# PLLs vs PLL's (The Greengrocer's Apostrophe)



## Stefan (Jul 10, 2009)

In my understanding, "PLL's", "OLL's", etc are wrong. Am I wrong?
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/vivian.c/Punctuation/ApostGrocers.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apostrophe#Greengrocers.27_apostrophes

I just saw a single post with six occurences of "PLL's" and it drove me crazy.


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## MTGjumper (Jul 10, 2009)

I just looked at all of the similar threads, and every single one apostrophised PLLs and/or OLLs


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## Johannes91 (Jul 10, 2009)

http://www.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/acronyms.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acronym_and_initialism#Representing_plurals_and_possessives
http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=499296

Many seem to consider it wrong, but it's quite common. Google search for "plural acronym apostrophe" or something similar gives many relevant links.


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## DAE_JA_VOO (Jul 10, 2009)

You're correct Stefan. It's PLLs, not PLL's. It drives me off my head when people just throw in apostrophes wherever they can.

EDIT: Man, I JUST read that very thread you mentioned after making my post. 

My eyes hurt


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## MichaelErskine (Jul 10, 2009)

Commonly occurring != Correct 

I'm on an ongoing (albeit rather quiet and polite) campaign to abolish the abuse of apostrophes and I uphold their use in terms like "Man, it was better in the '80s!" just because I write that so often


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## Cride5 (Jul 10, 2009)

msemtd said:


> Commonly occurring != Correct


... this is why I follow the philosophy in my sig 

An apostrophe before the s is supposed to indicate possession. So if I said: "PLL's rock!" I'd be referring to a rock belonging to some dude (or dudette) called PLL. I think people just use it to separate the s from the possessive for aesthetic reasons. Personally it doesn't bug me, but I try to avoid such practices because writing properly makes you more understandable


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## cookingfat (Jul 10, 2009)

PLLs yes. 

As Cride5 said, something would have to belong to a PLL to be called PLL's


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## byu (Jul 10, 2009)

Correct:
"I prefer 2-gen PLLs"

Also Correct:
"This PLL's moves are 2-gen"

Not Correct
"2-gen PLL's are better"


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## Lucas Garron (Jul 10, 2009)

From the Wikipedia page:


> Use in forming certain plurals
> An apostrophe is used by some writers to form a plural for abbreviations, acronyms, and symbols where adding just s rather than 's may leave things ambiguous or inelegant.



From my very trustworthy and knowledgeable 8th grade English teacher, I learned that I should pluralize an abbreviation like PLL by adding an apostrophe. This is one of the few technical grammar changes I've picked up in school, and though I'm not sure I agree with that convention, "PLL's" look perfectly justifiable to me.


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## Cride5 (Jul 10, 2009)

I'm not sure if there's a right or wrong answer to this, but certainly using apostrophes for plurals introduces yet more possibility for ambiguities. The "PLL's rock!" example is one. The other side of the coin is that sometimes it can clarify. For example: "How many a's are there in abracadabra?". Without an apostrophe it wouldn't really make sense.

My strategy: Avoid unless absolutely necessary.

EDIT: Here's an interesting read on the topic.


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## JTW2007 (Jul 10, 2009)

StefanPochmann said:


> In my understanding, "PLL's", "OLL's", etc are wrong. Am I wrong?
> http://homepage.ntlworld.com/vivian.c/Punctuation/ApostGrocers.htm
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apostrophe#Greengrocers.27_apostrophes
> 
> I just saw a single post with six occurences of "PLL's" and it drove me crazy.



You're correct.


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## Stefan (Jul 10, 2009)

PLL's and OLL's are just the examples I remember best because I see them more often. But it's also done with ordinary words. Some examples:

Any Australian's here?
Competitior profile video's
2 Look OLL Alg's?
Featured on a Blog About Mozillas's Fastest Firefox (ugh)

There were some more recently but I already fixed them.


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## riffz (Jul 10, 2009)

I agree with Stefan. However, I do use apostrophes for pluralizing individual letters because it looks less messy:

ie.

"This sentence contains lots of A's"

instead of 

"This sentence contains lots of As"

I realize you could also surround them in single quotes like 'A' (programmer style).


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## trying-to-speedcube... (Jul 10, 2009)

[email protected] Mozillas's


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## Gabriel (Jul 10, 2009)

Well I'm one who uses apostrophes, but I use them in PLL's or OLL's because they are abbreviation, and if Lucas Garron is right, then it's correct.


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## Stefan (Jul 10, 2009)

StefanPochmann said:


> 2 Look OLL Alg's?


I might take that one back. I'm not used to the apostrophe standing for omitted letters as in "Serg't" (only in "don't" and the like). But I really doubt Regisiew meant it that way.


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## blade740 (Jul 10, 2009)

I've always used an apostrophe when I'm pronouncing individual letters in an acronym.


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## brunson (Jul 10, 2009)

StefanPochmann said:


> StefanPochmann said:
> 
> 
> > 2 Look OLL Alg's?
> ...


No, I think you were right the first time. I would consider "alg" an abbreviation, so "alg's" is no more correct than "algorithm's".


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## JTW2007 (Jul 10, 2009)

"Alg's" drives me absolutely crazy (providing that it is referring to plural and not possessive). I think I may be the only one who does cube types without apostrophes, i.e. "I have two black Type Cs." I think that's correct, isn't it?


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## brunson (Jul 10, 2009)

I think "two type Cs" is correct, but it looks weird to me. I think the apostrophe is required to pluralize lower case letters, just to separate the s. "cs" vs. "c's".

http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/621/01/


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## Johannes91 (Jul 11, 2009)

msemtd said:


> Commonly occurring != Correct


In general, I agree. But when it comes to natural languages... To some extent they are *defined* by the common usage. (I find it hilarious that some purists consider some Finnish words that practically everybody uses to be incorrect for really silly reasons.) And while some common mistakes are obviously mistakes, this is one of the things where it doesn't seem to be 100% clear. Using an apostrophe feels consistent with plurals of letters and the ambiguity doesn't seem like it'd ever matter in practice.

I've written it as "PLLs" before and probably will in future, but seeing an apostrophe in there isn't going to drive me crazy.


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## Dene (Jul 12, 2009)

I think you guys are wasting your time getting caught up in technical grammar. English is a giant deforming bubble of goo. You cannot expect things to stay as they have traditionally.


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## Darshen (Jul 12, 2009)

byu said:


> Also Correct:
> "This PLL's moves are 2-gen"



THIS IS NOT AN ATTACK ON byu, OR HIS COMMENT JUST AN OBSERVATION

I had learnt that this is not correct, remember I am just remembering from school, don't attack me if I am wrong (just quote where I am wrong and comment constructively). I thought: Inanimate objects or theories did not have apostrophe s, if owning, but do if missing out 'is'. This is also the case with the word 'it'.

Correct:
"It's dead." - This is because the word 'is' is left out.

Correct:
"Its moves are 2-gen" - This is because 'It' is not a person.

This is what I understand from my teacher, am I right?


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## rjohnson_8ball (Jul 12, 2009)

Like brunson said. If someone uses lowercase for an acronym then an apostrophe is useful to indicate the "s" is not part of the acronym. So I believe pll's and oll's would be more appropriate than plls and olls. It seems to me lowercase acronyms seem to become acceptable after they become popular -- like radar and lasar. I don't see much harm in saying PLL's and OLL's though. It is not as bad as apple's and orange's.


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## brunson (Jul 12, 2009)

Darshen said:


> Correct:
> "It's dead." - This is because the word 'is' is left out.
> 
> Correct:
> ...


I'm not positive, but I think this may be a special case only for "its" because it would be ambiguous otherwise.

"My car's tire is flat" or "My cars tire is flat"?


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## beingforitself (Jul 12, 2009)

StefanPochmann said:


> In my understanding, "PLL's", "OLL's", etc are wrong. Am I wrong?
> http://homepage.ntlworld.com/vivian.c/Punctuation/ApostGrocers.htm
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apostrophe#Greengrocers.27_apostrophes
> 
> I just saw a single post with six occurences of "PLL's" and it drove me crazy.



http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/17/garden/17vampire.html?_r=1

Given this, I am assuming that as of 2005 the New York Times manual of style and usage says apostrophization of plural acronyms is correct.


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## Stefan (Jul 12, 2009)

beingforitself said:


> http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/17/garden/17vampire.html?_r=1
> 
> Given this, I am assuming that as of 2005 the New York Times manual of style and usage says apostrophization of plural acronyms is correct.



New York Times 2009:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/10/sports/baseball/10umps.html?scp=1&sq=tvs&st=cse


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## beingforitself (Jul 13, 2009)

StefanPochmann said:


> beingforitself said:
> 
> 
> > http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/17/garden/17vampire.html?_r=1
> ...



True; however:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/07/world/asia/07afghan.html?scp=1&sq="g.i.'s"&st=cse
(sorry for article's morbidity)

as well as:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/14/fashion/14newlove.html?scp=1&sq="c.d.'s"&st=cse
(bottom of page)

Implying that (at least according to the NYT) both "PLLs" and "P.L.L.'s" would be correct for plural (degenerating of course into the form "PLLs" due to the fact that "P.L.L." is almost never used).

I checked a few other major English newspapers, and all use unapostrophized plurals for (non-periodicized) acronyms, except for a few (including the NYT) which seem to have used *only* apostrophized plural acronyms until around the year 2005.

In other words: it would appear that you are correct, but at one point in (recent) time were only debatably correct.


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