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Please, help to understand the meanings of two sentences.

1) I found the rule about the usage of this pattern.

  • The only rule I found at all was about this pattern ?

  • About this pattern I found only one rule ?

2) I found a rule about the usage of this pattern.

  • One of the rules I found was about this pattern ?

  • About this pattern I found at least one rule ?

Thanks in advance.

Nikolay Komolov
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    This post is the general go-to post for questions like this one. – pazzo Nov 14 '14 at 21:00
  • What @CarSmack said. Nikolay - in your specific context, (1) implies you (and everyone else, including whoever you're addressing) know there definitely *is* (only *one) such rule. And possibly that it was known you were searching for it. Whereas (2) might imply you just stumbled across a rule you never even suspected* existed (or that there could be even more rules you haven't yet discovered, etc.). – FumbleFingers Nov 14 '14 at 21:06

1 Answers1

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In your first example, the implication of the wording is that there is only one rule governing "the usage of this pattern." In your second example, the suggestion is that there are an indeterminate number of relevant rules, though the actual number may turn out to be anything from one to a very large number indeed.

Sven Yargs
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