French language Q&A Forum

...in the following:

“et qui lui ont promis de lui montrer la vie...”

“et qui lui ont promis de lui faire découvrir la vie...”

Is this (a) a mistake, (b) just my ears missing the sound, or (c) a natural French abbreviation (a bit like “tu as” being pronounced as “ta”)?

Est-ce que tu des sous vetements dans ce magasin ou seulement des legumes?

This exercise used the imperfect tense of pouvoir to translate the English word, could.  The French also use the conditional tense to translate could.  I am sometimes confused as to the correct choice when trying to translate could.  I searched the library for pouvoir and found lots of lessons regarding various tenses for pouvoir; however, I found none for the imperfect.  I am surmising that the use of the imperfect for pouvoir is appropriate in what I call "if I could-then I would" constructions. The if part would take the imperfect of pouvoir.  This is distinctive from a simple condition as in "Could you pass me the salt?", which I believe would use the conditional form of pouvoir.  I hope you understand my question.  I am simply trying to figure out when to use the imperfect form for pouvoir when trying to translate could.  Thanks in advance.

Thanks a lot, have to work a bit harder...

Bonjour, je voudrais savoir si'il y a (il doit que) pour sobjonctif

J'ai vu cette exemple:

Il doit partir la semaine prochaine. 

Est-ce qu'on peut dire aussi:

Il doit que nous partions la semaine prochaine. 

Is another translation of this: Il a abattu le parrain? My French dictionary gives the definition of abattre as `to shoot down ` or `to kill` Is there a nuance?

Just took the Kwiz on my lesson plan and the question was to fill in the blank for this sentence:

"__________________ hier quand je lui ai marche sur le pied."("I hurt Olive yesterday when I stepped on her foot.")

Here was my answer, which was marked wrong:

"J'ai fait mal à Olivier hier quand je lui ai marche sur le pied."

My mistake? It wasn't at all the grammar. I simply typed Olivier instead Olive, probably because subconsciously Olivier seems like a French name to me, whereas Olive doesn't.

Now, although I understand this lesson completely and thoroughly, I will be marked down and have to do several more tests just to get back to where I was instead getting the extra percentage points that I should have gotten. 

May I suggest that a simple typo with a name - which is completely irrelevant to the lesson - should be marked as "almost correct" and the answer be given the total points.