French language Q&A Forum

In the lesson on the partitive articles, they are listed as du, de l’, de la and des. When would you use the plural “des?” It seems that with uncountable nouns, you’re always talking about an amount or quantity of something, some sugar, some coffee, etc and would therefore always be singular. 

The example is given of something like “Tu achètes des épinards.” Here, “des” is used because “épinards” is a masculine plural noun. Is this the only time you use “des?” Otherwise, it’s really used as an indefinite article?

Thank you for any help!

I find this expression interesing: "comme le veut la tradition". Is there a specific lesson for that?

Would it work also in these examples? E.g. "The cake was made of chocolate, like how he wanted it." "The red coat is more beautiful, as she says."

Thank you

Why is is imparfait used in this sentence?  L'écureuil allait plus vite que lui...  I would have considered the phrase  part of the story chronology-- not background/description.  Or should I "translate" it as The squirrel was faster than him...  since it is a comparison of speed?  Merci?

excellent essay

I understand why “Quel est le meilleur aspirateur? “ uses  meilleur but would the answer to that question in a shop be “Cet aspirateur est mieux que ceux-là.”, or Cet aspirateur est meilleur que ceux. Is a general statement (using mieux) able to be used for comparing two specific objects the speakers are pointing to, trying on, testing out, deciding between?

In the negative half of the lesson, the adjective plus mauvais seems to be used for similarly structured sentences. Mon accent est plus mauvais que le tien. and Ses résultats sont plus mauvais que l'année dernière.

I was confused initially as this lesson was to be devoted to regular verbs.  The conjugation of être is given in a later lesson an includes the same example copied above. To prevent confusion,  I suggest this particular example be removed from this lesson and also the video clip on être as there is another lesson devoted to this subject.

Why is "était fait" used in a compound verb structure when avoir is normally used w/ faire?

In regards to the sentence: Ils quittent leur travail à 19h, is the following identification of different articles of speech correct: 

(subject)Ils (verb)quittent (indirect object pronoun)leur (direct object)travail (preposition)à (??)19h 

I am not sure what article of speech does "19h" come under?

Are you saying qui can’t be used unless it’s in the inverted form? Here’s the lesson question and I used qui vs qui est-ce que: Qui vous avez envie de revoir ? I know you can’t use the longer version with inverted questions. Thanks for your help.