Too many commas?

[SimonDoom]

Nope. Freshly-manicured is a compound adjective describing the hand and should be hyphenated.

No it is not. It's not a compound adjective. It's a simple adverb modifying an adjective, in which case no hyphen is required.

Freshly manicured hands. No hyphen.

Other examples:

Newly minted coins.

Awkwardly posted sign.

Very fast greens (on a golf course).

On the other hand:

Six-gun salute. There you have a hyphen, because "six-gun" is a compound adjective: an adjective (six) and a noun (gun) put together to function as an adjective that modifies a noun (salute).

My sources: The Chicago Manual of Style, which is clear on this, and Margaret Schertzer's The Elements of Grammar.

Here's a Grammarly discussion of the subject: https://www.grammarly.com/blog/part...ves/?msockid=3bfbfdbac335689b3827e897c2b66915.

 

[If_Only_]

Considering.

Trying to take it in.

 

[Britva415]

Six-gun salute. There you have a hyphen, because "six-gun" is a compound adjective: an adjective (six) and a noun (gun) put together to function as an adjective that modifies a noun (salute).

Ambiguous, salutes from six guns or one salute from a six-gun?

 

[RocketGrunt]

If there were six guns saluting, it would be possessive. "Six guns' salute." And if it was a gun that saluted six times, it would be plural on the other end. "Six gun's salutes."

 

[IWroteThis]

If there were six guns saluting, it would be possessive. "Six guns' salute." And if it was a gun that saluted six times, it would be plural on the other end. "Six gun's salutes."

No, it wouldn't. A 21-gun salute involves 21 guns. All of the various similar but different salutes use the singular, non-possessive form of gun.

 

[IWroteThis]

No it is not. It's not a compound adjective. It's a simple adverb modifying an adjective, in which case no hyphen is required.

Freshly manicured hands. No hyphen.

Other examples:

Newly minted coins.

Awkwardly posted sign.

Very fast greens (on a golf course).

On the other hand:

Six-gun salute. There you have a hyphen, because "six-gun" is a compound adjective: an adjective (six) and a noun (gun) put together to function as an adjective that modifies a noun (salute).

My sources: The Chicago Manual of Style, which is clear on this, and Margaret Schertzer's The Elements of Grammar.

Here's a Grammarly discussion of the subject: https://www.grammarly.com/blog/part...ves/?msockid=3bfbfdbac335689b3827e897c2b66915.

Well, it turns out that we're both right and we're both wrong.

Freshly manicured is a compound adjective, but it's not hyphenated because there is an exception to the rule when the adverb ends in "ly".

 

[designatedvictim]

Freshly manicured is a compound adjective, but it's not hyphenated because there is an exception to the rule when the adverb ends in "ly".

English has rules?

 

[ShelbyDawn57]

English has rules?

Pirate’s code, more of guidelines…

 

[anthrodisiac]

I just reject any code that uses any increment inside an expression, no matter which side. Yes, dear intern, I know you can write strcpy using a single for loop; doesn’t mean you should.

So you only use C, not C++?

I'm not apologizing.

 

[SimonDoom]

Ambiguous, salutes from six guns or one salute from a six-gun?

I have to grudgingly admire you for this. That's pretty good.

 

[old_prof]

So you only use C, not C++?

I'm not apologizing.

I refuse to associate with anyone who uses C++ willingly.

 

[TheLobster]

I refuse to associate with anyone who uses C++ willingly.

I wouldn’t either, you’d be prone to catching an std::

 

[Andreas_Kreuz]

And I push back against them using postfix increment unless they can clearly explain what it does and write a good comment for it. -2 for that.

There was a comment, and yes, I can explain. But of course you are right. And writing compilers at the time was pretty yacc. Algol-68 rules!

*c=&f[s++];

Still counts the same towards the 750-word limit.

But it is great to meet people here who can read this. Then you should also enjoy reading my stories.

 

[designatedvictim]

Pirate’s code, more of guidelines…

This, of course, is the response I was aiming for.