On Friday 04 April 2008 06:41, Christian Perrier wrote:
> Quoting Justin B Rye (jbr@edlug.org.uk):
> > Since it's unlikely to get into dictionaries, the only guide to
> > what's "correct" is the majority opinion: "metapackage".
> >
> > Of course, I say that because I agree with the consensus here, but I
> > can also offer a supporting argument if you'd prefer.
> >
> > * Most coinages in English with "meta" seem to be written solid:
> > "metadata", "metafiction", "metamathematics", and so on.
> > * "Meta-" also occurs, sometimes to avoid an awkward string of
> > vowel letters ("meta-argument"), sometimes as IUPAC-standard
> > chemical terminology ("meta-tyrosine").
> > * "Meta" as a freestanding word can be used as an adjective, with a
> > slightly different sense ("this conversation is far too
> > meta"), so that's worth avoiding.
>
> From Justin's arguments, it seems that English uses about the same
> rule than French with such latin prepositions: write them solid unless
> the juxtaposition introduces a diphtongue (en?):
> I would then go for "metapackage".
Thanks for your answers.
> Such check could even be added to recenly added Lintian check about
> some common incorrect spelling (MySQL, PostgreSQL, etc.)
I've thought about this too before asking on debian-l10n-english and if no
one else disagrees with "metapackage" as the "correct" spelling I'll file a
wishlist bug on Lintian asking for such a check.
Cheers,
--
Frank S. Thomas <fst@debian.org> PGP public key ID: 0xDC426429
Debian Developer finger fst/key@db.debian.org
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