https://arxiv.org/search/cs?query=runtime&searchtype=all&abs...

In any case Quanta Magazine is not a formal academic journal, and neither is hacker news. We're having an informal discussion about a popular science article.

https://arxiv.org/abs/2401.14645

https://arxiv.org/abs/2401.13770

https://arxiv.org/abs/2401.12253

https://arxiv.org/abs/2401.12205

https://arxiv.org/abs/2401.10856

There isn't a fixed consistent usage, even in the academic literature. More importantly though it doesn't matter which you use, as long as its obvious what you're talking about.

Language matters when you want to get across. (and so does context).

https://www.nature.com/articles/s43588-023-00589-x

Here is one in Nature Physics

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41567-023-02325-8

Here is one in Nature Precedings

https://www.nature.com/articles/npre.2011.5593.1

And here is one in Nature Communications

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-023-44008-1

It isn't a matter of a lack of due care - it just really really doesn't matter which term you use as long as your meaning is clear.

The reason is much simpler: many (most) researchers are not native English speakers. For example, my doctoral advisor (who knows English well, but is not a native speaker) could hardly help me with questions concerning more subtle aspects of English terms used in the research area. He told me that hardly anybody cares. Even more: when you look for examples, you always have to consider the situation that a word is used wrongly because the author who comes from an arbitrary country does not know better.

Even more: sometimes I do ask native English speakers about subtle aspects of the English language. My impression from this is: while it is not uncommon among native German speakers to deeply analyze German words, various native English speakers independently told me that doing such an analysis "is not how the English language works" (or how native English speakers think about their language).

I'm tempted to question this idea that English speakers are just unconcerned with their own language, but then I'm not entirely sure what you have in mind when you speak of "deep [linguistic] analysis" (or a lack thereof). Can you provide an example?

Those references don’t seem to be about environments like Java.

Also worth keeping in mind that usage defines what words mean. If a given usage is common, that makes it de-facto correct, and eventually the dictionary will catch up. This one reason why the dictionaries keep adding new definitions.

Since you’re incorrect about the definitions, and since the meaning of the word runtime was correct in the top comment and understood by everyone reading, and never confused in this thread, the context does not matter here in this case.

I’ve learned from a lot of experience being wrong that the problem with trying to police language is you’re almost never right. Words are beautifully fluid and have multiple and surprising meanings. It’s common for people to mistakenly think the meaning they know is the only meaning, and not be aware of the wider history and usage. So, speaking from experience in the role of English pedant, and getting rightly smacked down, be careful or you end up on the wrong side of your corrections.