grammar

[Sue Blake]

On Fri, May 30, 2003 at 06:28:36PM -0400, John Baldwin wrote:
> 
> On 30-May-2003 Matthew Hunt wrote:
> > On Sat, May 31, 2003 at 08:06:45AM +1000, Sue Blake wrote:
> > 
> >> Tell me, how would you follow the following (hypothetical) instruction?
> >> 
> >>  In case you run out of memory, don't run all of the programs together.
> >> 
> >> Is it something to do as a precaution, or a response to take when
> >> an unlikely situation occurs? I would read it as a precaution and
> >> make a workplace rule that we must follow it.
> > 
> > Do you know the national origin of this documentation?  Was it generally
> > satisfactory otherwise?  I'm wondering if it was written by a non-native
> > speaker.
> 
> It feels that way.  That sentence read very odd.  Doesn't "feel" like
> it's correct.  Maybe the contrast of "in case" which implies a chance
> occurrence, and the present tense of "run".  I.e. it might sound better
> as:
> 
> In case you have run out of memory, <blah>.
> 
> In which case I think it is a grammar error.

I would understand that as
 You might have run out of memory without realising it,
 so take the precaution of doing <blah>.


-- 

Regards,
        -*Sue*-