French language Q&A Forum

I'm confused because on many other sites I see both these used as conditionnel. E.g., J'avais pu = I had been able to/could have

Si tu avais pu, tu aurais fait = If you could have, you would have.

Please explain.

Is there any difference between "à temps" and "à l'heure"?

Any the proper french phrases for "on time" and "in time" ?

Merci boucoup d'avance!

If "ai" is pronounced as "e" what about "eu" "au" "aux" "œ"... ??

These are the examples given:

- parler : nous parlons (we are talking) -> je parlais

- finir : nous finissons (we are finishing) -> je finissais

- faire : nous faisons (we are doing) -> je faisais

- prendre : nous prenons (we are taking) -> je prenais

All the verbs have the same ending despite the subject. Perhaps I'm missing something

Why must I have a circumflex on the i for quoi?

This isn't covered in fully in the lessons, but I would like to know: how do we know when to use à + verb as opposed to de + verb? Some lessons cover de + verb, for example to say 'before running' I can say 'avant de courir'. But I'm not sure about the other case, à + verb. Any answers? I haven't had much luck searching the web for this, so any help would be much appreciated.

This is the one specific to this exercise:

"qui consiste à appliquer de la peinture sur de l'eau". Why not "qui consiste d'appliquer ...?"

Here are other cases I've found on this website:

nous avons commencé à le faire il y a quelques années

quand tu auras fini de ranger ta chambre, tu m'aideras à faire la vaisselle.

on est toujours pressé d'oublier les moments délicats

le temps que je finisse de manger, ... j'aurai fini de vérifier ... le temps que ça lui prend de se préparer