Re: Beginner question: seitu'a lo velrimni je pemci

[Mark Vines <vinesm@wholefoods.com>]

la rik. spuda mi di'e

> > .i la refgram. ca selcau lemi briju skami
>
> ...
>
> My question is simple: what influenced your choice of
> "selcau" in the first bridi?  Why not just use "claxu"
> and reverse the arguments?  Was it a conscious decision
> or have you just gained sufficient fluency (or
> vocabulary) that it just comes naturally?

mi spuda la rik. di'e

It was a conscious decision; I have not yet gained fluency
in Lojban.

Part of the reason still stands:  I wanted the refgram to
be the first sumti, a position I think of as the topical.

Another part of the reason is that I have recently been
organizing my study of the gismu such that I am associating
each gismu with all of the corresponding lujvo that have
this pattern:

  (conversion cmavo rafsi) + (gismu or gismu rafsi)

Because {selcau} has this pattern, I have studied the word
recently, which made its use more convenient.

But part of the reason for my decision to use {selcau}
instead of {claxu} disappeared when I added the tense
marker {ca} while editing my message prior to posting it.
Originally, I had planned to leave the bridi unmarked for
tense.  This plan allowed (at least) two options:

  1  .i lemi briju skami cu claxu la refgram.
  2  .i la refgram. selcau lemi briju skami

When I counted syllables, the first option was longer,
because the word {cu} was required to separate the first
sumti from the selbri.  The second option was shorter,
because its first sumti was a cmene, whose boundary was
clear enough even without {cu}.  So I decided to use the
second, shorter option.

Of course, after I chose to add the tense marker {ca},
the two options became more or less equal in length:

  1  .i lemi briju skami ca claxu la refgram.
  2  .i la refgram. ca selcau lemi briju skami

but, by that time, I had already selected option 2.

  ...

> > .iku'i lemi skami xelmri ca zvati po'o lemi briju
> > skami
>
> "However, the computer that carries my mail is only my
> office computer."

I would translate {lemi skami xelmri} as "my email
system" rather than "the computer that carries my mail".
In the typical tanru, the last word - in this case
{xelmri}, "mail system" - is the definitive one.

Also, I would translate {zvati} as "is at" or "is located
at" or "is present at", rather than "is".

So my preferred translation would be:  "However, my email
system is currently located only on my office computer."

But, since your translation has the same sense as mine,
the differences between them really don't matter much.

co'omi'e markl.