Talk:half past

Instead of half past one I've heard English people say half one. Is it correct to use it? D.D.

I don't think so. I certainly never saw it.

Concerning the 'vijf na één'. Why didn't you leave the wrong ones with the remark they are colloquial?

Polyglot 19:58 Apr 4, 2003 (UTC)

You probably have a point there. I even think they are colloquial and regional (AFAIK na is only used in Flanders in this sense). If you don't beat me to it I'll probably do it this weekend. I'm quitting now (I've had a tiring week) D.D.


 * I had my concerns about these pages, but chose to leave them alone lest I just add to the confusion. I would personally use "one-thirty"; "ten after" is used more often than "ten past".  I have heard some others use "ten of" or "ten till" instead of "ten to".  Perhaps there should be a whole article on how to tell time.  Eclecticology 00:32 Apr 5, 2003 (UTC)

It's certainly a challenge to indicate how time is told in different languages. Apparently it's not even clear how to do it in even one language. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't be trying it.

Isn't it possible to make more pages and then refer from one to the other? I had been thinking about one thirty as well, but I needed one system as a 'hook' to add the translations. Also one thirty would be translated differently in the other languages, so it certainly deserves its own page. If you would delete those pages, please advise me. I'm entering data in this wiktionary because it gives me the impression that I'm working on my own dictionary project. I plan to reuse the data from this site for the dictionary I'm trying to create. (It's based on a relational database all the way). The problem is I don't have enough time on my hands to work a lot on it. Maybe by the time I retire...

Polyglot 06:13 Apr 5, 2003 (UTC)
 * I wasn't about to delete the pages. That approach without making a positive contribution to the matter would not be very polite of me.  I was just expressing concerns, without a specific solution in mind.  Having separate pages for five past and ten past etc. strikes me as needlessly redundant; by this token one could also argue in favour of seven past.  The important thing here is the pattern rather than the specific number.  The question then becomes: how do we express that pattern in a way that will be useful to a person who doesn't know the pattern? Eclecticology 12:54 Apr 6, 2003 (UTC)


 * The reason for having every five minutes is because in some languages it might be important. 5 past and 10 past might be expressed in a different way. I agree that it is rather with :20, :25, :35 and :40 that strange things occur. So maybe 5 past and 10 past could be dropped. On the other hand, it's very systematic now.


 * I do agree that a page that refers to these different pages might be useful. To sum it all up.


 * All this is not exactly relevant when the dictionary is primarily oriented towards English. But I'm specifically interested in all the languages and their interrelationships. For me English is just one of the many.

Polyglot 17:50 Apr 6, 2003 (UTC)

@D.D.: "Half one" is used in the United Kingdom, possibly also in Ireland. &mdash; hippietrail (talk) 06:50, 11 October 2012 (UTC)