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Subject:Re: A usage question From:Robert Bononno <bononno -at- ACF2 -dot- NYU -dot- EDU> Date:Tue, 4 May 1993 00:50:04 -0400
On Mon, 3 May 1993, Fred M Jacobson wrote:
> > I have found also that educating people about the "behind-the-scenes"
> > interactions of one software with another ...
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^>
> I always use "software" as a collective noun or as
> an adjective. (I would never say, "I lost my self-control and bought
> three softwares for my PC on the way home from work.") Is the above
> usage and similar ones, such as "a new software for the Mac," acceptable
> in writing? in formal speech? (I don't ask about informal speech, because
> there I accept whatever communicates best.)
I've always seen it expressed as a software application, or an
application, or a software package, when referring to an individual
entity. Would we then say "a hardware?"