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It's the subjunctive, and it's not considered archaic yet.
However it's wrongly used in that sentence and that's one reason it sounds awk.
Change "to be" to "be":
"This process need only be followed in case of driver failure."
Again, not yet archaic (at least not in the arc of my experience of our language). But it's not how we write, we tech writers.
This is how I would write it:
"If a driver fails, follow this process:"
Or better yet:
"If a driver fails:
1. Do this.
2. Then do this here.
3. (etc.)
________________________________
From: Suzette Leeming <suzette -dot- leeming -at- gmail -dot- com>
To: Bruce Megan (ST-CO/ENG2.2) <Megan -dot- Bruce -at- us -dot- bosch -dot- com>
Cc: techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
Sent: Thursday, April 23, 2009 2:36:36 PM
Subject: Re:
I would say "This process only needs to be followed in cases of hard drive
failure". The way it's worded sounds awkward.
Suzette Leeming
Stouffville, Ontario
On Thu, Apr 23, 2009 at 2:34 PM, Bruce Megan (ST-CO/ENG2.2) <
Megan -dot- Bruce -at- us -dot- bosch -dot- com> wrote:
> Hello all,
> Just wanted to check the "correctness" of the following sentence. I know
> I've seen people use this type of wording...but it seems a bit archaic
> to me...
> SENTENCE: This process need only to be followed in case of drive
> failure.
> The words I question are "need only to be"
> Suggestions? Comments?
>
> Thanks Meg
>
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