Template talk:U:fr:É

Documentation

This template is only to be used for French words starting with a upper case É where the É also/usually written E. Common examples include Égypte/Egypte and États-Unis/Etats-Unis. Must always appear under the header ====Usage notes====

RFD Discussion

The following information passed a request for deletion.

This discussion is no longer live and is left here as an archive. Please do not modify this conversation, but feel free to discuss its conclusions.

---

«Égypte is an error and only Egypte is valid» Automatik (talk) 21:16, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

This template says a thing which is clearly false. Really, Wiktionary can do that ? See Académie française, they explain that forggetting the accent is a fault in French. --ArséniureDeGallium (talk) 20:54, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

Keep, I've never opposed reforming the template but I do oppose deleting it. The thing is... rules change. Accents on capital letters are a pretty recent thing, the last few decades which in linguistic terms is a tiny amount. I asked a French friend about this, she's a little younger than me, maybe 22 or 23. She says that Égypte and Egypte are both valid. Older speakers are telling me that Égypte is an error and only Egypte is valid. You're saying Égypte is valid and not Egypte. How do you want to cover this sort of usage whilst deleting the template? Mglovesfun (talk) 22:55, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

I agree with a template reform; it's truly necessary. Automatik (talk) 21:16, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

Clearly false if you have no idea what you're talking about. Please do some fact checking before talking complete rubbish. Also please avoid inflammatory language. 21:22, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

Sorry. I don't have English for maternal language. That's why I don't see in my talk inflammatory language. However, I think verifiability is important when we say something controversial. Regards, Automatik (talk) 21:35, 17 April 2013 (UTC) Ok, sorry for the confusion. Automatik (talk) 22:22, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

Technically, the template's information is true. It says it's omitted in "traditional orthography", which is true. It just leaves out the important part that the traditional orthography is no longer the current one. —CodeCat 21:25, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

Should we not also consider the non-traditional spelling? Cordially, Automatik (talk) 21:35, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

Well, yes, but that's more or less obvious. As long as a language is being written, our entries will always cover the most current spellings and grammar. —CodeCat 21:39, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

It's possible to say that the spelling without accent is the most used. I think however it's not correct to suggest that a single spelling is prefered; and that's this template do. It would be better to describe the two uses, and not to exclude one with a sentence which excludes the current spelling (note: the reader is primarily there to learn French today, not yesterday's). That's why I support a reform of it, as proposed Mglovesfun. The trend is to increasingly accents on capital (an example). Printing has changed and the rules of typography too. We can't say so categorically today that the accent is usually forgotten on capital letters. Regards, Automatik (talk) 21:53, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

I believe Canadian French keeps the accents on capitals, and the Académie has no say in that. I am not an expert. —Michael Z. 2013-04-21 23:38 z

Hi, I support also the idea that note lack of neutrality. Both are usually use nowadays for all kinds of typewriting but fact normalizing institutions (such as Académie Française) promote É instead E as typographic normed rule and lot of editors follow that normalization. But with the handwritting, we still continue to omit the diacritics on capital letters, maybe you should speak about that fact instead of an hypothethic traditional orthography which doesn't have any sense. But anyways all actives French contributors who read this note found it really "awkward" and confuse, you should reformulate it or simply omit it in my humble opinion. V!v£ l@ Rosière ^/Whisper…/ 00:50, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

Surely all of this is a reason to keep it (with some sort of content). Mglovesfun (talk) 13:44, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

Kept —CodeCat 12:18, 5 August 2013 (UTC)

Discussion

The claim made by this template seems wrong and is certainly unsubstantiated at the moment. I'm currently doing a little research to try and find any older orthotypography recommendations that actually give such a rule. My suspicion is that accented upper-case was always preferable, but was often omitted in the past purely because of technical constraints (type availability). Urhixidur (talk) 13:40, 21 January 2017 (UTC)

Gustave Daupeley, Le Compositeur et le correcteur typographes, Librairie Rouvier et Logeat, Paris, 1880 (Google Books ID 7dANAAAAQAAJ), has a long chapter (second part, chapter III, p. 268 ff.) discussing when upper-case should be used (in much detail). He does not discuss upper-case diacritics, but the examples abundantly show they are kept. There is nothing else that a Google Books search for "Imprimerie nationale" and majuscules will find for the nineteenth century. Urhixidur (talk) 13:57, 21 January 2017 (UTC)