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Person Pronouns

This page provides details on when to use the following pronouns:

  • Singular first-person pronouns: "I," "me," "my," "mine," "myself"
  • Plural first-person pronouns: "we," "us," "our," "ours," "ourselves"
  • Second-person pronouns: "you," "your," "yours," "yourself"
caution

Third-person pronouns should rarely, if ever, be used.

In documentation​

Documentation should use second-person pronouns ("you," "your," "yours," "yourself").

When writing in second person, you address the reader directly as if having a conversation with them. The use of personal pronouns like "you" or "your" creates a friendly and approachable tone. By doing so, it also helps to steer clear of passive voice by keeping the focus on the reader. Sometimes, omitting the word "you" altogether can make the sentence even more effective, but doing so should be based on your own judgment.

note

An exception to this guideline is when you need to direct the reader to "contact us."

Example - Second-person pronoun usage​

The following is an example of second-person pronouns usage:

You need to have a license key (trial license or commercial license) to use ScalarDB Cluster. If you don't have a license key, please contact us.

In blog posts​

Since blog posts are intended to be casual, you can use singular first-person pronouns when referring to the author of the blog post; plural first-person pronouns when referring to Scalar; and second-person pronouns when referring to the reader.

Example - Singular first-person pronoun usage​

In this case "I" is referring to the author, who is expressing their opinion in the blog post.

However, with new technologies, the downsides of 2PC are not only addressed but there is an increased merit to utilizing 2PC in microservices. I also believe that approaches like Saga are no longer a good option in microservices due to the burden and complexity to application developers.

Example - Plural first-person pronoun usage​

In this case "we" is referring to Scalar, the organization.

We are excited to introduce Scalar Manager, a handy graphical user interface (GUI) tool designed to enhance the experience of managing and monitoring ScalarDB and ScalarDL in Kubernetes clusters.