Here's a friday morning light weight question:
I had a question about indices on a table and, of course, I put it up on SO. I got my answer, but funnily enough, somebody changed the word indices to say indexes.
We know that the plural of Index is Indices, but we also know that almost everybody prefers the "wrong" word, if I may.
What are some other "wrong" terms like this that really shouldn't be, but are overtaking their "correct" counterparts?
According to webster.com, both "indexes" and "indices" are correct; "indexes" is listed first.
That said, since "indices" was entirely correct to begin with, I don't really think it was appropriate to edit it and replace it with "indexes".
Most people don't know that "data" is the plural and "datum" is the singular. How often have you heard "a single data point?"
But then again, even those of us who do know think it sounds goofy and hardly ever say it.
Language is mutable and "datum" might be on its way to becoming archaic by popular decree!
Indices (coming from latin) are used in scientific work, but otherwise indexes are used. So the use of indexes is correct in this case. Reference 1.
How about a reverse answer:
Too many people stubbornly (or maybe pendantically, or ignorantly?) insist on using the word "Octopi." "Octopus" originates from Greek, so the whole "us to i" for plurals paradigm doesn't exist. Some folks will even correct you if you say "octopuses," which is the correct English plural.
Not to judge, but I notice the folks who say 'octopi' are generally the same ones who insist on 'datum' and 'indeces' ;)
"Indices" is the mathematical formulation whereas in publishing they use "indexes" (which is probably why so many people in IT consider "indices" to be more correct than "indexes").
I think that a table index is analogous to an index in a book rather than an exponent in maths, so the publishing variant is the appropriate plural to use in this context.
Furthermore, at least in Oracle, the data dictionary views are called DBA_INDEXES, ALL_INDEXES and USER_INDEXES. It is usually a good idea to employ the same terminology which the domain uses.
This is just a continuation of the kilobyte/megabyte/gigabyte discussion. The English language is continuously evolving, and a dictionary isn't a book of rules to be followed, its a snapshot of how the language is used at that point in time. If we chose to use a word differently, then Webster better keep up.