

Enforcing users to use a particular pattern for passwords - Bughunter101
http://ux.stackexchange.com/q/38226/4679

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lutusp
This article has been entered as a candidate in the international unlimited
functional illiteracy sweepstakes. Starting with the title -- "Enforcing users
to use a particular pattern for passwords" -- the word the author wanted, but
could not find, was "Forcing".

Moving on to the first sentence in the article -- "Many websites specially
government ones enforce users to use a password which is specific to a
particular criteria."

"Specially government ones" is a phrase children use below the age of three,
before they acquire an instinct for sentence construction. And "a particular
criteria" _must be_ "a particular criterion."

Further on, we read: "I have found such password pattern are rather hard to
follow and if you do, it becomes extremely difficult to remember." This is a
perfect self-referential comment on the topic of "hard to follow".

We wish this candidate the best of luck -- he certainly earned his place in
the running for this prestigious award.

~~~
DanBC
Editing the question on stack exchange would have provided a lot more benefit
than your snarky, unhelpful, comment here.

Maybe English is not the first language of Salman Ali Ehsan?

EDIT: While snarking about someone else's English you've made some errors
yourself.

> And "a particular criteria" _must_ be "a particular criterion."

No. In context the author should have said "particular criteria". The password
must match a list of elements, not a single element.

> Further on, we read: "I have found such password pattern are rather hard to
> follow and if you do, it becomes extremely difficult to remember." This is a
> perfect self-referential comment on the topic of "hard to follow".

No. The list of criteria are hard to follow. But if you do follow them you get
a password that is hard to remember. Since hard to follow lists provide hard
to remember passwords should users be forced to follow the lists of password
creation rules?

I'm not sure why you're so hung up on "enforced" either. It's not as if it's a
bizarre word choice. It's at least an almost correct word choice.

> _to put or keep in force; compel obedience to: to enforce a rule; "Traffic
> laws will be strictly enforced."_

~~~
lutusp
> EDIT: While snarking about someone else's English you've made some errors
> yourself.

I invite you to locate one.

>> And "a particular criteria" must be "a particular criterion."

> No. In context the author should have said "particular criteria". The
> password must match a list of elements, not a single element.

That's not a correction, it's an alternative. Continuing the theme, your
second "correction" isn't a correction, it's an editorial comment.

> I'm not sure why you're so hung up on "enforced" either.

Because it's grammatically incorrect in the context? "Forced" is not
"enforced." They refer to different things. "The burglar enforced his way into
my house."

> It's at least an almost correct word choice.

Ah ... almost correct. Thanks for the clarification. But you prefaced it by
claiming I had made some errors.

~~~
DanBC
EDIT: You don't appear to understand why I'm pointing this out. It's less
about a discussion of English usage. It was to point out that your initial
comment made you sound like a dick.

> That's not a correction, it's an alternative.

There is a list of criteria. The password must conform to that list of
criteria. It doesn't matter if a password only matches one criterion, because
if it doesn't match the other criteria it will fail. Thus, your alternative, '
_must_ be "a particular criterion"' with a highlighted _must_ , is incorrect.

~~~
lutusp
> It was to point out that your initial comment made you sound like a dick.

On that basis, you believe yourself to be in a position to criticize my posts
based on their tone? Your sense of irony must have been surgically removed.

Your correction is an error masquerading as criticism. A password requirement
can possess one or more criteria. A single criterion is that it must be at
least eight characters in length. Multiple criteria might be that the password
must contain punctuation marks and be at least eight characters in length.
That means you are wrong, and you have yet to locate an error in my posts.

