French language Q&A Forum

'Personne n'a pas son billet.' is incorrect because of the 'pas'. Can you explain why this is so?

Complétez avec le contraire des prépositions : 

1. Le chien est sur la table.

2. L’ordinateur est à gauche du mur.

3. L’oiseau est au-dessous du bureau.

4. Le cinéma est devant l’hôtel.

5. L’école est loin de ma maison.

How would I say, " Reading is my favorite pass-time, it relaxes me"? Where "it" refers to reading. 

This may be a strange question, but if you have/see a female dog and you want to describe her, would you use il or elle since "dog" is a masculine noun but the dog itself is a female. Like would I say Il est très gentil or elle est très gentille? I am asking because where I live I always hear female dogs referred to as "il" even when everyone knows the dog is a girl. I don't know if that's just because they don't care about the gender of the dog, or because the proper way to refer to it is as "il" since dog is masculine. 

Asked to translate, “ In the evening before a test “, I wrote, “La veille d’une épreuve” which was considered incorrect. The answer given was, “Le soir avant un exam”. Why was my answer wrong especially as “exam” does not feature in Harrap’s Shorter French And English Dictionary or Le Robert de poche. Test is translated as épreuve and examination is translated as examen. In a school context tests and examinations are different the former being of less importance.

In the last sentence I typed "quand ils partent de mon salon !" but "partent de" marked as an error and advised "quittent" or "sortent de". 

Could you please explain why "partent de" cannot be used here as an option ?

For "partir", in the relevant lesson, it is written as: "When used with a place, it will always be followed by a preposition (e.g. I leave from / for  = Je pars de / pour)" Example: Je pars de cette ville.

I’m not sure here why souhaite ends with an ‘e’ when it’s prefixed by a vous? Is it irregular? 

I have no recollection of attempting this exercise.  Why has it appeared?  Thank you. 

Please: could someone please explain why the "de" is necessary in the following sentence:

"Il avait trop bu la veille de l'accident. "

I don't understand the need for the "de" following "la veille."

Thanks in advance!

Kalpana