[#DuolingoForumGems originally posted on 2020-05-23 on the Duolingo Hungarian for English speakers forum by MrtonPolgr ]

Behind the scenes: reporting, development of trees and more

Hi there!

If you are reading this post, you probably belong to the small minority of Duolingo users that contributors and other learners can access. This is amazing, you guys provide the most feedback to the courses while having a much better Duolingo experience thanks to all the knowledge that's available on the forum! There are things that you maybe haven't come across yet.
This post is meant for "naive" Duolingo users, like I was a couple of months ago, not quite knowing how Duolingo is programmed and what happens behind the scenes. Now that I have been a contributor for almost two months, I thought it would be good to share a couple of things that I learned from it. This includes to-do's, not-to-do's, general information about what you can expect in certain scenarios and of course my own personal opinion sometimes.

Reverse course

Something that may be unexpected is that a lot of resources are shared between the EN-HU and the HU-EN courses. This isn't a unique thing, just how Duolingo works. X for Y speakers and Y for X speakers always complement each other. This means you can't have the same sentence in both courses as distinct entries. The same way, you can't have the same words in both courses as separate entities either. If you change a common sentence, it will change for the other course as well. This is a huge constraint on acceptable translations and also part of the reason why hints are so problematic. Their reverse-translation is our translation and vice versa. This means certain translation issues can only be resolved with the help of the EN-HU team. (I find this design choice quite weird. It seems fairly obvious not the same people want to contribute to an English course and to a Hungarian course - it's also obvious these courses have very different needs.)

 [#DuolingoForumGems originally posted on 2017-02-10 on the Duolingo Hungarian for English speakers forum by iRBiS ]

How shall we count with Hungarian numbers?

—LIT. "HOGYAN SZÁMOLJUNK MAGYAR SZÁMOKKAL?"

I had the idea that I would give you a little overview of cardinal numbers in the Hungarian language (and save ordinal numbers for another time) here on Duolingo discussions. I'm writing in accordance with the Official Spelling Rulebook (in Hungarian) where possible; otherwise, based off of my own experience. Please feel free to comment on anything.

How do Hungarians read their numbers out loud?

KEY POINTS:

• 11 and 12 are not any more special than 13 or 14 or 15.
• Group by thousands first. There is no 15 hundred etc.
• Years are also read out loud the same way.
• Use the long scale for large numbers.

Numeric identifiers

If you have to tell someone your telephone or bank card number, do it in any way you like. The most common thing to do is either to say every individual digit or to form numbers in the 10–99 range. For numbers in the 200–999 range, száz (hundred) is often dropped. Be careful that kétszáz then becomes kettő.

• (46) 365-111
• "negyvenhat, három(száz)hatvanöt, száztizenegy"
• (20) 640-3201
• "húsz(as), hat(száz)negyven, harminckettő nulla egy"
• +36 1 768 9000
• "plusz harminchat, egy, hét(száz)hatvannyolc, kilencezer"

Because kétszáz, hétszáz and négyszáz sound similar as does hét and négy, and the quality of the phone line may be bad, if you are asked which one a number was, say it like this:

• 200 = "kettőszáz" or "kettes|száz"
• 400 = "négyes|száz"
• 700 = "hetes|száz"

The idea here is that the names of numbers used to reference them (e.g. "This is the number two.") have the -as/os/es/ös suffix, and the stem before the suffix changes differently.

Here is what to listen for:

• 2 = "kettes" (short vowel 'e' + double-length stop consonant 'tt')
• 4 = "négyes" (long vowel 'é')
• 7 = "hetes" (short vowel 'e' + single-length stop consonant 't')

How do Hungarians write their numbers?

KEY POINTS:

• Use the decimal comma instead of the decimal point.
• Group by thousands with a space (optional).
• Put a space before units of measurement.
• Signs such as # and % are joined (a common stylistic rule).

There is a rule that says that, when writing numbers over 2000 as text, put a dash between every group of thousands. It is also worth mentioning here that egy should not be dropped from the initial egyezer and egyszáz when filling out cheques.

• 1 750 535
• common: "egymillió-hétszázötvenezer-ötszázharmincöt"
• 121 000
• common: "százhuszonegyezer"
• bank-teller-approved: "egyszázhuszonegyezer"
• 1500 Ft
• common: "ezerötszáz forint"
• bank-teller-approved: "egyezerötszáz forint"
• 30 960 000 000 Ft
• commoner/VIP-approved: "harmincmilliárd-kilencszázhatvanmillió forint"

Decimal numbers

KEY POINTS:

• The decimal comma is read out loud as egész (whole); before that, it is the integer part.
• The part after the comma, the fractional part, is either read out like a number (colloquial) or as a fraction where the denominator is a power of 10.

• 0,5
• colloquial: "nulla egész öt"
• math-teacher-approved: "nulla egész öt tized"
• 0,05
• colloquial: "nulla egész nulla öt"
• math-teacher-approved: "nulla egész öt század"
• 0,505
• colloquial #1: "nulla egész öt nulla öt"
• colloquial #2: "nulla egész ötszázöt"
• math-teacher-approved: "nulla egész ötszázöt ezred"

Units of measurement (adjectival form)

KEY POINTS:

• When either the number word or the word after it is a compound word, put a space between them; otherwise, join the two words.

• 10 vs 11 y/o
• "tízéves" (long vowel 'í')
• "tizenegy éves" (short vowel 'i')
• 1 m-es
• "egyméteres"
• 2 dl-es
• "két deciliteres" (colloquially: "kétdecis")
• 500 cm³ (colloquially: 500 cc)
• "ötszáz köbcentiméteres" (colloquially: "ötszáz köbcentis")

This joining of words (tízéves and egyméteres) can only happen when the adjectival -as/os/es/ös suffix is used.

• "ezerforintos bankjegy" = 1000 Ft bank note
• "tízezer forintos bankjegy" = 10 000 Ft bank note

Superessive case

 [Part of this post is taken from the Duolingo Hungarian Tips & Notes ]

Superessive case (on/en/ön/n ending)

The superessive case is one that expresses a spatial relation. As with the inessive , the superessive usually conforms to an English preposition and has forms based on vowel harmony.

It's easy for English speakers, as it sounds like the preposition ‘on’! -n/-on/-en/ön

English	Hungarian
the ship	a hajó
on the ship	a hajón
the sidewalk	a járda
on the sidewalk	a járdán
the table	az asztal
on the table	az asztalon
the airplane	a repülőgép
on the airplane	a repülőgépen
the ground	a föld
on the ground	a földön

Using the suffixes -n/-on/-en/ön is like using the English preposition on, but after the word.

If a word ends in a vowel (except for “a” and “e”) you can add the ending “-n” directly .

If the word ends in “-a” or “-e” it gets the “-n” but “-a” becomes “-á” and “-e” becomes “-é”.

For words ending in a consonant you also have to consider vowel harmony. Words containing only back vowels (or dominantly back vowels), like asztal, we add “-on”asztal-on. You will meet an exceptional vowel, the ”back -i”, like we had in “iszik”. The ‘-í’ in ‘híd’ (= bridge) behaves as a back vowel, so we will say ‘a hídon’ (= on the bridge). Memorization is our only recourse .

However, for words with only front vowels, the suffix is sometimes -en and sometimes -ön. As in verb conjugations, “-ön” is used if the last syllable contains -ö/-ő/-ü/-ű, like föld meaning ‘floor, ground, Earth’, it becomes földön ‘on the ground’.

For other front vowels (-e/-é/-i/-í) add “-en”, like szék, which becomes széken.

When to use it?

1: Express that “something is ON something”:

The cat sits on the car. = A macska az autón ül.

The coat is on the bag. = A kabát a táskán van.

The apple is on the table. = Az alma az asztalon van.

I live on a hill. = Egy hegyen élek.

The book is on the floor. = A könyv a földön van.

Compare with -ban/-ben: doboz = box

The pen is in the box. = A toll a dobozban van.

The pen is on the box. = A toll a dobozon van.

2: Express being somewhere, regardless of the preposition used in English, if that place is:
any means of transport: busz (bus), villamos (tram), vonat (train), hajó (ship) (but not a car!)
an open space: piac (market), utca (street), tér (square), pályaudvar (train station), repülőtér (airport), járda (sidewalk), udvar (yard)
an event: kiállítás (exhibition), megbeszélés (meeting)
or an exception… see this list: posta (post office), folyosó (corridor), menza (canteen), egyetem (university)

I am on the bus. = A buszon vagyok.

Are you at the market? = A piacon vagy?

We are not running on the sidewalk. = Nem a járdán futunk.

3: Do you remember the days of the week? We added this same suffix to them (except for vasárnap, which doesn’t get any suffix).

• hétfő-n ‘on Monday’
• kedd-en ‘on Tuesday’
• szerdá-n ‘on Wednesday’
• csütörtök-ön ‘on Thursday’
• péntek-en ‘on Friday’
• szombat-on ‘on Saturday’
• vasárnap ‘on Sunday’

Also two seasons nyár ( = summer) and tél (= winter) get the same suffix:

nyáron = in summer
télen = in winter

[#DuolingoForumGems originally posted on 2018-08-08 on the Duolingo Hungarian for English speakers forum by pizspozseng ] 

Family members in Hungarian - more than what Duo teaches

Duolingo teaches just a few of the information below in the family section. Rokon is relative or family member, rokonság refers to all your relatives. Vérrokon is a relative who you have common genes with, this means your spouse's relatives aren't vérrokons.

The neutral words are apa and anya for parents. Most people also call their parents like this when talking to them. Some people address them as Apu and Anyu, others (especially the elderly) may use the bit formal Édesanyám, Édesapám. Anyuci and Apuci are sometimes considered overly sweetish. In Northern Hungary, I have heard about someone calling her father Api.

When talking to other people about each other's parents, we usually provide words anyuka, apuka with the correct personal suffix: anyukám, anyukád. However, anyuka/apuka in itself is a not-so-polite way of addressing a parent of a child who you know. The word for parents is szülők, also used in singular szülő.

Stepparents are refered to as mostohaszülők (mostohaanya, mostohaapa, also mostohatestvér), but these words (due to use in literature) have some negative meaning, they may even suggest that person being evil. A more proper way of saying this is nevelőszülők (literally raising parents), but adopted children most often do not talk about their parents in a different way as any other person.

Siblings. The word testvér (literally body blood) is generally used for them, used much more frequently than sibling in English. Tesó is an informal, somewhat lazy slang-like nickname for testvér. Fivér means brother generally (hardly ever used, almost always báty and öcs are used instead), although there's no word that fits both older and younger sisters.

Older brother: báty (bátyám, bátyád, bátyja). Younger brother: öcs (öcsém, öcséd, öccse). Older sister: nővér (nővérem, nővéred, nővére). Younger sister: húg (húgom, húgod, húga). Originally, nén/néne was older sister (and nővér was sister generally), it remained in compound nouns like nagynéni (aunt). Sometimes these words were used to address anybody in a personal way (except húg). This means that bátyám (or bátya) was said to older men than the speaker, öcsém to younger men or child boys. Children may call any adult first name+néni (derived from néne) if female and first name+bácsi (derived from báty) if male. Adults only use these formulas to older people in polite situations. Younger men and women especially don't like it when they're called like this. Öcsi, derived from öcs is a common nickname regardless of the person's first name. Nővér also means nurse or nun, while fivér can mean monk.

Twins=ikrek, twin=ikertestvér. Identical twins are called 'egypetéjű ikrek' (literally one-celled twins), non-identicals are 'kétpetéjű ikrek'. Three or four children of the same pregnancy are hármasikrek, négyesikrek etc. Conjoined twins are 'kettős torzok' in medical language, although they are 'sziámi ikrek' in colloquial language.

Grandparents - as Duo teaches it - are nagyszülők. On the one hand, the word nagyanya is very rare, nagymama (nagymamám, nagymamád, nagymamája) is used instead. On the other hand, for grandfathers, nagyapa and nagypapa are both commonly used. People may address their grandparents like Nagymama/Nagypapa, Mama/Papa, Nagyi (grandmother). Great-grandparents are dédszülők: dédanya, dédapa. Great-grandmothers may be addressed Dédi by their great-grandchildren. The generations in order are as follows: nagy, déd, ük, szép, ős. This means ükapám=my great-great-grandfather.

These prefixes can also put before unoka (grandchild): dédunoka, ükunoka, szépunoka, ősunoka. Someone might say lányunoka/fiúunoka, but there's usually no gender distinction when talking about your grandchild.

Your parents' siblings (aunt, uncle) are nagynéne/nagynéni and nagybácsi/nagybátya. Their children (your cousins) are unokatestvér. This latter word is generally free of gender distinction, because unokahúg/unokaöcs means niece/nephew. Unokabácsi/másodnagybácsi/másodnagynéni/unokanéni is one of your parent's cousin, their child is your másodunokatestvér (second cousin). Nagy-nagynéni and nagy-nagybácsi are seldom ways of referring to your great aunt/uncle.

Spouses are házastárs, feleség, férj. In some villages nej is a synonym for wife, I personally don't like that word. Your spouse's parents are após and anyós (ipa and napa in rural areas), although the word anyós suggests some negative meaning due to its appearance in popular culture and jokes. Some people are using formal you to in-laws, some don't. They're often addressed with the first name+néni, bácsi formula. Brother- and sister-in-law are sógor and sógornő, you may hear ángy in some rural areas for sógornő. Son- and daughter-in-law are vej (sometimes vő) and meny. The words for bride and groom (menyasszony, vőlegény) are derived from them. Godfather and godmother are keresztapa/keresztanya, your children's godfather is your 'koma', while your children's godmother is your 'komámasszony'. Don't even think of using this latter one, because even many Hungarian don't know the meaning of it!

Some words are only used in some areas, or just in the countryside. One of these words is the prefix jobb for either the 2nd (grandparents) or the 7th generation. Nász and nászasszony are your child's spouse's parents, e.g. someone's two grandfathers are the nász of each other.

Mozaikcsalád is a word describing a family where most people are at their second-third marriage, and many of the children are not even related. Your féltestvér (always without gender, e.g. we don't say félhúg) is somebody who you have one common parent with.

Ami, amelyik, amely

 [#DuolingoForumGems originally posted on 2016-08-20 on the Duolingo Hungarian for English speakers forum, this is a sentence discussion for "Az az iroda a harmadik elemeten olyan, mint ez." ]

Ami, amelyik, amely   https://duolingo.hobune.stream/comment/17279272

"Az az iroda a harmadik emeleten olyan, amilyen ez."

Translation:That office on the third floor is like this one.

Comment by AlsEenPoffertje

When do you use "olyan...mint" and when do you use "olyan...amilyen"? Here are the sentences I've gotten for both, just to use as examples:

Mint:

• Ez az asztal olyan, mint az. = This table is like that one.
• Az a kutya olyan, mint ez. = That dog is like this one.

Amilyen:

• A szobor a városban olyan, amilyen a város: unalmas. = The statue in the city is like the city: boring.

• Az iskola előtt olyan óvónő harcol, amilyen a város fölött repül. = In front of the school such a kindergarten teacher is fighting as the one that is flying above the city.

• Az az iroda a harmadik emeleten olyan, amilyen ez. = That office on the third floor is like this one.

What's the difference between the two in this type of structure?

Initially I thought it might have to do with the fact that just a pronoun is used after the two examples with mint, but the same is true of the last example with amilyen. :/

Comment by 96314081311257

• They seem to be interchangeable to me, or you could even use both (mint amilyen.) Pay extra attention to the óvónő one because you need to add a pronoun if you use mint: Olyan óvónő harcol, mint aki/ami/amelyik repül.

Comment by vvsey

Yes, they are interchangeable, in this case. But this is just like special relativity - it is just a special case of the much broader theory of general relativity. See, in special relativity... but I digress.

Look closely at the "olyan - amilyen" pair. There is something common in them.

Yes, they are in the same case!

Let's call it the nominative case. They are both in the nominative.

But they don't need to be in the nominative. They could both be in the accusative:

"olyat - amilyet":

• "Milyen sört kérsz?"
• "Olyat, amilyet te iszol."

Or any other case:

• "Milyen autóval mész?" - What kind of car are you going with?
• "Olyannal, amilyennel te" - "With such a one as the one you are."
  Or:
• "Olyannal, mint te". - "Same as you."

Back to the beer for a second:

"Olyat, amilyet te iszol." - "Such, as the one you drink".
I could not say this one with just "mint". Because there is "iszol" - "you drink". That is, "you drink something". And that something is in the accusative. For the logic of the sentence to stay intact, I need something in the accusative that "iszol" can refer to.
And I can't put "mint" in the accusative! I need the word "amilyen" which I can freely conjugate. "Olyat, amilyet te iszol."

So, if I need to conjugate in the second clause, I do need the word "amilyen".

If I remove "iszol":

• "Milyen sört kérsz?"
• "Olyat, amilyet te."

then I do not need to worry about any conjugation. The only thing other than "amilyet" in the second clause is "te". A subject. And "te" does not care. The word "amilyet" is in the same case as "olyat", it can safely be replaced by "mint":

• "Olyat, mint te." - perfect.

Any other case is also possible, of course.

Now it becomes interesting.

The two members of the pair do not need to be in the same case. Pick virtually any two cases (noun suffix or postposition) and apply them separately to the two:

"olyanBÓL - amilyenHEZ"
"olyan ALATT - amilyenBEN"
"olyanNAL - amilyenRE"
Etc.

• "Milyen autóval megyünk?" - What kind of car are we going with?
• "OlyanNAL, amilyenRE pénzünk van" - "WITH such one FOR which we have money."

Do I need to further explain why "amilyen" is needed here? Something must be conjugated to indicate the case of the second clause. "Mint" can't be conjugated. We need "amilyen".

So, let's set up the rule here:

The full form is:

"olyan .... , mint amilyen ...".

The word "mint" is optional, it can be omitted.
And the word "amilyen" can be omitted (keeping "mint") under one of these conditions:
- if both are in the nominative case
- sometimes if at least the second clause is in the nominative
- if both are in the same case, and the only other thing the second clause contains is a subject.

So, that's how "olyan, amilyen" and "olyan, mint" are special cases and are interchangeable.

I hope I didn't miss or mess up anything.

 [Part of this post is taken from the Duolingo Hungarian Tips & Notes ]

The Hungarian alphabet

This is the Hungarian alphabet:

A, Á, B, C, Cs, D, Dz, Dzs, E, É, F, G, Gy, H, I, Í, J, K, L, Ly, M, N, Ny, O, Ó, Ö, Ő,
 P, Q, R, S, Sz, T, Ty, U, Ú, Ü, Ű, V, W, X, Y, Z, Zs

Orthography (spelling) and pronunciation

Hungarian uses the Latin alphabet (abcd) with some additional letters and diacritics (accent marks).

Let's start with the vowels.

Vowels can be short and long. Short vowels are a, e, i, o, u, ö and ü. Their long versions are á, é, í, ó, ú, ő and ű.

Consonants can also be short and long. Consonants become long by doubling them, as in reggel ’morning’.

If a digraph or a trigraph (a letter that consists of two or three characters) becomes long, we don't write it down twice, but shorten it:

sz + sz = ssz, cs + cs = ccs, zs + zs = zzs

dinnye [watermelon] consist of diny+nye. The long 'ny' is 'nny'. (A long 'dzs' is 'ddzs' but you won't see this often.)

Some English consonants are spelled differently in Hungarian:

Letter	Hungarian pronunciation	IPA
c	like ts in cats	[t͡s]
cs	like ch in channel	[t͡ʃ]
s	like sh in shower	[ʃ]
sz	like s in sing	[s]
zs	like s in pleasure	[ʒ]
gy	no English equivalent	[ɟ]
ny	like gn in lasagne	[ɲ]
ty	like t in Tuesday (British pronunciation)	[c]
dzs	like j in jump	[d͡ʒ]

So Hungarian szia (’hello’ or ’goodbye’) sounds like English see ya!

The letters gy, ny, ty are sounds which not all varieties of English have. They sound a bit like adding a y sound to the preceding sound.

Don't forget that these di- and trigraph letters aren't pronounced consonant by consonant, they represent ONE sound.

Keep in mind that sz and cs are completely distinct sounds - the same applies for gy and zs.

Hungarians think of these multigraphs as ONE letter.

Check the Wikipedia page:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hungarian_alphabet


A Youtube video for pronunciation:  
The sounds of the Hungarian alphabet

Hungarian pronounciation practice

gy and ty are especially problematic for learners, here is a video about pronouncing GY, from Gellért

How to pronounce the letter "Gy"?-Hungarian pronunciation