Too big to look at or even download.

Where does ``and'' in ``try and make it smaller'' come out?

Actually, I have had a lot of difficulty getting the size right.
Originally I drew the diagram on A3 paper and reduced it down to A4 on
a photocopier which produced a pretty legible diagram. I then scanned
it using photostudio 5 and used Yahoo pagewizard to build the page.

Ideally, I would like to post it using "Acrobat" or "windows media and
fax viewer" in printed form but at the moment, I don't know how.

endipatterson@yahoo.com wrote:

Actually, I have had a lot of difficulty getting the size right.
Originally I drew the diagram on A3 paper and reduced it down to A4 on
a photocopier which produced a pretty legible diagram. I then scanned
it using photostudio 5 and used Yahoo pagewizard to build the page.

There are many reasons why you ended with a monster of a JPEG.

The scanning resolution may have been too high. Reduce it to 72dpi
and see. The compression of the JPEG may have been too low, perhaps
even no compression, which is going to produce a JPEG larger than
the uncompressed image. Try scanning at 72dpi, then try saving in
a lossless format, GIF for instance. If it is too big (say, more
than 100k), try saving it as a JPEG, with 50% compression (will
probably look awful, but you can try again and again with
less compression). Getting it right is messy and time-consuming,
and there are no shortcuts.

Ideally, I would like to post it using "Acrobat" or "windows media and
fax viewer" in printed form but at the moment, I don't know how.

Just as well! Don't!

Thankyou Jacques, I'll try that if I'm able. The reason I mentioned
"Acrobat" and "fax viewer", though is that the viewer can choose the
size themselves.

I had spaces
in the names of some of my directories.

endipatterson@yahoo.com wrote:

Actually, I have had a lot of difficulty getting the size right.
Originally I drew the diagram on A3 paper and reduced it down to A4 on
a photocopier which produced a pretty legible diagram. I then scanned
it using photostudio 5 and used Yahoo pagewizard to build the page.

There are many reasons why you ended with a monster of a JPEG.

The scanning resolution may have been too high. Reduce it to 72dpi
and see. The compression of the JPEG may have been too low, perhaps
even no compression, which is going to produce a JPEG larger than
the uncompressed image. Try scanning at 72dpi, then try saving in
a lossless format, GIF for instance. If it is too big (say, more
than 100k), try saving it as a JPEG, with 50% compression (will
probably look awful, but you can try again and again with
less compression). Getting it right is messy and time-consuming,
and there are no shortcuts.

Ideally, I would like to post it using "Acrobat" or "windows media and
fax viewer" in printed form but at the moment, I don't know how.

Just as well! Don't!

Too big to look at or even download.

Where does ``and'' in ``try and make it smaller'' come out?

I have reposted the diagram in a smaller format, and at another site.
(The old name was too long and didn't come out as a link.) You can
view it at:

http://www.geocities.com/endipatterson/Catenatives.jpg

Once again, comments and critisisms welcolme. I'd appreciate it if you
could concentrate on whether the diagram is accurate or not.

You need to reference a html web page that contains that link because
geocities wants to put an ad out in payment for the space you're taking,
and won't let anybody access a direct link like that without going through
an ad-bearing page.

endipatterson@yahoo.com wrote:

Thankyou Jacques, I'll try that if I'm able. The reason I mentioned
"Acrobat" and "fax viewer", though is that the viewer can choose the
size themselves.

I tried downloading that jpg out of curiosity,
using FreshDownload from www.freshdevices.com, but it
stopped half-way through, and when I tried to resume the
download, I was told that the file did not exist.


You'll exceed your download quota in no time flat
too, if you have such huge files on your site.

Perhaps geocities disconnected me seeing I was
downloading an inordinate amount of stuff.

Actually, I just tried again, and it seems to have risen
from the grave. But it will take almost 15 minutes.
So we should know pretty soon (9 minutes to go
now). Yes. It just stopped again, after 1.22M,
when there were still 8 minutes to go ("45% completed").
Bet you it won't work when I try to resume the download
(even though it says that "Resume is supported")

Let me try now... Same thing: "file not found" flashes
and it goes into "pause" again.

And again. I imagine that I have to wait a few hours
before it lets me continue.

endipatterson@yahoo.com wrote:
I have reposted the diagram in a smaller format, and at another site.
(The old name was too long and didn't come out as a link.) You can
view it at:

http://www.geocities.com/endipatterson/Catenatives.jpg

Once again, comments and critisisms welcolme. I'd appreciate it if you
could concentrate on whether the diagram is accurate or not.

You need to reference a html web page that contains that link because
geocities wants to put an ad out in payment for the space you're taking,
and won't let anybody access a direct link like that without going through
an ad-bearing page.

Ron Hardin wrote:

You need to reference a html web page that contains that link because
geocities wants to put an ad out in payment for the space you're taking,
and won't let anybody access a direct link like that without going through
an ad-bearing page.


Yes, a browser barfs on it, but FreshDownload gets it all right,
and it's "only" 489K. I did manage to download the 2.7M
monster a few minutes ago, and I've got good news and
bad news for you (not you, him!). The good news is:
you can shrink it to about 35K. The bad news is: you'll
have to _type_ the text, and you'll have to learn a bit of
HTML to fit it inside and around the diagrams.

Where does ``and'' in ``try and make it smaller'' come out?

Two possible mechanisms suggest themselves:

1. Conative constructions are frequently infinitival, e.g. "I'm ready to try
to pop this zit." This brings two to's too close together, encouraging
dissimilation of "to ... to" to "to ... and" by analogy with non-conative
expressions like "I'm ready to go and pop this zit." The collocation of "try
and" is then extended to non-infinitival constructions: "If you can't pop
that zit, at least try and make it smaller!"

2. Conative constructions are inherently unreal, and one way of emphasizing
them is to make them less unreal. "Try and ..." originated as an emphatic
form of "try to ...", but with erosion of emphasis through continued use, it
ended up with the same force as the original collocation.

I don't know the detailed history of this usage. Mencken says that "try and"
was denounced by Edward S. Gould in his hortatory deskbook _Good English_,
published in 1867. It is marked as "colloquial" or "informal" by the
dictionaries I have which mention it.