Expressing Degrees of Certainty in IT Communication
5 exercises — use appropriate certainty language in incident reports, post-mortems, and technical investigations.
0 / 20 completed
1 / 20
In an incident report at the investigation stage, which phrasing is most appropriate for an unconfirmed root cause?
"Appears to be" signals a conclusion based on evidence but not yet confirmed — appropriate during investigation. Options A and B assert certainty prematurely; in a live incident, this can mislead responders if the assumption is wrong. Option D claims the opposite without evidence. Good incident reports hedge until root cause is verified: "appears to be," "seems to be," "may be related to." Overclaiming certainty during investigation is a common professional communication error.
2 / 20
The deployment succeeded, but latency ___ increased since the update was pushed. Choose the most precise hedged phrasing.
"Has likely increased" expresses a probable conclusion drawn from current evidence. "Is definitely" overclaims. "Might have possibly" is redundant double hedging — choose one hedge word. "Will have increased" expresses a future perfect or logical conclusion, which is too strong here without confirmation. In SRE and DevOps communication, "has likely" and "appears to have" are standard calibrated phrasing for probable but unconfirmed observations.
3 / 20
The service ___ experience intermittent timeouts if the connection pool is not increased before the traffic spike.
"Might" expresses possibility — appropriate when predicting a future risk that depends on conditions. "Will definitely" overclaims certainty about future behaviour. "Is" (present tense) does not fit the conditional future context. "Has" is past tense and irrelevant here. In capacity planning and risk assessments, "might," "could," and "may" are appropriate for conditional predictions: "the service might experience timeouts if..." signals a risk without overstating certainty.
4 / 20
Which sentence best expresses HIGH confidence in a post-mortem report after the root cause is confirmed?
In a completed post-mortem where the root cause is confirmed, plain past tense ("was caused by") is the correct register — no hedging needed. Options A and B are appropriate during investigation, not in a finalised report. Option D ("appears to have been") still hedges, which would undermine confidence in a confirmed finding. The principle: match your certainty language to your evidence level. Hedging when you have confirmed data appears evasive.
5 / 20
We ___ a connection between the deployment and the spike in error rates, but we need more data to confirm.
"Suspect" is a precise calibrated verb in technical investigation: "we suspect a connection" conveys a hypothesis based on correlation but not yet established causation. Other useful hypothesis verbs: "believe," "hypothesise," "theorise." "Have confirmed" claims certainty we do not have. "Deny" means the opposite. "Know" is too strong without confirmation. The distinction between "suspect" and "confirm" is professionally significant in incident communication.
6 / 20
Sarah (Senior Developer) comments on a PR draft: 'I'm seeing some increased latency after this change. It *might* be related to the new caching logic. We should investigate further.' Which phrase best reflects Sarah's level of certainty and is appropriate for a code review comment?
Sarah's phrasing carefully avoids definitive statements. 'Might be related' and 'likely' acknowledge a potential connection without assuming causation. The incorrect options present overly strong assertions or irrelevant conclusions. Sarah's wording is crucial for collaborative debugging and avoiding premature judgements.
7 / 20
Ben (DevOps Engineer) posts in a Slack channel: 'The API endpoint /users/{user_id} is returning 502 errors intermittently. We've increased the instance count but it's still happening. It could be network congestion, or something within the service itself.' What does Ben mean by 'it *could* be…'? Choose the most accurate phrasing reflecting his uncertainty.
Ben uses 'could' to express a possibility rather than certainty. The phrase indicates that multiple potential causes exist and that the problem isn't fully understood. Options A and B are too assertive; option D is demonstrably false. This demonstrates a key principle of technical communication – acknowledging uncertainty when data is incomplete.
8 / 20
You're writing the description for a PR introducing a new feature flag. Which statement best represents your confidence level regarding the feature's immediate impact?
This option reflects appropriate cautiousness when introducing a new feature. 'Currently unknown' acknowledges the inherent uncertainty of evaluating a newly deployed change. The other options make claims about performance or user engagement that lack sufficient evidence at this stage. It emphasizes the need for ongoing observation and data collection.
9 / 20
David (Lead Engineer) writes in a post-mortem report: 'We observed a spike in error rates following deployment v2.3. While we believe the increased traffic volume is a contributing factor, further investigation is needed to determine if there were any underlying code issues.' What does David's phrasing primarily convey?
David's careful wording highlights a nuanced situation. 'While we believe' acknowledges the leading hypothesis (increased traffic) while simultaneously admitting the need for more investigation. The other options present conclusions that are not supported by the report's content – they express certainty where only probability is available.
10 / 20
Emily (Software Engineer) submits a bug report: 'The application crashed intermittently when processing large datasets. We've identified a potential memory leak and are working on a fix.' Which of the following statements best describes Emily's confidence level regarding the reported issue?
Emily uses 'may' to indicate possibility rather than certainty. The phrase acknowledges a potential root cause (memory leak) without claiming it's the *only* cause or that the fix is guaranteed. This demonstrates responsible reporting and avoids prematurely declaring resolution.
11 / 20
Sarah (Senior Developer) comments on a PR draft: 'I'm seeing some increased latency after this change. It *might* be related to the new caching logic. We should investigate further.' Which phrase best reflects Sarah's level of certainty and is appropriate for a code review comment?
Sarah's phrasing carefully avoids definitive statements. 'Might be related' and 'likely' acknowledge a potential connection without assuming causation. The incorrect options present overly strong assertions or irrelevant conclusions. Sarah's wording is crucial for collaborative debugging and avoiding premature judgements.
12 / 20
Ben (DevOps Engineer) posts in a Slack channel: 'The API endpoint /users/{user_id} is returning 502 errors intermittently. We've increased the instance count but it's still happening. It could be network congestion, or something within the service itself.' What does Ben mean by 'it *could* be…'? Choose the most accurate phrasing reflecting his uncertainty.
Ben uses 'could' to express a possibility rather than certainty. The phrase indicates that multiple potential causes exist and that the problem isn't fully understood. Options A and B are too assertive; option D is demonstrably false. This demonstrates a key principle of technical communication – acknowledging uncertainty when data is incomplete.
13 / 20
You're writing the description for a PR introducing a new feature flag. Which statement best represents your confidence level regarding the feature's immediate impact?
This option reflects appropriate cautiousness when introducing a new feature. 'Currently unknown' acknowledges the inherent uncertainty of evaluating a newly deployed change. The other options make claims about performance or user engagement that lack sufficient evidence at this stage. It emphasizes the need for ongoing observation and data collection.
14 / 20
David (Lead Engineer) writes in a post-mortem report: 'We observed a spike in error rates following deployment v2.3. While we believe the increased traffic volume is a contributing factor, further investigation is needed to determine if there were any underlying code issues.' What does David's phrasing primarily convey?
David's careful wording highlights a nuanced situation. 'While we believe' acknowledges the leading hypothesis (increased traffic) while simultaneously admitting the need for more investigation. The other options present conclusions that are not supported by the report's content – they express certainty where only probability is available.
15 / 20
Emily (Software Engineer) submits a bug report: 'The application crashed intermittently when processing large datasets. We've identified a potential memory leak and are working on a fix.' Which of the following statements best describes Emily's confidence level regarding the reported issue?
Emily uses 'may' to indicate possibility rather than certainty. The phrase acknowledges a potential root cause (memory leak) without claiming it's the *only* cause or that the fix is guaranteed. This demonstrates responsible reporting and avoids prematurely declaring resolution.
16 / 20
Sarah (Senior Developer) comments on a PR draft: 'I'm seeing some increased latency after this change. It *might* be related to the new caching logic. We should investigate further.' Which phrase best reflects Sarah's level of certainty and is appropriate for a code review comment?
Sarah's phrasing carefully avoids definitive statements. 'Might be related' and 'likely' acknowledge a potential connection without assuming causation. The incorrect options present overly strong assertions or irrelevant conclusions. Sarah's wording is crucial for collaborative debugging and avoiding premature judgements.
17 / 20
Ben (DevOps Engineer) posts in a Slack channel: 'The API endpoint /users/{user_id} is returning 502 errors intermittently. We've increased the instance count but it's still happening. It could be network congestion, or something within the service itself.' What does Ben mean by 'it *could* be…'? Choose the most accurate phrasing reflecting his uncertainty.
Ben uses 'could' to express a possibility rather than certainty. The phrase indicates that multiple potential causes exist and that the problem isn't fully understood. Options A and B are too assertive; option D is demonstrably false. This demonstrates a key principle of technical communication – acknowledging uncertainty when data is incomplete.
18 / 20
You're writing the description for a PR introducing a new feature flag. Which statement best represents your confidence level regarding the feature's immediate impact?
This option reflects appropriate cautiousness when introducing a new feature. 'Currently unknown' acknowledges the inherent uncertainty of evaluating a newly deployed change. The other options make claims about performance or user engagement that lack sufficient evidence at this stage. It emphasizes the need for ongoing observation and data collection.
19 / 20
David (Lead Engineer) writes in a post-mortem report: 'We observed a spike in error rates following deployment v2.3. While we believe the increased traffic volume is a contributing factor, further investigation is needed to determine if there were any underlying code issues.' What does David's phrasing primarily convey?
David's careful wording highlights a nuanced situation. 'While we believe' acknowledges the leading hypothesis (increased traffic) while simultaneously admitting the need for more investigation. The other options present conclusions that are not supported by the report's content – they express certainty where only probability is available.
20 / 20
Emily (Software Engineer) submits a bug report: 'The application crashed intermittently when processing large datasets. We've identified a potential memory leak and are working on a fix.' Which of the following statements best describes Emily's confidence level regarding the reported issue?
Emily uses 'may' to indicate possibility rather than certainty. The phrase acknowledges a potential root cause (memory leak) without claiming it's the *only* cause or that the fix is guaranteed. This demonstrates responsible reporting and avoids prematurely declaring resolution.
What will I practise in "Degrees of Certainty in Technical English — Grammar Exercises"?
Practise hedging language and degrees of certainty in IT incident reports and technical communication. 5 advanced exercises.
How many exercises are in this module?
This module has 20 multiple-choice exercises, each with instant feedback and a full explanation of the correct answer.
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How is this different from reading an article on the same topic?
Articles explain grammar rules in prose; this exercise tests and reinforces those rules through active recall with immediate feedback — the two work best together.
Who writes these exercises?
Every exercise is written by the CoderSlingo team, drawing on real workplace English used in IT roles, then reviewed for accuracy and clarity.