Incorrect use of "it's" in package control files -- file mass bug?

["Kevin B. McCarty" <kmccarty@Princeton.EDU>]

Dear all,

I ran a script (attached) over the Packages file in the archive to check 
for incorrect use of "it's" in the Description field.  Of course it is not 
really possible to determine by computer whether or not something is 
correct grammar, so the script finds all uses of "it's", and I went over 
the results manually. As a result, I may have missed some incorrect uses, 
and I checked only packages that exist on i386.

Recall that "it's" is a contraction for "it is" or "it has", and any other 
use (e.g. as a possessive) is not grammatically correct English. 
Hypothetical examples:

- XMMS is cool.  It's one of the best ...   [correct, "It is"]
- XMMS is cool.  It's been rated highly ... [correct, "It has"]
- XMMS is cool.  It's features include ...  [wrong]
- XMMS is cool.  Its features include ...   [correct, possessive]

Using "it's" and "its" correctly is in your best interest, since incorrect 
usage may cause someone browsing the package descriptions to have a bad 
first impression of that package.

Please let me know (in accordance with the Developer's Reference 7.1.1) 
whether or not I should file a mass bug report on the 59 packages listed 
below by maintainer.  I would send the bug reports to maintonly@bugs.d.o 
with severity minor. Obviously I don't expect any of these to be fixed in 
sarge (nor even to have anyone make an upload solely to fix this), so 
there is no urgency.

Aigars Mahinovs <aigarius@debian.org>
  re
Alexander Shishckin <shisha@shisha.spb.ru>
  gkrellmwho2
Anand Kumria <wildfire@progsoc.org>
  xmms-infinity
Anthony Towns <ajt@debian.org>
  netkit-inetd
Arthur Korn <arthur@debian.org>
  devtodo
Bas Zoetekouw <bas@debian.org>
  mp
Bruno Barrera C. <bruno.barrera@igloo.cl>
  xmms-defx
Chris Mason <chris@k-rad.org>
  statslog
Dagfinn Ilmari Mannsaker <ilmari@ilmari.org>
  libconfig-general-perl
Dan Korostelev <dan@ats.energo.ru>
  gnome-ppp
Daniel Martin <fizbin@debian.org>
  fvwm95
dann frazier <dannf@debian.org>
  systemimager-client
Debian Firebird Group <pkg-firebird-general@lists.alioth.debian.org>
  firebird-s32-server - "It is has it's adventages [sic]..." (3 errors)
  firebird-s64-server - "It is has it's adventages [sic]..." (3 errors)
  firebird2-super-server - (other 2 errors fixed, but still uses "it's" incorrectly)
Debian QA Group <packages@qa.debian.org>
  3dwm-server
  epic4-script-thirdeye
Debian Qt/KDE Maintainers <debian-qt-kde@lists.debian.org>
  konsole
Domenico Andreoli <cavok@debian.org>
  libnet0
Eric Dorland <eric@debian.org>
  libassuan-dev
Filip Van Raemdonck <mechanix@debian.org>
  mdbtools-gmdb
Fredrik Steen <stone@debian.org>
  monit
Gerfried Fuchs <alfie@debian.org>
  t-prot - (only the first use of "it's" is in error)
Guenter Geiger <geiger@debian.org>
  ivtools-bin - "these tools and it's usage" (should be "their usages")
Ivan Kohler <ivan-debian@420.am>
  libdns-zoneparse-perl
Jamin W. Collins <jcollins@asgardsrealm.net>
  mediamate
Jeroen van Wolffelaar <jeroen@wolffelaar.nl>
  phpbb2-conf-mysql
John Lines <john@paladin.demon.co.uk>
  plptools-kde
Jonathan Walther <krooger@debian.org>
  ratmenu
Lars Wirzenius <liw@iki.fi>
  publib-dev
Lenart Janos <ocsi@debian.org>
  dfm
Lionel Elie Mamane <lionel@mamane.lu>
  gnotepad+
Marcelo E. Magallon <mmagallo@debian.org>
  libwings-dev - (twice)
Mark Purcell <msp@debian.org>
  bayonne
  libccrtp-dev
  libccrtp1-1.0-0c102
martin f. krafft <madduck@debian.org>
  iprelay
Masayuki Hatta (mhatta) <mhatta@debian.org>
  blender
Michael Banck <mbanck@debian.org>
  jack
Michael Zehrer <zehrer@zepan.org>
  oops
Neil Roeth <neil@debian.org>
  openjade
Ola Lundqvist <opal@debian.org>
  x2vnc
Oliver Kurth <oku@debian.org>
  termnet
Oohara Yuuma <oohara@debian.org>
  xchain
Paul van Tilburg <paulvt@debian.org>
  gmoo - (twice)
Philipp Kern <phil@philkern.de>
  ytalk
Piotr Roszatycki <dexter@debian.org>
  ldapdns
  libapache-mod-rpaf
RISKO Gergely <risko@debian.org>
  sbm
Robert Lemmen <robertle@semistable.com>
  fastdep
Robert Stone <talby@debian.org>
  fspd
Ron Lee <ron@debian.org>
  libwxgtk2.4-python
Russell Coker <russell@coker.com.au>
  portslave
Sergio Talens-Oliag <sto@debian.org>
  cgvg
Siggy Brentrup <bsb@debian.org>
  styx
Stefan Gybas <sgybas@debian.org>
  doc++
Turbo Fredriksson <turbo@debian.org>
  php4-idn
Yann Dirson <dirson@debian.org>
  openjade1.3


I also found some other grammatical / spelling errors while browsing
control files, which I may file bugs against separately, later:

Abraham van der Merwe <abz@debian.org>
  tint - "there is a few differences." (s/is/are/)
Bartosz Fenski <fenio@o2.pl>
  makeself - "All what the user..." (s/what/that/)
           - "since they XXX it's actually shell scripts..." (missing "know" at XXX)
Debian Java Maintainers <pkg-java-maintainers@lists.alioth.debian.org>
  libfop-java - "now known has fop" (s/has/as/)
  libfop-java-doc - "now known has fop" (s/has/as/)
Gaetan RYCKEBOER <gryckeboer@virtual-net.fr>
  spip - "If you wan't to edit..." (s/wan't/want/)
       - "all the comments and variable ..." (s/variable/variables/)
GOTO Masanori <gotom@debian.or.jp>
  xfonts-shinonome - ("It's consist of" should be "It consists of")
Guenter Geiger (Debian/GNU) <geiger@debian.org>
  shaketracker - "subdivided in columns of it's on" (s/of/if/ [?])
Jonas Meurer <mejo@debian.org>
  zope2.6-verbosesecurity - ("zope >= 2.6" -- should be "<= 2.6"?)
Kevin M. Rosenberg <kmr@debian.org>
  cl-puri - "It's is based..." (s/is//)
Robert Millan <rmh@debian.org>
  drip - "It's made up out two..." (s/out/of/)
Sebastien Chaumat <schaumat@debian.org>
  replicator - "It's REALLY faster than..." (s/REALLY/MUCH/)

regards,

--
Kevin B. McCarty <kmccarty@princeton.edu>   Physics Department
WWW: http://www.princeton.edu/~kmccarty/    Princeton University
GPG: public key ID 4F83C751                 Princeton, NJ 08544

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