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  EDline Vol. 8, no. 13    (17 February 2003)

  Editorial mailing list (digest version)
  Published by the Electric Editors
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  Contents:

         Q & A
  [2xn]  Prefix problems: 'e-'

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---[2]-- Q & A --------------------------------------------------

         Date: Mon, 10 Feb 2003
         From: Alison Southby, southby@intracen.org

The report I'm editing today includes this sentence:

  Considerable progress was made in the area of "e" in terms of
  field-based capacity building in "e" and delivery of technical
  assistance through "e". 

Has anyone seen "e" used like this before, i.e. to indicate
e-trade and general electronic information sharing? It doesn't
seem like standard usage to me.

Any suggestions for turning it into more standard English without
adding lots of extra words?


         ----------------------
         Date: Mon, 10 Feb 2003
         From: Christopher Pipe, watermark@britishlibrary.net

How about the following?

  We spent several terms going round and round the field
  measuring its area and working out how we could help farmers
  grow more food additives.

No? Isn't that what it means?

Ah, well . . .


         ----------------------
         Date: Mon, 10 Feb 2003
         From: Andrew Smith, andy@sciedit.fsnet.co.uk

Meaningless nonsense as far as I'm concerned. E as a prefix is
simply an abbreviation of electronic. Another option, similarly
meaningless on close examination, but IMHO more elegant, would be

  Considerable progress was made in applying web technology, in
  terms of both field-based capacity and delivery of technical
  assistance.

I don't like "in terms of" but you've got to give the author some
reassurance that it is still his or her sentence.


         ----------------------
         Date: Wed, 12 Feb 2003
         From: Steve Rickaby, srickaby@wordmongers.demon.co.uk

Alison Southby wrote:

>  Considerable progress was made in the area of "e" in terms of
>  field-based capacity building in "e" and delivery of technical
>  assistance through "e".

If that it the intended usage, and there is not some other
mysterious and arcane meaning of "e" within the author's field of
expertise, the answer is 'no'. It reads like gibberish to me, and
I work exclusively in IT.

The phrase 'field-based capacity building' also reads like
something created by an automatic report-generating Waffletron.
I'm sure you can translate it into something that humans can
understand.


         ----------------------
         Date: Wed, 12 Feb 2003
         From: Viviane Lowe, vivilowe@bluewin.ch

What is meant here by "e" is often glossed in the business world
as "web-based solutions" (could be training courses, e-trade, or
simply email... it's general enough).


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