On Sunday 11 October 2009 17:50:37 Mick wrote: > On Sunday 11 October 2009, Alan McKinnon wrote: > > On Sunday 11 October 2009 13:22:48 Albert Hopkins wrote: > > > On Sun, 2009-10-11 at 13:18 +0200, Justin wrote: > > > > I would say it is about just to many germans who are translating > > > > german > > > > words literally into english and as the the german word for package > > > > is "Paket" they come up with packet. > > > > > > Oh wow I did not know that. See I knew it had to have some reasonable > > > explanation. Thanks for the education. > > > > Well, at least now we know that English contains at least one word that > > is less ambiguous than the German equivalent. > > > > I would not have thought it could be done. > > Packet in English is almost always correctly used to denote a format of > network transmitted data (in the context of a conversation about IT and > computers) which is routable: > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Packet_(information_technology) > > The word packet also has other meanings like: a 'small amount of', a > 'package of' and can be used in the context of money (one's salary or > earnings), crisps, condoms, chewing-gums, etc. > > Therefore the word packet can be ambiguous in English too, if the context > in which it is mentioned is not known.
Yes, I know all that. You missed the in-joke :-) -- alan dot mckinnon at gmail dot com
