1

Let’s say I have this title:

How to Install a PHP Extension: Quick and Easy

Should I say quick and easy or quickly and easily?

Why?

tchrist
  • 134,759
user557108
  • 395
  • 1
    It depends on the tone you want to convey. In an informal register, this works; someone will claim it's an obvious elision of 'How to Install a PHP Extension: the Quick and Easy Way'. Informally, sentence fragments / ellipses are usually quite acceptable if they don't bring about ambiguity. If you want a formal version, drop most of the capitals and the colon, and use the adverbs. (But you still don't have a true sentence.) – Edwin Ashworth Feb 02 '14 at 17:15
  • @EdwinAshworth I like your implied noun. Why not make it an answer? – bib Feb 02 '14 at 17:18
  • @bib: Someone will claim that the claim that "it's an obvious elision of 'How to Install a PHP Extension: the Quick and Easy Way' " is spurious. – Edwin Ashworth Feb 02 '14 at 17:24
  • I don't believe this is a duplicate of 56563. That question is about using adjectives such as easy like adverbs in sentences. This question is about using them in titles, which don't follow the same rules as sentences. – phenry Feb 03 '14 at 22:26

4 Answers4

2

The terms Quick and Easy modify Install. Technically, since install is a verb, they should be adverbs - Quickly and Easily.

However titles have a life of their own, and they often exist on a different planet than we prescriptivist grammarians. You get a lot of latitude.

Additionally, the adjectival forms have an implied noun to modify: installation. You are suggesting the installation will be quick and easy.

To be a purist, make them adverbs. Or you can leave it punchy.

bib
  • 72,782
2

Quick is what we call a flat adverb...Do it nice and easy, nice and slow, drive quick, stay safe...these are all grammatically correct.

I'd keep the title.

Louel
  • 2,657
  • The question is clearly a dup (we get "flat adverb" questions every other week, it seems). But yours seems to be the only answer clearly acknowledging that both forms are grammatically "correct" in OP's context, so +1 – FumbleFingers Feb 02 '14 at 18:22
  • 1
    Here's a nice video from merriam Webster about flat adverbs:http://www.merriam-webster.com/video/0030-flatadverbs.htm – Louel Feb 02 '14 at 18:25
  • Nice link. Disappointing to see that even after having it spelt out as plain (-ly ?!) as day, the first comment there says for the most part, flat adverbs are colloquial, and would not be acceptable in what we consider formal writing. That commenter obviously didn't try hard (-ly) to grasp the point being made. – FumbleFingers Feb 02 '14 at 18:48
  • 1
    Note: safe in “Stay safe” is the odd one out here since it is not a flat adverb, but a simple adjective. Stay is a linking verb, and safe is its predicate, i.e., a noun phrase. In the other sentences you give, the (flat) adverbs modify the verb and are true adverbs. You can do it nicely and drive slowly, but you cannot *stay safely. – Janus Bahs Jacquet Dec 23 '14 at 00:29
  • @Janus Bahs Jacquet You can, English being what it is, stay safely in your home. And stay safely in certain parts of Elbonia. Though perhaps the first example is a prepositional-phrase modifier usage rather than an adverbial one. – Edwin Ashworth May 20 '15 at 10:17
  • @EdwinAshworth True; what I meant was that you cannot ‘stay safely’ with the same meaning as ‘stay safe’. Safe doesn't work as a flat adverb with stay, only as an adjective. – Janus Bahs Jacquet May 20 '15 at 10:23
  • 1
    @Janus But I could not resist pointing out yet another quirk of the incredible language we know and love. Hate. Use. Think we can master. – Edwin Ashworth May 20 '15 at 10:30
0

Your are modifying an infinitive so you need adverbs, so you'd be on unassailable ground with Quickly and Easily, but Quick and Easy might be snappier in a title. You could make the issue disappear with either "PHP Extension Installation, Quick and Easy" or "Quick and Easy Installation of PHP Extension."

Michael Owen Sartin
  • 5,346
0

"Quick" is an adjective and "quickly" is an adverb, so you should use "quickly" to modify "do".

However, "quick as possible" is often used in everyday English.
http://www.usingenglish.com/forum/ask-teacher/132007-quick-quickly.html

But I suggest you to use fast and easy. See this link.

Quick can be adverb or adjective.

Glorfindel
  • 14,499
Masoud Mohammadi
  • 392