Expressions of the form *full, e.g. cupful, bag full, screenfull

[Stephen Tashi]

What is your personal practice in dealing with expressions of fullness that end with "full"? (I'm just curious what other people do, I'm not likely to change my own habits.)

I don't know if USA English has a rule about writing expressions like "cup full" (two words) vs "cupful" (one word sans an "L") vs "cupfull" (one word that the internet says is a misspelling. ). Perhaps each attempt to suffix a word by "full" is separate case. I don't follow a general rule. To me, "screenfull" looks ok, especially in talking about computers. Something like "fountainfull" looks wrong. Situations like "playful" are (to me) special cases. I don't think of "playful" as meaning a play that is full of something.

 

[hutchphd]

Seems to me you are mixing the apples with the oranges. Words like playful (vengeful,delightful,awful) are a separate genre from cup full (screen full, head full). The first are transmuted versions of play-filled delight-filled
Personally I use these two different genres as written above. Since there is no Academie Americaine, and so we are chock full of lawful uses.

 

[PeroK]

Generally, the suffix is ful (with one "l"): headful, pocketful, cupboardful, spoonful. There may be some exceptions, I don't know.

You could draw a distinction between, for example, he was manful (brave, resolute) and he was a man full of bad ideas. Keeping "full" as a separate word may have a subtly different emphasis.

I would say chock full is no different from stuffed full or even filled full.

 

[Stephen Tashi]

Since there is no Academie Americaine, and so we are chock full of lawful uses.

- and awful uses.

 

[OCR]

I would say chock full is no different from stuffed full or even filled full.

I'm filled with thoughtful agreement here, but, I'm also mindful of what is a seamful

and insightful, yet not a fully discernible, very minor error. . . chock full should actually

be chocked full. . . .
Then we might could say, in a truthful and shameful, or, even disgraceful way. . ."Sometimes, even my Goodyears are chocked full of inactivity. . ."

Lol. . . .

.

 

[Borek]

English dictionary built in Linux spellcheckers lists two words ending with full - overfull and bellyfull.

It lists 161 words ending with ful.