# Getting vs. being



## Chaosritter

Ich habe vor kurzem etwas in ein englisches Technikforum gepostet, allerdings bin ich mir nicht ganz sicher wie folgender Satz korrekt lauten müsste:

"I'd advise against a live CD, thanks to the lack of drivers and limitations due to the fact that the whole system is getting streamed from the disc, it wouldn't provide proper results at all."

oder

"I'd advise against a live CD, thanks to the lack of drivers and limitations due to the fact that the whole system is being streamed from the disc, it wouldn't provide proper results at all."

Ich weiß, das "getting" soviel wie "es wird/werdend" heißt und "being" soviel wie "sein/ist", allerdings bin ich mir nicht sicher wie man es in derartigen Fällen verwendet. Gibts da eine Eselsbrücke?


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## Sowka

Hallo Chaosritter 

Könntest Du bitte den deutschen Originalsatz dazu posten? Dann ist es leichter, etwas zu sagen.


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## Chaosritter

Sorry, die deutsche Fassung lautet in etwa so:

"Ich würde von einer Live-CD abraten, dank der fehlenden Treiber und Beschränkungen aufgrund der Tatsache, dass das gesamte System von der Disc gestreamt wird, würde es am Ende eh keine vernünftigen Ergenisse liefern."


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## Biddlesby

Mir scheint, dass der Satzbau mehr Englisch sein sollte. Schrieben Sie "being".

I'd advise against a live CD. There aren't many drivers, and because the whole system is being streamed from the disc, it wouldn't end up providing proper results.
I'd advise against a live CD. There aren't that many drivers, and because the whole system is being streamed live from the disc, it wouldn't provide proper results at all.

Entschuldigung für mein Deutsch .


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## HON_Redakteur

Chaosritter said:


> "Ich würde von einer Live-CD abraten, dank der fehlenden Treiber und Beschränkungen aufgrund der Tatsache, dass das gesamte System von der Disc gestreamt wird, würde es am Ende eh keine vernünftigen Ergenisse liefern."


 
Hi, Chaosritter!

I find the original German slightly confusing, not explicit enough, and/or in need of correction. Let me suggest:

"Live-CDs verfügen (bekanntlich) über keinen Treiber. Und weil bei der Verwendung von Live-CDs das gesamte System von der Disc gestreamt wird, würde es [was "es"? DIE Live-CD? DIE Disc? DAS System?] am Ende daher keine vernünftigen Ergebnisse liefern. Aus diesem Grunde würde ich von dem Einsatz einer Live-CD abraten."

In your English sentences, I wonder why you use the word "thanks," which suggests something positive:

"I'd advise against a live CD, thanks to the lack of drivers and limitations due to the fact that the whole system is getting streamed from the disc, it wouldn't provide proper results at all."

oder

"I'd advise against a live CD, thanks to the lack of drivers and limitations due to the fact that the whole system is being streamed from the disc, it wouldn't provide proper results at all."

NOTE: It's always better to let the REASON (Begründung) PRECEDE the RESULT:

"Because they [live CDs?] lack drivers and because, when using live CDs, the whole system is streamed from the disc, using a live CD wouldn't provide the desired results. I would therefore advise against using live CDs."

I feel that my sentence is much likely to be misunderstood (e.g., by a Japanese computer freak struggling with his English).

Regards,


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## Hutschi

HON_Redakteur said:


> ...
> "Live-CDs verfügen (bekanntlich) über keinen Treiber. Und weil bei der Verwendung von Live-CDs das gesamte System von der Disc gestreamt wird, würde es [was "es"? DIE Live-CD? DIE Disc? DAS System?] ...


The advantage of German is that the gender and number makes it very clear in this sentence, as well as the context:
es - das System - neutre
vs.
sie - die CD, die Disc - female

There are very few exceptions to this rule, such an exception is when "es" is not used as pronoun for a noun but as generalized word: _Es ist klar, es funktioniert nicht ..._
In this case the first "es" is independend on nouns, and the second can be independend. It depends on the noun _if_ there is a noun binding it.

In this case an example is "das Ganze/die Gesamtheit", this can be replaced by "das" - _Es ist klar, das funktioniert nicht._

But if it is bound it depends on the noun.

Wir haben hier eine Gesamtheit von Funktionen. Sie funktioniert nicht. (die Gesamtheit) Sie funktionieren nicht. (die Funktionen.


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## HON_Redakteur

Yes, Hutschi, you are quite right about the German use of gender and number making it clear in this sentence, but the "es" could still have been a generic, generalized "es," so there's still some vagueness*. As a Tech Writer, I try to write so unambiguously as possible - even to the point of repeating nouns rather than using relative pronouns. The resultant "fractal" sentences contain lots of overlapping, and are thus intelligible even if subsequently fragmented.

*Specifically: I think that the "es" ("das gesamte System") should, in fact, instead be a "sie" ("die Verwendung...").

My "dream" German sentence:

"Live-CDs verfügen [bekanntlich] über keinen Treiber. Weil bei der Verwendung von Live-CDs das gesamte System [vielmehr] von der Disc gestreamt wird, würden Live-CDs daher nicht zu den gewünschten Ergebnissen führen. Aus diesem Grunde ist von dem Einsatz von Live-CDs abzuraten."

My "dream" English sentence:

"Because live CDs lack drivers and, instead, the whole system is streamed from the disc, using live CDs thus wouldn't yield the desired results. I therefore advise against using live CDs."

Regards,


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## Derselbe

HON_Redakteur said:


> Yes, Hutschi, you are quite right about the German use of gender and number making it clear in this sentence, but the "es" could still have been a generic, generalized "es," so there's still some vagueness


Für einen Muttersprachler können sich mE hier keine Zweifel ergeben. Für ein generisches "es" ist die Situation nicht passend. Es kann sich nur auf System beziehen. 


> My "dream" German sentence:
> 
> "Live-CDs verfügen [bekanntlich] über keinen Treiber. Weil bei der Verwendung von Live-CDs das gesamte System [vielmehr] von der Disc gestreamt wird, würden Live-CDs daher nicht zu den gewünschten Ergebnissen führen. Aus diesem Grunde ist von dem Einsatz von Live-CDs abzuraten."


"vielmehr" ergibt hier mE wenig Sinn. 
"Das System ist nicht auf der Festplatte. Es wird vielmehr von der Disc gestreamt." wäre ein sinnvoller Gegensatz. Den kann ich bei den Treibern nicht erkennen. Das scheinen mir eher zwei unabhängige Informationen zu sein. Aber das ist wohl eher eine inhaltliche Frage und ich bin kein Informatiker.
Das dritte Live-CD ist mir zu viel. Ich würde hier "Aus diesem Grund ist von ihrem Einsatz abzuraten." schreiben. Potential für Missverständnisse sehe ich nicht.

Was ist denn eigentlich aus der ursprünglichen Frage geworden. Was ist der Unterschied zwischen zwischen 
"the system gets streamed"
"the system is streamed"
Ist das get falsch/umgangssprachlich oder etwas anderes?

Beste Grüße


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## Hutschi

You are right when you consider your audience as technical writer. I'm working as technical writer, too, and so I appreciate that you made the sentences shorter and clear.

But the style of the original language is lax, it is more like oral and contains flavoring words, like "eh".

So the audience seems to be a friend and the sentence is supposed to tell: "don't worry, I tell you in easy (non-technical, colloquial) words what are the facts."

For a native speaker the German sentence is clear enough. Especially it is not essential what component is not working. 
"... eh keine vernünftigen Ergebnisse"  say, whatever you do with it, it will not work properly.

From grammatical point of view, the "generic" meaning of "es" is blocked in this sentence because "es" is bound to "das System".

In all sentences it is not clear what "system" is.

There seams to be an inner mistake in the argument. Why does does the system not work when streamed from the CD?

The "System" is streamed, so I think, it is software. Hardware cannot be streamed.

It depends on the purpose and configuration if the system works and and if it is fast enough.

"Live-CDs verfügen [bekanntlich] über keinen Treiber (this is usually not true, it should be: *"oft nicht über einige der benötigten Treiber"*). Weil bei der  Verwendung von Live-CDs das gesamte System [vielmehr] von der Disc  gestreamt wird, würden Live-CDs daher *oft *nicht zu den gewünschten  Ergebnissen führen. Aus diesem Grunde ist von dem Einsatz von Live-CDs  abzuraten."


"Because live CDs lack drivers and, instead ("*additionally*"?), the whole system is  streamed from the disc, using live CDs thus wouldn't yield the desired  results. I therefore advise against using live CDs.

Is "instead" correct here? The disc *is *the CD in the original context. As I see this was not clear for you as native English speaker, so this is an additional mistake.


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## HON_Redakteur

Hutschi, Derselbe:

Your comments are quite legitimate! And, yes: Though I wasn't trying to "hijack" the thread, the thrust of my comments did go rather far afield. I was, indeed, not addressing the simple question of what was grammatically correct (i.e., whether "getting" was to be preferred over "being") or stylistically "smooth." And I definitely did willfully ignore the fact that the audience might be so "savvy" as to understand the description even if lots of meta-info was left out. As a Technical Editor, unambiguity is the highest good. What I proposed would have therefore been the optimal solution for, e.g., a User's Manual which might later have to be, e.g., translated by a harried programmer in Korea, or a sloppy secretary in Brazil, or read by a scatter-brained oldster in Nebraska, or which might have to be excerpted for a different document. When writing a "Fachartikel" for "Gleichgesinnte," one can greatly compress the information content (but then, lots of documents written for specialized audiences are STILL later encountered by googlers who will thank their stars that the writer bothered to include such extra "Selbstverständlichkeiten").

Regards,


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## Hutschi

Thank you for the comment, HON_Redakteur,

I have just one question remaining from above:


> "Because live CDs lack drivers and, instead ("*additionally*"?),  the whole system is  streamed from the disc, using live CDs thus  wouldn't yield the desired  results. I therefore advise against using  live CDs.
> 
> Is "instead" correct here? The disc *is *the CD in the  original context. As I see this was not clear for you as native English  speaker, so this is an additional mistake.


My version: 
"Because live CDs lack drivers and the whole system is  streamed from the *live CD*, using live CDs thus   wouldn't yield the desired  results. I therefore advise against using   live CDs.

I agree under condition:
"As a Technical Editor, unambiguity is the highest good." (... assumed the content is correct and understandable for the audience.)


There is an additional rule: The same thing should have the same name. (This is a kind of reverse unambiguity.)


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## HON_Redakteur

Hutschi,

Even after you have supplied the additional meta-info "The disc *is *the CD in the original context," I can't answer your question. The answer depends... There are various possibilities. Why don't you try to explain to me what it would be like if live CDs DIDN'T lack drivers? Why would it then not be necessary to stream from the live CD? How would THEN the "desired results" be obtained?

Regards,


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## Hutschi

It does not mean that I have the same opinion. I just tried to give an answer how to best translate or interpret the original sentence.

Chaosritter basically explained


> "Because live CDs lack drivers and, additionally,   the whole system  is  streamed from the disc, using live CDs thus   wouldn't yield the  desired  results. I therefore advise against using   live CDs.



But you transformed it to



> "Because live CDs lack drivers and, instead,   the whole system is  streamed from the disc, using live CDs thus   wouldn't yield the desired  results. I therefore advise against using   live CDs.


In this context I do not understand "instead". Can you tell me, what "instead" means here? As far as I see it is not "instead" but "additionally" or something like that. (You could simply omit "instead". As far as I see "instead" changes the meaning and makes the proposition wrong. Or did I miss something in English? Cann "instead" mean "in addition"?

---

My own opinion:
Eine Live-CD kann für viele Sachen sehr nützlich sein. Weil sie keine Installation auf einer Festplatte erfordert sondern direkt vom CD-Laufwerk aus gestartet werden kann und die meisten Treiber mitbringt, eignet sie sich besonders für Tests oder zum Ausprobieren neuer Systeme. Allerdings starten sie von der relativ langsam.

But this was not the question.


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## HON_Redakteur

Hi, Hutschi:

I used "instead" because I genuinely thought that the lack of a driver seemed to directly (logically - because of the language) imply that, instead of being streamed from the driver, the whole system had to be streamed from the disc. I freely admit that I made a logical "leap" here, and that my insertion of the word "instead" was based upon my faulty understanding of the actual situation.

Chaosritter and other technical specialists really can't imagine that there are a lot of people out there who want to be able to perform certain procedures (like using live CDs - whatever they are) and who are by all means capable of doing so (provided they are taken by the hand and given explicit, unambiguous step-by-step instructions), but who actually have virtually no computer "savvy."

As soon as any description of a technical procedure I am expected to follow departs from a purely mechanical level ("Stick the shiny plastic-covered metallic silver disc into the disc drive WITH THE GROOVES FACING DOWNWARDS, and the Aufdruck facing upwards...") and begins to offer reasons and justifications, it's quite possible that a non-negligible percentage of the readers (and a LOT of translators) will be LOST and will start DOING (translating) THE WRONG THINGS unless the Tech Writer shifts gears and reverts to virtual "baby talk."

Consequently, when writing copy like the kind Chaosritter submitted, I always imagine a total layperson having to later translate it into a foreign language.

Regards,


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## HON_Redakteur

Sorry, I meant "...(logically - NOT because of the language)..."

Regards,


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## Hutschi

Thank you. I understand this well.

A short summary may be:

1. it is important to consider the audience and the style.
2. for technical writing it has to be unambiguously, precise and concise. There should be easy steps and short sentences, especially if it is supposed to be translated.
3. In such cases coll. language should be avoided.

Did I get this right?

So the original sentence becomes:

"Because live CDs lack drivers and the whole system is  streamed from  the *live CD*, using live CDs wouldn't yield the desired   results in some cases. I therefore advise against using   live CDs.
---

Or my opinion:
You can use a live CD for test purposes.
(...)


Best regards
Hutschi


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## HON_Redakteur

Yes, Hutschi, that is an excellent summarization of the most-important criteria for Technical Writing.

I would only add that the Tech Writer should also focus special attention on the proper use/meaning of conjunctions (not just "and," "or," & "but," but also "therefore," "as a result," "in contrast," "instead," "if...then," "because," etc.). Further, it's best to avoid subordinate clauses - especially those containing relative pronouns. And extreme care should be exercised in using distributive adjectives. Whenever stating a prohibition, also state the counter-situation (the proscription) (e.g.: "Don't discard part 'A.' Instead, retain part 'A' for future use.").

In your final example ("Because live CDs..."), I'd still debate your use of the word "and," since I suspect that the "streaming" is a LOGICAL RESULT of the "lack of drivers," and not merely a further (independent) justification. I think that what you've proposed is an example of an enthymeme. So if you're going to omit that unspoken premise, you could at least include a "therefore" to signal the hidden "Verknüpfung."

Basically, I'm saying that it's dangerous to "string along" bits of information using "nichtsagende" conjunctions like "and" when in fact the individual bits of info are "logically linked."

Regards,


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## Hutschi

"Streaming" is not a result of lack of drivers but of using a Live CD. Even if all drivers are available, streaming is used (or may be used, depending on the used process).

Lack of drivers has as result a malfunction, for example of a printer, or a scanner, or a display, or Internet connection, or whatever.

Streaming, however, may result in malfunction if it is too slow or interrupted, for example. 

Because it is a read-only medium you cannot add drivers without using an extra medium.


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## HON_Redakteur

Hi, Hutschi:

Okay. Then the writer would ideally say "There are two totally separate reasons why live CDs shouldn't be used; each of these reasons alone would suffice to trigger a malfunction, but together, these two reasons make the use of live CDs extremely inadvisable: 1) Live CDs lack drivers (and because they lack drivers, problems would ensue, namely: XXX); 2) If you attempt to use live CDs, your computer will recognize this and automatically begin streaming the whole system (instead of doing what it would otherwise do if you hadn't used live CDs, namely: XXX), and since streaming can result in a malfunction if it is too slow or is interrupted, anything eliciting streaming (e.g., the use of live CDs, or XXX) should always be avoided whenever possible.

I feel like I am living the "Chinese Room" scenario postulated in the context of the Turing Test (for Artificial Intelligence).

Regards,


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## Chaosritter

Sorry if I interrupt you, but could we get back to the initial question?

In case the original sentence wasn't definite enough, how about that:

"The music plays, when the CD is read by the laser"

"The music plays, when the CD is getting read by the laser"

"The music plays, when the CD is being read by the laser"

I hope this one's better.


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## HON_Redakteur

Chaosritter said:


> "The music plays, [comma is WRONG] when the CD is read by the laser"
> 
> "The music plays, [comma is WRONG] when the CD is getting read by the laser"
> 
> "The music plays, [comma is WRONG] when the CD is being read by the laser"


 
Hi, Chaosritter:

Rule #1: It's better to have the cause precede the result.
Rule #2: Active Mood is superior to Passive Mood.

So:

"When the laser reads the CD, the system plays the music."

Or, since the Passive Voice isn't actually _*so*_ bad in this subordinate clause:

"When the laser reads the CD, the music is played."

Regards,


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## Chaosritter

Oh god, that's far more complicated than I ever imagined...

So you're telling to change the whole sentence? Isn't there any way to enunciate it properly without changing too much?


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## HON_Redakteur

Chaosritter said:


> Oh god, that's far more complicated than I ever imagined...
> 
> So you're telling to change the whole sentence? Isn't there any way to enunciate it properly without changing too much?


 
Well, Chaosritter, I'm telling you what, in my opinion, would be the optimal solution(s) - without any consideration of the *extent* of the necessary changes.

What's the problem with implementing my proposal? Are you attempting to make as minimal a change as possible, in the hope that no one will detect that you changed it? If there's no penalty for you involved here, I'd recommend a complete re-write; it's only a single sentence, after all.

(As a rule of thumb, though, I'd advise you to renounce the use of the word "getting" as a helper verb in contexts like this one.)

Regards,


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## HON_Redakteur

Having said that, your first variant ("The music plays when the CD is read by the laser") - without the comma - would be the minimalistic solution.

Regards,


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## Chaosritter

I could change it without any problems (I'm a moderator after all, I could physically delete the whole post and completely rewrite it), but it's hard to get used to a completely new style of writing. I'll keep in mind what you've said (first the cause, then the result), I just wanna know if I've f****ed this one completely up or if there is any possibility of considering it a minor mistake.

Let's say I just wanna know it for my own peace of mind. 

Oh right, just in case I got anything wrong, I'm supposed to formulate it this way:

"Because the CD is read by the laser, the music plays"

But what about the initial sentence? Would "I'd advise against a live CD. It wouldn't deliver proper results after all since it lacks the essential driver and because the whole system is constantly streamed from the disc" work better?


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## HON_Redakteur

Hey, Chaosritter:

I've been a Technical Writer and Translator ("Fachübersetzer") for neigh onto three decades, now, so my responses in this forum are probably more niggling than they should be. In short: I'm a fuss-budget!

As to your final proposal ("Because the CD is read...") - why, suddenly, are you interjecting the word "because?" I mean, I feel that that over-emphasizes the laser as the "causative agent." In fact, I'd have the same problem with that sentence in German ("Weil die CD vom Laser..."). The laser reading the CD is a _*prerequisite*_ for the music playing, but it isn't actually the _*root cause*_ (instead, it's merely the _*proximal cause*_, as Aristotole would say). So it's a philosophical point, not a linguistic one.

Still: Imagine how silly it would be to say "Because the bus stopped, the people boarded it."

Regards,


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## Chaosritter

I think I got it now:

"Since the live system lacks essential driver and is constantly streamed from (the) disc, it wouldn't provide proper results at all"

It doesn't have to be a lyrical masterpiece, I just wanna avoid critical errors.


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