"Are you doing well?"
Translation:Ça va bien ?
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What about faites-vous bien? I didn't get point :( Google translate lied to me D:
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Google translator is only good for literal translations so many times will not give the correct answer. I would avoid using it
"Faites-vous bien ?" is grammatically correct, but you would not say it to mean "are you doing well?" with the meaning of "are you working well?" .
It would need an object, like "Faites-vous bien vos devoirs ?" (are you doing you homework well?)
"Va" is the conjugation for 3rd person singular: il, elle, on, ça, etc.
"Vas" is the conjugation for 2nd person singular: tu vas.
yes, thats the answer I wrote and it is correct. Not Awesome but I got a 'great'. Its better than being wrong.
I wrote "ça va bien?" And it also gave me great, so it might be random if it says awesome or great
Salute , but in this question there is no option of ça va bien . I'm still confused
Its like a literal translation... Of are you doin well? You= tu Doin well= va bien Just in a interrogative way..
Gotta remember something "ça va" is literally translated to "It goes?" So in this sentence there is no "It" instead there is a "You" so "ça va bien" is not "Tu vas bien" and don't worry i was as much as confused as all of you... This one was a kind of a trick question to test your understanding of this language... If you fail its okay learn from it... And keep going... Good luck..
I think a true French person would understand it, in real conversation it could be acceptable you know what I mean?
I was "close". Ça va bien ? is not quite the same as Ça va bien? (Say what?) Does the space really matter?
First you are asking if the person is going (doing) well. Second you are asking if it (life) is going well.
At my college newspaper we use to add 2 spaces after a period more for aesthetics. English speaker/American
Me too, but using 2 spaces after a period is from the days of typewriters that had fixed width characters, so the period was centered within a pretty large gap. The two spaces helped to make the sentence breaks clearer. This is not how things were ever typeset, nor is it needed with modern computers that use variable width characters. So in this case it was a workaround for a fairly primitive printing device, rather than a printing convention, as it apparently is in French.
For “Are you doing well?” I answered with: Ça vas bien? I was told that was wrong. The reason I was given was this: You used the tu form "vas" instead of the il/elle/on form "va". Can someone explain why we use the il/elle/on form when we are trying to say “you”, not he/she/it. The correct solutions were: Ça va bien? And: Ça va bien ? (this last one just has a space between bien and the question mark). I hope someone can understand my confusion.
In the sentence "ça va bien", the subject is "ça", short version of "cela" which is 3rd person singular, like "it/that".
Ohhh! Thanks Sitesurf. Now another question: I'm not familiar with "cela" (yet). Is it similar to c'il y a?
No, "s'il y a..." means "if there is..." where the <s'> is contracted from "si" (=if).
To understand "ceci" and "celà", you may to start with the literal translation: ceci = this thing here and celà = that thing there):
- this is longer than that = ceci est plus long que celà
As in English, "ceci/this/here" is closer to you in time or space and "celà/that/there" is further in time or space.
In speech, "celà" is simplified as "ça" but "ceci" is never simplified.
Please correct me if I'm wrong, but "ca va bien?" Means "Is it going well?" rather than "How are you doing?" hence the third-person form of aller (forgive the lack of a cedille, my phone can't type those, need a new keyboard)
Literally you may be right, but colloquially ça ba bien? is ok.
By the way, on most phones, accented characters may be obtained by holding down the letter for a while and moving to the desired character. So press down on the c for a bit to get c with a cedilla etc.
ça va bien = impersonal (ça = like "it", 3rd person singular)
Tu vas bien = personal, 2nd person singular
The verb is aller, which is an irregular verb. The form with Ça is va; with tu it is vas.
I am confused as well. The answer is apperantly Tu vas bien? Which I haven't been taught yet smh
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Yes, but to me it does mean: "How are you doing? well? That is what the comma is for. I agree that "Comment ca va bien" without a comma (and with the circumflex which I can't type here...) would be incorrect.
In this case, you have to put the "?".
Comment ça va? Bien? (or: Bien j'espère? ) Yes, it's correct?
It says it could also be translated as "Vas-tu bien?" This has never been covered in the lessons. What's the diff?
No "ça va" is only used for health (I'm fine), or to mean, "it's ok", like in this example:
-How is your pupil's work today?
-ça va/ ça peut aller.
-Do you think my drawing is ok? -oui, ça va!
It's not very enthusiastic here...
The confusion, is because they didn't teach "Comment ça va?" and "Comment allez-vous?" before teaching "ça va bien" and "ça va".
Let's try to start again...
The proper formal form is "Comment allez-vous?"/ "Comment vas-tu?"
Then, the informal form use the impersonal "ça" instead of the pronoun "vous" and "tu". Comment ça va? is more informal, because of that pronoun replacement.
Then, an even more informal form is "ça va?", shortened for of "Comment ça va?"
Then "ça va?" can become "ça va bien?, because you take the reply, to turn it as a question (a very informal way to ask question, even in English: it's ok?)
Comment ça va? should be approved, Nobody ever says, "are you doing well", its a literal translation of "ça va bien" which you do say in French, not in English but should be translated as, "how are you", etc, etc...
There are two words for different context.
"Bien" is an adverb (well), and "Bon"/"Bonne" is an adjective, (good). To mean how is the health of someone, use "well" (bien), because the adjerb modifies the meaning of the verb.
One is asked with a questioning voice, with the end of the sentence going up in intonation. This is a perfectly acceptable way to ask a question in French (and English).
Allez-vous bien is correct, it is a more formal phrase, but it means exactly the same thing : Allez-vous bien or ça va bien.
I was taught, "Ça Va bien" up until now(on Duo), but that wasn't given as option here. I had use Google Translate which suggested "Tu vas bien?" As an answer. Can somebody te me the difference between the two? (Vas on its own meant 'going', idk what is happening)
Both, confusingly. Haha! "Ça va" as a statement means "I'm (doing) fine". "Ça va?" as a question means "How are you (doing)?"
All you have to to is hold down on the C on your keybord and the Ç option shoukd appear
If you hold down the "c" you should get a mini menu with "ç" as an option.
Translation more formal "Allez-vous bien ?" Not accepted, why? It is really French.
Read the TIPS before doing the lesson. Lots of instruction in the TIPS. Also, hover over any of the underlined words in the lessons to get further hints.
Interesting how when you answer some questions correctly program gives you the exact same answer you provided as an alternate answer/ sharp software or programmer!!!
It's probably because you wrote ça va bien? And with a space ça va bien ? Is a printing convention in France
No, you can't. In form of a joke, some people say "comment vas-tu bien ?" where the answer is in the question...
Comment vas-tu? Or Comment ça va? But you can't put "bien" in the question, except in "ça va bien?" (that is more a statement turned into a question, that a real proper question.
The ward" are" has two ways to write Sont .. es What is the differences in use
The verb être means to be. In French this, and all other verbs, are conjugated into six different forms for each tense depending on the subject. In English verbs normally have only two conjugations for each tense, but to be has three: I am, you are and he/she/it is.
The French verb être in present tense indicative:
Je suis=I am
Tu es=You are (singular informal form of you)
Il/elle/on est=He/it/she/it/one is
Nous sommes=We are
Vous êtes=You are (singular formal and plural informal/formal form of you)
Ils/elles sont=They are
Since English and French do not conjugate the same way is this a difficult thing to grasp and to remember. A good advice is not to learn the subject and verb form apart ("Je"="I") but as a unit ("Je suis"="I am"). This way you will know when to use which "are" when.
I'm not French, but I've lived and worked in France, and taught English as a foreign language to French speakers - in my opinion that should be allowed. (I'm finding this site very good at brushing up my many spelling errors.)
Technically it is closer to 'how goes it' or 'how are you' than 'are you doing well.' But I have to say, I've heard your version far more often than the other.
It could be that they are trying to teach you a construction in this case, (the inverted verb pronoun as a way of asking a question) which will be useful further down the line, but just so you know - if you said this in France everyone would know you were asking after their well being. Don't be discouraged! Duolingo are very good at enforcing grammar rules without you noticing, and I think that is what has happened here.
Your translation is grammatically correct, but "faites-vous bien ?" does not inquire about somebody's health but whether or not that person is actually doing/making something the right way.
Good question. With inflection (going up at the end) it would work perfectly well in colloquial speech (though technically it means 'it goes well.' You would be more correct and better understood, however, if you said something like 'va-tu bien?' or even 'tu va bien?' as a rhetorical question. Duolinguo can't afford to cover every single permutation of an answer though - there can be literally dozens. They're trying to teach the precise grammar. But don't feel bad - as I said, your reply would be understood. (I know that my level isn't reflected on here, but I do speak good French, having lived and worked there three years.)
Since 'Comment allez-vous?' is also correct, why not 'Comment allez-vous bien?'
Like "how are you doing fine?" - "how/comment" is a question that may not assume the answer.
I fail to see how "how are you" and "are you doing well" translate to the exact same thing. They may have a relatively similar meaning but one is a yes/no question and one isn't, and in terms of actual word structure they seem quite different.
Why is it not acceptable to use "comment ça va bien" the same as "ça va bien"?
Ce sont deux verbes, (es) (tu es _ you are) est la conjugaison du verbe être (to be) et (vas) (tu vas _ you go) est la conjugaison du verbe aller (to go)
How do you expect early beginners to understand explanations in French?
I wanna know one thing that for saying how are u say ca va bein and for saying am doing well u ll also say ça va bein, i have a doubt in this can anyone tell me
"ça va bien" (watch your spelling!) The difference between "ça va bien?" as a question, and "ça va bien" as a statement is strictly the context of the conversation and the inflection in your voice. (or if writing, then the question mark at the end of the statement).
For example, if we meet somewhere and I greet you with, "Salut, ça va bien?"... I'm obviously asking you the question. There is no circumstance where I would walk up to you and say "Hi, I am doing well" as a statement unless you had asked me how I was doing first. Once I asked you the question, your reply would like be "Oui, ça va bien" or similar. Obviously, a statement and not a question.