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Subject:SUMMARY: "Click" vs. "click on" From:"Mark L. Levinson" <mark -at- MEMCO -dot- CO -dot- IL> Date:Wed, 6 Aug 1997 14:51:16 +0300
I know that the issue of "click" vs. "click on." is a dead horse,
but as Miracle Max points out, being dead doesn't necessarily mean
being entirely dead. Thanks to all who responded. The question
had to do with whether a line in a list gets clicked or clicked on.
I received fifteen answers.
Many answers included ifs, ands, or buts. Simplified mercilessly,
the answers can be reduced to?-
11 for click
2 for click on
2 for choose
The anti-prepositionists cited works by Microsoft and by
other standard-setting companies.
One respondent is against "click" for any purpose, because it
wrongly assumes that everyone's pointing device is a mouse.
Many respondents favor "click" in general but sometimes use
other words. The following recommendations came up once or
twice apiece:
- "in" for fields
- "on" for lines or words
- "choose" for menus or lists
- "check" and "uncheck" for checkboxes
- "select" for words
- and other prepositions as necessary to help situate the click
There seems to be some residual though ever-weakening feeling
that it's more reasonable to think of clicking a button, which
might if it were a real button emit a real click, than clicking
a line of text, which if it were a real line of text would just
rub off on your finger.
--
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