"Fine, thank you."

Translation: Dobrze, dziękuję.

[JaydanKyle]

why cant i say 'dobry' here

[Jellei]

'dobry' is an adjective. It could possibly be a translation of 'fine', but 'fine' is clearly an adverb here. The adverbial form is 'dobrze'.

[ElizabethV727724]

I am using my Samsung phone and can't get the Polish characters done. Please help!

[alik1989]

Settings > Language and input > Language. There you can add additional keyboard settings. Look for Polish there.

[Bish462992]

Go to your keyboard settings and download the Polish language for the keyboard. Duolingo will switch between the two languages automatically.

[KristineKruszer]

Why is dziękuje spelled dziękuję in this case?

[alik1989]

It's basically a verb (to thank). And we need the first person form here.

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/dzi%C4%99kowa%C4%87#Conjugation

Dziękuje would be the third person singular form (he/she/it is thanking).

[Bish462992]

How do I know if I'm supposed to use ż or z like in Dobrze or Dobże.

[alik1989]

I have to admit, even native speakers sometimes struggle with that. Basically there are two types of "rz":

• Type 1) Static rz, which developped from a soft (palatalised) Old Slavic r. There's no other way than to just remember how those words are spelled. If you speak an East Slavic language, there's a trick: Look for a cognate and check whether it has a rolled r in it. If it does, it's a rz in 99% of cases.

• Type 2) Dynamic rz. Now that's easy. In the case of adverbs, check the corresponding adjective (dobry). Remember these two rules: r + ie = rze & r + i = rzy. The ie-suffix is added to form the adverb, thus dobr (stem) + [ie] become dobrze. The same goes for nouns: Górze is the locative/dative form of góra. [-ie] is the suffix that creates the rz according to the aforementioned rule.

[TomNies]

Interesting! I was of course aware of the stem rule ("dobrze" being related to "dobry, dobra, dobro" etc" so R --> RZ. But I was not aware of type 1. It it like "rzeka" because it is "rieka" in say Russian?

[alik1989]

Yes, exactly. Or compare it with Proto-Slavic rěka. This test works for almost every word that has a Russian/Ukrainian cognate. The only exception I could find so far was żebro (ребро/riebro):

https://sjp.pwn.pl/poradnia/haslo/Dlaczego-zebro-a-nie-rzebro;13244.html

[SusJoj1]

Why is "fajny" not accepted? Isn't this like saying "cool"?

[Jellei]

"fajny" is "cool", yes. They have nothing to do with "fine", though.

Even if they did, the right form would be the adverb "fajnie".