Completely Off Topic: is German, perhaps, your first language?
Could you explain, cause I'm curious, the german grammar that inspires, in English, the usage "since $TIMESTAMP", when English would generally expect "since $DURATION"? I assume that's what causes it, but I've always been curious...
Posted Jul 1, 2012 19:26 UTC (Sun) by apoelstra (subscriber, #75205)
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As a native (Canadian) English speaker, I have always found "since $TIMESTAMP" to sound more natural than "since $DURATION". So it may just be a dialectical thing.
CyanogenMod 9.0-rc1 available
Posted Jul 1, 2012 22:10 UTC (Sun) by nix (subscriber, #2304)
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It's more complex than that. "Since last Thursday" is valid, as is "since November 2011", as is "since two weeks ago": what isn't valid is "since two weeks", i.e. unadorned relative time without the "ago" marker.
CyanogenMod 9.0-rc1 available
Posted Jul 1, 2012 23:10 UTC (Sun) by anselm (subscriber, #2796)
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I'm German, and I was taught in English class way back when that it is either »since $TIMESTAMP« or »for $DURATION«, German grammar making no difference between the two. So, according to this theory, »I have been a Linux user since 1993« would be correct, as would be »I have been a Linux user for 19 years«, but »I have been a Linux user since 19 years« would be incorrect.
It should probably also be mentioned that English classes in Germany tend to emphasise British English as opposed to (US) American English. People who learn English in school in Germany and then move to the USA usually end up with a weird mixture of the two, in varying proportions.