20
>> AnthonyL=20
>>=20

>> Why ever wait to finish a job before starting the next?
>

>I have found that if I am riding in a bus, tram or train, the movement of t=
>he train results in different letters being selected on a touch screen. Th=
>e spell checker then corrects these to something else [or not]. Even when =
>not travelling my "fat fingers" result in many more typos on a phone or tab=
>let than a proper keyboard.
>

Does it also stop you from understanding the words that were written?

[AnthonyL]

I'm not just talking about spelling, I'm talking also about
comprehension. So these people who prioritise to the point of
mis-reading the message cause another message to be sent to clarify
that which was clearly written in the first place - such as this
message!!

It even gets worse when the original message included a cc and within
just a few iterations a dozen emails are floating around including
correct responses to the original and incorrect responses to the
explanatory message.

I'm not seeing a good use of time here for those that have
misunderstood what is important. One of the mis-readers of one of my
messages actually had the humility to apologise for not reading to the
end.

Perfect examples of this phenomenon is the mess customer service
personnel get into when the message requires more than a Yes/No
response. On a recent post I made to uk.legal.moderated I bemoaned
the fact that I could not extract an official receipt from a financial
institution to whom I had paid the princely sum of £15 for a service.
When I made this a formal and written (a posted letter) complaint, and
one which would have come under the remit of the Financial Conduct
Authority a literate person read all the email and noted all the phone
calls, apologised for their failure to understand my request and sent
me £35 for my troubles.

Whether any of the above was a result of smartphone usage I don't know
but if the levels of comprehension fail on a proper (large screen)
computer then I despair for a generation that is going to fix all the
problems us older folk have bestowed upon them.

Whilst I'm in rant mode my electricity supplier has emailed to say
they are ready to fit a smart meter. I responded:

>Dear Sirs

>Please have on written record that we do not wish to have smart meters installed.

>Thank you

>Anthony Lees

to which they replied:

>Hello Anthony,

>Thanks for getting in touch with us here at xxx

>It has been noted on your account that you do not wish to have a smart meter installed.

>Kind Regards,

A few days later I receive an email saying:

>Hi Anthony,

>We know you’re busy, but we haven’t heard from you yet about fitting smart meters for you.

To which I reply:

>You have heard from us. You're supposed to have a note on the file to say we have responded. Can you check that it is there and if it is why have we received this email?

Their response:

>Hi Anthony,

>I can see on your account that you have stated that you are not interested in having a smart meter installed. However that was set as: not interested, please contact again later. I have amended it to show you are not interested and to not send you any future correspondence in regards to smart meters. I can confirm that you will not receive any future messages about smart meters.

>If there is anything that we can assist you with, please don't hesitate to get in touch.

What a load of nonsense and a waste of time.

[Chris]

AnthonyL <nos...@please.invalid> wrote:
> Otherwise intelligent people appear not to comprehend clearly written
> messages and it seems clear that this is because they are using their
> smartphones. Either they are not concentrating when they deal with
> the message, maybe because they are crossing the road at the time or
> watching TV, or they simply miss sentences because the screens are too
> small.
>
> When they respond their messages are littered with grammatical
> mistakes and spelling errors that they would never commit in a letter

What's "a letter"? :p

[BrightsideS9]

On Thu, 26 Aug 2021 19:07:55 -0000 (UTC), Chris <ithi...@gmail.com>
wrote:

Paper stuff, often from the constabulary. 8-)

brightside S9

[David Rance]

On 25/08/2021 20:28, AnthonyL wrote:

>>>When they respond their messages are littered with grammatical
>>>mistakes and spelling errors that they would never commit in a
>>>letter plus failing to deal with the subject matter.

I quite agree that the level of grammar is lamentable these days!

However:

On Thu, 26 Aug 2021 12:19:48 AnthonyL wrote:

>Whether any of the above was a result of smartphone usage I don't know
>but if the levels of comprehension fail on a proper (large screen)
>computer then I despair for a generation that is going to fix all the
>problems us older folk have bestowed upon them.

"us older folk"?

"Us older folk" is the start of a subordinate clause and therefore "us"
is the subject of "have bestowed" which means that it should be "we
older folk have bestowed ... " (nominative case)

Well, it's all a matter of degree, isn't it? Did that mistake stop us
from understanding your sentence? No, I wouldn't have thought so, but at
what point do we stop ignoring grammatical mistakes? Is everyone's
threshold of understanding the same?

Yes, I get *very* irritated at spelling mistakes and bad grammar but,
since English grammar stopped being taught in our schools, I'm afraid
that we're stuck with it. ;-)

Have you ever read "Eats shoots and leaves" by Lynne Truss?

David (probably one of the oldest folk here and a first class pedant!)

[Tweed]

The point is that English has grammar guidelines, not rules. Alleged
guardians of “the rules” are self appointed.

[David Rance]

On Fri, 27 Aug 2021 09:15:37 Tweed wrote:

>The point is that English has grammar guidelines, not rules. Alleged
>guardians of “the rules” are self appointed.

Ah, such liberal thinking is the result of modern education! :-)

David

[Java Jive]

On 27/08/2021 10:03, David Rance wrote:
>
> David (probably one of the oldest folk here and a first class pedant!)

And even has an appropriate name! Sounds like 'rants'! :-)

--

Fake news kills!

I may be contacted via the contact address given on my website:
www.macfh.co.uk

[Tweed]

David Rance <david...@SPAMOFF.invalid> wrote:
> On Fri, 27 Aug 2021 09:15:37 Tweed wrote:
>
>> The point is that English has grammar guidelines, not rules. Alleged
>> guardians of “the rules” are self appointed.
>
> Ah, such liberal thinking is the result of modern education! :-)
>
> David
>

I’m afraid my eduction was long ago, still had O levels and the 11 plus.
However, having travelled around a bit I realise how flexible English can
be, which is probably one of its strengths.

[David Rance]

On Fri, 27 Aug 2021 11:56:25 Java Jive wrote:

>On 27/08/2021 10:03, David Rance wrote:
>> David (probably one of the oldest folk here and a first class
>>pedant!)
>
>And even has an appropriate name! Sounds like 'rants'! :-)

Ha ha! It's actually pronounced with a long "a" and rhymes with "France"
as it would be in the south of England!

Some Rances pronounce it "Rants" but we don't recognise them! ;-)

David

[Java Jive]

On 27/08/2021 13:25, David Rance wrote:
>
> "France" as it would be in the south of England!

That'll be the day, France in the south of England! However would all
those Brexiteers cope?

[MB]

On 26/08/2021 09:38, Abandoned_Trolley wrote:
> We have already seen a massive migration of applications in to web
> interfaces and as more and more stuff moves to "The Cloud" there might
> be almost no need for native applications at all.

I wrote in another newsgroup taht many years ago Guy Kewney wrote that
originally computers were big things controlled by the equivalent of the
IT department. If you asked them nicely then they might run your work,
at their convenience of course.

Then desktop computers came along with applications that allowed people
to do all their work without having to beg the IT people to do it and so
they lost their power.

But the computers started to be connected to the network so "IT"
regained their power especially after the applications were housed on
the network and the desktop computer became a glorified dumb terminal.

This seems to have continued with the "cloud" and Mordac the Preventer
of Information Services continues to rule in many places.

[Abandoned_Trolley]

Well ... just as many years ago (actually around 1972) I did a bit of a
Fortran course at what was then the North East London Poly.

We scribbled our thoughts out on coding sheets, making sure there was a
diagonal line though all the zeros, and the results were gathered
together and POSTED to the NCC in Manchester.

Some lucky person up there had the task of tapping all this stuff on to
80 column punch cards, which were then stacked up and run through in
some spare "machine time" probably in the middle of the night.

If you were lucky, the results would appear on a printout, which would
then be wrapped around your punch cards, and then posted back to the
college in time for the next lecture.

The idea of even being in the same room as a computer seemed like a
pipedream at the time ....

[Abandoned_Trolley]

> as it would be in the south of England!
>
> Some Rances pronounce it "Rants" but we don't recognise them! ;-)
>
> David
>

Some time in the 80s I did some work at Marconi Space and Defence
Systems with a young bearded chap called John Rance - I wonder if he is
related ?

[David Rance]

On Fri, 27 Aug 2021 18:14:14 Abandoned_Trolley wrote:

>> as it would be in the south of England!
>> Some Rances pronounce it "Rants" but we don't recognise them! ;-)
>> David
>>
>
>Some time in the 80s I did some work at Marconi Space and Defence
>Systems with a young bearded chap called John Rance - I wonder if he is
>related ?

Don't think so. There are more Rances around than you might think,
especially David Rances, though I've never met any of them.

[notya...@gmail.com]

No, but it might make the response a bit weird, or worse result in selecting an incorrect option in a menu.

Consider "I am going to buy a duck". Two typo's result in "I am going to bum a *uck". Where m is one key away and f is adjacent.

[notya...@gmail.com]

Not just that, but language drift - consider how "would and should" and "Will and shall" have shifted from verb conjugation to meaning differing degrees of intent / obligation.

and remember to never split the infinitive, misuse negatives or use a conjunction to end a sentence with...

[Woody]

F is adjacent agreed, but M is two rows away. Eh?

[notya...@gmail.com]

Yup!

> but M is two rows away. Eh?

on my [UK] keyboard the bottom row goes zxcvBnM,. so one [more] key away from B is M. As in next door but one.

One of the ambiguities in English as in there is no equivalent of romance languages "si" e.g. "Have you not posted these letters?" does a plain yes mean affirm the question (have not) or the action (have)?

All the abbreviations used on smart phones make this worse.

[BrightsideS9]

On Sun, 29 Aug 2021 03:54:00 -0700 (PDT), "notya...@gmail.com"

But, as Woody pointed out, your typo example was M for a Y. They are
two rows apart and I imagine there is a very probability of fat
fingers substituting M for Y.low

Your bottom row is standard on various UK keyboards, and on my phone.

>One of the ambiguities in English as in there is no equivalent of romance languages "si" e.g. "Have you not posted these letters?" does a plain yes mean affirm the question (have not) or the action (have)?
>
>All the abbreviations used on smart phones make this worse.

--
brightside S9

[notya...@gmail.com]

Oops confused substituting b instead of y for m.

[BrightsideS9]

Is there some law that states - when commenting on typos in newsgroups
there is always going to be one or more typo in your comment. 8-)

>>One of the ambiguities in English as in there is no equivalent of romance languages "si" e.g. "Have you not posted these letters?" does a plain yes mean affirm the question (have not) or the action (have)?
>>
>>All the abbreviations used on smart phones make this worse.

Brightside S9

[Chris Green]

BrightsideS9 <reply_to_ad...@invalid.invalid> wrote:
> >But, as Woody pointed out, your typo example was M for a Y. They are
> >two rows apart and I imagine there is a very probability of fat
> >fingers substituting M for Y.low
> >
> >Your bottom row is standard on various UK keyboards, and on my phone.
> >
> Is there some law that states - when commenting on typos in newsgroups
> there is always going to be one or more typo in your comment. 8-)
>

Absolutely, it's inevitable! (something about petards should follow)

--
Chris Green
·

[AnthonyL]

On Fri, 27 Aug 2021 10:03:35 +0100, David Rance
<david...@SPAMOFF.invalid> wrote:


>
>On Thu, 26 Aug 2021 12:19:48 AnthonyL wrote:
>
>>Whether any of the above was a result of smartphone usage I don't know
>>but if the levels of comprehension fail on a proper (large screen)
>>computer then I despair for a generation that is going to fix all the
>>problems us older folk have bestowed upon them.
>
>"us older folk"?
>
>"Us older folk" is the start of a subordinate clause and therefore "us"
>is the subject of "have bestowed" which means that it should be "we
>older folk have bestowed ... " (nominative case)
>

Yes, I should have (or for some, "should of") used quotation marks as
it is a colloquial expression, at least around these parts.