French language Q&A Forum

Are both of these options correct? When do you use à + direct/indirect pronoun?

Bonjour

Can one as an alternative to "deux sucettes au caramel" write "deux sucettes caramélisées"? This is in line with phrases like "porc salé" and "bouillon aromatisé".

Or, does "deux sucettes au caramel" imply lollipops that contain pieces of caramel compared to "deux sucettes caramélisées" that implies lollipops with a caramel flavour?

There is a glitch in the writing and dictation exercises -- when you finish typing and hit enter (or whatever), it moves directly to the next portion to read/listen to without giving the option to grade it. It's frustrating.

I find the difference between singular and plural to be very subtle in spoken French, even when spoken slowly and carefully as in the audio lessons.

des (¨day¨) vs de (¨duh¨) 

J'adore aussi l'odeur des châtaignes (plural)

J'adore aussi l'odeur de châtaigne (singular)

Any hints on how to pick up that difference when listening?

On the introductory page of the dictée "Rendez-vous pour le contrôle technique", the word is spelled 'defectueux'. But in the body of the exercise, in section four where it appears, it is spelled 'défecteux'.

Yet your explanation says to use "jouons au" for a sport that you play regularly. "We play waterpolo" means we play it regularly. That's an unambiguous English sentence. There is no other way to translate that. No English-speaking person would use the phrase "We play" for a single incident. They'd say, "We're playing waterpolo." This seems like a bug to me. 

Even the article you link to earlier in this discussion uses "jouons au" for waterpolo. Either you need to explain this better or change the quiz answer.

ETA: In fact, if you type "We play water polo" into Google translate, it says "Nous jouons au water polo." If you google "jouer à vs faire de" you get this explanation:

To remember when to use each verb: if the sport involves a ball, use jouer. If not, use faire.

Someone brought this up 3 years ago. You updated the lesson 2 months ago. This should've been addressed already.

For the line “Chaque seconde, un hectare de forêt vierge mondiale est détruit” one lesson listed is passive voice. Is this really passive voice, or is “détruit” just an adjective in this case? I would be able to see more clearly the passive voice nature of, for example, “Every second, one hectare of forest was destroyed by foresters” or even “Every second, one hectare of forest was destroyed” (with an implied subject enacting the verb). However, I’m not getting the passive voice in the original line, perhaps because “is” rather than “was” is being used. Explanation welcome, as I do struggle with passive voice topics.

Passive voice

J'étais soulagée après que tu as réussi ton exam. Here, the main verb is in the plus que parfait and après que is followed by a verb in the passé composé. Isn't that backwards; shouldn't the main verb be in the passé composé and the subordinate verb be in the plus que parfait? 

“…four or so…” sounds like an indeterminate or uncountable number to me, hence should be included amongst the right answers to the use of “quelques”.  is it four or isn’t it four? :-)

Is there a lesson which covers this case of using an adverb "bien" instead of an adjective "bonne" ?