Re: [PATCH] maint.mk: prohibit common grammar error: "all these"

[Jim Meyering]

Paul Eggert wrote:
> On 06/11/2012 01:05 AM, Jim Meyering wrote:
>> I suspect that some those (sic) instances are exercising poetic license
>> (Shakespeare, surely) or merely demonstrate that this error is common
>> in informal speech (Salinger's narrative).
>
> Sorry, but that's not what's happening here.  Certainly
> E.B. White was not using informal speech in The New Yorker.
> And I can easily find hundreds of other examples in formal
> English that is carefully edited and is similarly unlikely
> to contain grammatical errors.  For example:
>
>   Foremost among the reasons for all these changes in family structure
>   are the gains of the women’s movement.
>     -- Kate Bolick, "All the Single Ladies", The Atlantic, Nov. 2011
>     
> <http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2011/11/all-the-single-ladies/8654/>
>
>   But all these dramas were facilitated by the F.B.I.
>     -- David K. Shipler, "Terrorist Plots, Hatched by the F.B.I.",
>        New York Times, April 28, 2012
>        
> <http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/29/opinion/sunday/terrorist-plots-helped-along-by-the-fbi.html>
>
>   All these decisions lie in our own hands.
>     -- David Cameron, in a prepared formal speech at the World Economic
>        Forum, January 26, 2012
>        <http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/public/davos/article3300564.ece>
>
> There's nothing grammatically wrong with any of these
> examples, and more generally, the notion that "all these" is
> grammatically incorrect is just wrong.  On the contrary, the
> traditional form uniformly omits the "of": there are dozens
> of instances of "all these" in the King James Version and in
> Shakespeare, and zero instances of "all of these".  The form
> "all of these" is relatively recent, and is probably due to
> form-association with "some of these", "most of these", etc.
> Although "all of these" is now grammatically correct, it has
> by no means supplanted the traditional form "all these";
> both forms are OK.
>
>> I did a quick search and found this in response to a question:
>> http://grammar.ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/grammarlogs2/grammarlogs339.htm
>> ...
>>   In most constructions, we dispense happily with the "of." However, when
>>   there is another pronoun (such as "those, those") following the "all,"
>>   it's probably a good idea to include the "of."
>>
>>   Authority: The New Fowler's Modern English Usage edited by
>>   R.W. Burchfield. Clarendon Press: Oxford, England. 1996. Used with the
>>   permission of Oxford University Press. (under _all_)
>
> I'm afraid you've been had.  That web page is bogus.
> I have a copy of Burchfield and it advises the opposite
> of what that web page claims it says.  Here's a direct
> quote from Burchfield:
>
>   _of_ can normally be dispensed with in nominal phrases:
>   e.g. _all those years ago_
>
>    -- Burchfield, p. 41, under "all"
>
>> do any those uses in gnulib sound better without the "of"?
>
> Clearly "of" is required after "any".  "Any" and "all" are
> grammatically different, which is why "all the time" is fine
> but "any the time" is not.
>
> But to get back to your question, all the examples in
> <http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-gnulib/2012-06/msg00074.html>
> work just as well, if not better, without the "of".  Often
> the optional "of" wastes the reader's time and wastes space.
> Sometimes the "of" adds clarity or regularity, but I don't
> see any such cases in those examples.

Hi Paul,

You seem to feel pretty strongly about this, I don't,
and it's not worth our time to debate it further,
so I've reverted most of the change:

>From 191622af65fefe28e476323f2f5e2b30dbec9630 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Jim Meyering <address@hidden>
Date: Mon, 11 Jun 2012 11:32:54 +0200
Subject: [PATCH] maint.mk: revert most of the previous change re "all these"

* top/maint.mk (prohibit_undesirable_word_seq_RE_): Remove that pair.
For rationale, see the discussion at
http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.comp.lib.gnulib.bugs/30912
---
 ChangeLog    | 7 +++++++
 top/maint.mk | 2 +-
 2 files changed, 8 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)

diff --git a/ChangeLog b/ChangeLog
index 7f27d17..3ba82c2 100644
--- a/ChangeLog
+++ b/ChangeLog
@@ -1,3 +1,10 @@
+2012-06-11  Jim Meyering  <address@hidden>
+
+       maint.mk: revert most of the previous change re "all these"
+       * top/maint.mk (prohibit_undesirable_word_seq_RE_): Remove that pair.
+       For rationale, see the discussion at
+       http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.comp.lib.gnulib.bugs/30912
+
 2012-06-10  Jim Meyering  <address@hidden>

        maint.mk: prohibit common grammar error: "all these"
diff --git a/top/maint.mk b/top/maint.mk
index bcdbe01..f0b889b 100644
--- a/top/maint.mk
+++ b/top/maint.mk
@@ -948,7 +948,7 @@ sc_prohibit_doubled_word:
 bad_xref_re_ ?= (?:[\w,:;] +|(?:see|also)\s+)address@hidden
 bad_pxref_re_ ?= (?:[.!?]|(?:see|also))address@hidden
 prohibit_undesirable_word_seq_RE_ ?=                                   \
-  /(?:\bcan\s+not\b|\ball these\b|$(bad_xref_re_)|$(bad_pxref_re_))/gims
+  /(?:\bcan\s+not\b|$(bad_xref_re_)|$(bad_pxref_re_))/gims
 prohibit_undesirable_word_seq_ =                                       \
     -e 'while ($(prohibit_undesirable_word_seq_RE_))'                  \
     $(perl_filename_lineno_text_)
--
1.7.11.rc2