usage - Whos that book by? vs. Whoms that book by? - English Language . . . 16 The simplest way to ask that question is: Who wrote that book? The original "Who's that book by?" is a clunky, unnatural construction You've got the who whom thing going on as well as the often maligned "ending a sentence with a preposition " "Who wrote that book?" is simple and direct It is clear and natural
prepositions - explain this vs explain about this - English . . . Yes, the sentence is much more fluent without the about The simplest answer is "because that's not how we generally speak in English"; you can see how much more common explain this is than explain about this is It is not impossible to use explain with about, but explain usually takes a direct object, which is the thing that you are explaining "explain about X" carries a sense of "to speak
SHALL vs. MUST in technical documents The simplest way of indicating a requirement, as per the RFC, is the use of the word "must" The alternatives mentioned in the RFC exist to allow for slightly more natural English avoiding the repetition of the word "must" "Every car MUST have a key, which shall be made of metal and is required to weigh less than 100g" The RFC was trying to codify existing practice, in which words like "shall
meaning - difference between didnt and doesnt - English Language . . . Present = simplest = best, though, IMHO But note that syntactically speaking, if doesn't is changed to Past Tense didn't then we should also change Present Perfect has been to Simple Past were (OR Past Perfect had been, but I personally wouldn't make that choice)
subjects - The usage of with and without - English Language . . . This door cannot be opened without removing the key from the lock This door cannot be opened without the key removed from the lock This door cannot be opened with the key inserted in the lock I think the first one is simplest, but I am not sure it is grammatically correct because the subject of "without" differs from the subject of the sentence
usage - Why is it she really done me? - English Language Learners . . . Besides the already-mentioned "she screwed me skillfully" [either sense of "screwed"] and "she improved my situation," it's also worth mentioning that there is a set phrase "she done me wrong", and so "she done me good" might be a bit of a play on that phrase, too It's likely a bit of all of these; the Beatles were big on double meanings for the sake of double meanings