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Hi,usually you better say what "a" can do.
But there may be cases where it is necessary to say what "a" cannot or must not do.
Until now we even do not know whether a is a person or a program or a machine.
But the solution depends on context.
Example:Tim, as sales person, cannot access the pagination module.Martina is unable to login. She forgot her password. (Does not able fit well here? I do not know, I am not a native speaker.) "Cannot" may fit. I'd prefer this.
Best regardsBernd
Sean Brierley <sean -dot- brierley -at- gerberscientific -dot- com> schrieb am 22:39 Montag, 5.Oktober 2015:
a cannot do b? Reduce the number of verbs. Better to say what a can do,
though.
On Mon, Oct 5, 2015 at 3:17 PM, Robert Lauriston <robert -at- lauriston -dot- com>
wrote:
> I'd probably use "fails" instead of "is unsuccessful."
>
> "Unable," hard to say without more context.
>
> On Mon, Oct 5, 2015 at 7:25 PM, Kari Gulbrandsen
> <kkgulbrandsen -at- gmail -dot- com> wrote:
> > Hi, all --
> >
> > When writing for translation, what phrasing would work better and why:
> >
> >Â Â - a is unable to do b *or* a is not able to do b
> >Â Â - x is unsuccessful *or* x is not successful
>
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