Talk:crystally clear

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crystally clear

sole sense: "in a crystal clear manner".

Is this used by native speakers as an adverb? Is it recent, dated, nonstandard? DCDuring TALK 03:52, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

I have never heard or read this version, and it sounds wrong. I've only ever seen "crystal clear" or "clear as crystal". --Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 03:58, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

It is certainly much, much less common than crystal clear. Google Books is unreliable in providing counts but shows crystal clear to be more than ten thousands time more common than crystally clear and crystal clearly more than four times as common. COCA has 481 instances of crystal clear, 1 of crystal clearly, 0 of crystally clear. I would expect it to be attestable as an adjective though I view it as an attestable error used as an adjective in contemporary English, possibly attributable to bad translations or non-native speakers. As an adverb it appears both less common and more clearly an error. DCDuring TALK 04:16, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

Perhaps, if anything, we should just have crystally adv.: you can also find "crystally perfect", "crystally transparent", etc. Equinox ◑ 05:31, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

Indeed, Whether crystally clear would meet CFI is another question. DCDuring TALK 11:54, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

Cited. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 19:51, 24 August 2013 (UTC)

• RfV passed DCDuring TALK 20:16, 24 August 2013 (UTC)

RfD discussion

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crystally clear

Adverb sense. Insofar as this is not SoP it seems to me to be a clear error in grammar. It is conceivable that clear is used as an adverb in parallel to words like fast which is used both as adjective and adverb, which would make this SoP. Otherwise, it seems like a simple grammatical error. Grammatical errors are never SoP, but they are […] errors. I didn't think we documented them. DCDuring TALK 20:24, 24 August 2013 (UTC)

Keep per CFI’s “A term should be included if it's likely that someone would run across it and want to know what it means.” Even if it is a grammatical error (I see it as an error of interpretation: forming a -ly adverb from the expression crystal clear and thinking crystal is an adjective, probably a result of it ending the same phonemes as the common adjectival suffix -al) we do include them (Mussulmen, avocadi). If anything is a SOP, it’s the adjective:

• “There is a crystally clear river flowing by Vidauban.” (crystally (“as a crystal”) + clear)
• “How dare you imply that the paradox rules aren't utterly, crystally clear!” (multiple adverbs (utterly and crystally (missing sense?) modifying the adjective)

— Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:37, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

@Ungoliant: These two are obviously adverbial uses of crystally#Adverb, modifying the adjective clear. Thus, it is SoP. That, as a matter of style, many, including me, would view it as inferior, is immaterial to its SoPitude. We do not have the talent to be a style guide and would be venturing into a realm that is gradually being abandoned by AHD, the sole major dictionary that offered any style guidance.

@Musselman: It's meaning is obvious from its parts. Crystally is attestable as an adverb, whether or not it agrees with anyone's theories of proper word formation and whether or not we can attest to crystal as an adjective. DCDuring TALK 15:51, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

Delete; covered by crystally (and in some cases evidently an error by non-native speakers). Equinox ◑ 16:15, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

@Musselman: crystal#Adjective "very clear" is attestable as an adjective. See Citations:crystal. DCDuring TALK 16:42, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

Actually CFI goes on to say "A term need not be limited to a single word in the usual sense. Any of these are also acceptable:

Compounds and multiple-word terms such as post office."

I suppose it doesn't mean all multiple word terms, but it doesn't say one way or another. I keep finding error or ambiguous bits of CFI, and even blatant errors are hard to get rid of, because there needs to be a 70% consensus on what to replace the error with, even if 70% of voters overall want to see the text change. Mglovesfun (talk) 20:40, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

• Last call before I close this as no consensus to delete. bd2412 T 17:41, 6 May 2014 (UTC)

Kept for lack of consensus to delete. bd2412 T 19:58, 8 May 2014 (UTC)