Hi @ripcurlgirl, what I’m now thinking is to edit for “strict typing” (assuming I get the go-ahead as a Contributor), but still have the current (no accents req’d) as the alternate answer. That way I won’t (or shouldn’t) upset those that don’t care about the accents. I’ll keep you (and others) posted. Thanks,
Longtemps, je me suis couche de bonne heure. Parfois, a peine ma bougie eteinte, mes yeux se fermaient si vite que je n’avais pas le temps de me dire : « Je m’endors. » Et, une demi-heure apres, la pensee qu’il était temps de chercher le sommeil m’eveillait ; je voulais poser le volume que je croyais avoir encore dans les mains et souffler ma lumiere ; je n’avais pas cesse en dormant de faire des reflexions sur ce que je venais de lire, mais ces reflexions avaient pris un tour un peu particulier ; il me semblait que j’etais moi-meme ce dont parlait l’ouvrage : une eglise, un quatuor, la rivalite de François Ier et de Charles Quint.
I totally agree with Maxine. I am a Frenchman and to my eyes the above text is not in French but in crippled French (fortunately it is not what Proust wrote). But of course people do as they want.
Best wishes.
2 Likes
I find it silly to try to learn a language without using accents. You don’t need accents to speak or read French? That’s just not true.
1 Like
But if you include the “no-accents” as an alternative, what would be the difference from how the things are without strict typing? You already can type the words either with all accents or without accents, both are accepted. If you switch the course to strict typing but include “no-accent” alternatives, the result will stay exactly the same…
3 Likes
It appears that everyone who has posted here, except for @Hydroptere, is strongly in favour of stricter courses insisting on the usage of accents.
I also agree with @lenagardariki - the course wouldn’t actually changed would it? I mean, if I typed « blamer » instead of « blâmer » it would be accepted and I would be none the wiser as to my error unless the correct spelling was also displayed after hitting enter.
1 Like
@lenagardariki
This is a reply to your post 2 days ago - I did not see it then 
I asked @Maxine_Downunder to look at French Verbs http://www.memrise.com/course/809/french-verbs/ - which are in the infinitive (single words, mostly) so there would be no commas etc - just the odd apostrophe for reflexive infinitives that begin with a vowel or mute ‘h’.
Is the apostrophe some kind of delimiter in databases? If it causes issues it could be replaced with the apostrophe used in typography: ’ (also right single quotation mark). It should be present on everybody’s keyboard.
1 Like
I understand but do you find it odd because it is ugly or does it cause some difficulties as well? In both cases ’ is an alternative choice.
Bonjour @Yves_Codet, can you please clarifying what ’ as distinct from '? (I copied the first one from your text). I always use ’ (the one on the quotes key) in such instances and most times in works. Whenever it doesn’t I’ve been pasting what’s in the answer to get by the question. Defeats the purpose of what one is trying to do and is time-consuming! Merci beaucoup.
Bonjour, Maxine, et bonne année !
Veuillez me permettre de vous répondre en français, ce sera plus facile pour moi, dont l’anglais n’est pas des meilleurs, et cela illustrera par la même occasion mon propos. L’apostrophe droite ’ est un vestige du temps des machines à écrire, sur lesquelles il n’était pas possible d’avoir tous les signes qui auraient été nécessaires ; c’est pourquoi on employait des graphies approximatives — et en fait fautives — comme ‘‘coeur’’ au lieu de « cœur », ‘‘l’année’’ au lieu de « l’année », ‘‘A bientôt !’’ au lieu de « À bientôt ! », et ainsi de suite. Mais à présent, surtout depuis la généralisation de l’Unicode, on peut écrire à peu près n’importe quoi sur un ordinateur, et il n’y a plus lieu de conserver de tels usages. Vous noterez, en ce qui concerne l’apostrophe, qu’elle a toujours la forme courbe ’ en typographie, sauf dans de rares publications peu soignées.
Maintenant, je conçois qu’il ne soit pas facile pour tout le monde d’écrire ’ plutôt que ', en particulier sur un téléphone, et qu’il soit préférable ici de conserver la variante droite.
J’espère avoir répondu à votre question.
Bien à vous,
Yves
Hmm, it seems non-breaking spaces are unknown here.
I appreciate your response and apologise for not responding in French. My French is not that good as yet (I used Reverso to translate your text!). I only understand the apostrophe - on the same key as the quotes ("). I don’t know where the ‘straight’ apostrophe is. I will save your notes because I am sure they will be useful to me as I progress further. Merci beaucoup Yves.
My pleasure.
I think it is the straight apostrophe ’ that you have on the same key as ". I do not know how the curved one can be typed on a US or UK keyboard.
My last remark was perhaps obscure. In French a “double” punctuation (formed of two parts, like ; : ?) must be preceded by a space (followed in the case of «), but it should be a non-breaking space which forbids line breaks such as:
… nécessaires
;…
But some applications treat non-breaking spaces as normal spaces, as you can see in my message; of course they should not.
1 Like
@Yves_Codet and @Maxine_Downunder
Salut ! I did a bit of investigating and found the following:
ALT 0145 = ‘ (left [open] curved single quotation mark)
ALT 0146 = ’ (right [closed] curved single quotation mark or apostrophe)
ALT 0147 = “ (left [open] curved double quotation mark)
ALT 0148 = ” (right [closed] curved double quotation mark)
These codes are for Windows. For Mac see the source of my info: http://desktoppub.about.com/cs/finetypography/ht/curly_quotes.htm
BTW You might have to zoom in to clearly see the shape of the marks.
2 Likes
Sure! I have activated ‘Mark Typing Strictly’.
3 Likes