"Are you permitted to use the phone here?"

Translation: Czy tu wolno używać telefonu?

[deactivated user]

Isn't it better to have the English sentence "Can I use the phone here?". Otherwise, the way I understand "Are you permitted to use the phone here?" is in Polish as "Czy masz pozwolenie, aby używać tutaj telefonu?". Something that would be asked by a stranger to someone who's already on the phone in a phone-free zone.

[Jellei]

1. Your version is accepted.

2. Well, the sentence is here to teach the totally impersonal "wolno". The closest translation is "Can one"... but it is not really used that often as "Can you". So we are sometimes using "Can one" and sometimes the (possibly quite impersonal as well) "Can you" to show how the Polish phrase is used.

[k9f100]

"Tu można" instead of "można tu" should be accepted.

[Apsa25]

Officially correct answer (Nov. 2018): "Czy tu wolno używać telefonu?"

Marked as incorrect, although also correct: "Czy wolno tu używać telefonu?" (reported)

Not checked, but also correct: "Czy wolno używać tu telefonu?"

"Tu" is very flexible here. And instead of "tu" also "tutaj" should be accepted in all of those positions.

[tontonzark]

I wrote Czy wolno używać telefonu tu?
why is it wrong ?

[monika-mmt]

"tu można" you use when you want to say "yes you can" " tu można skorzystać z telefonu, "można tu" you rather use in question "czy można tu skorzystać z telefonu?"

[k9f100]

While I do agree that the sequence "Czy można tu..." sounds more natural (come to think about it...), I would never find forming it "Czy tu można..." even a tiny bit odd.

Native speaker.

[HellRaider]

Imho both is correct: "Czy wolno tu... " and "Czy tu wolno..."

[alik1989]

Oversight. Added now.

[domnelson]

Is "czy wolno używać tu telefonu" too weird a word order?

[Apsa25]

It is correct, I put several correct options in a previous comment.

[Jellei]

Added now, the rest of Apsa25's answers worked already.

[Golebia]

Working from English to Polish I find the English sentence very confusing. More straightforward for us learners of Polish would be "Is it permitted/okay/allowed to use the phone here?"

[Jellei]

That's true, but then English also often does use that impersonal 'you', where "are you allowed" means "is one allowed"... I think it's good to have an opportunity to see that it shouldn't be translated literally as if it was "Are you allowed to do that, George?".

[Golebia]

Thanks for the follow-up. I understand your point. Especially when given the Polish and translating to English. But when given the English the literal translation back to Polish is clearly not what DL wants.

[Jellei]

Translating literally may not be what DL wants, but it is still allowed, because the English "you" can be understood that way.

[gsdobek]

"skorzystać z telefonu" is offered as a hint, but graded as a typo, preferring "korzystać z telefonu", instead. Is the perfective really wrong?

[Olga_Markushina]

Why there's no "jest" in the sentence? Where is the predicate?

[alik1989]

Wolno is a so-called 'defective verb'.

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/wolno#Verb
http://sgjp.pl/leksemy/#275372/wolno