5 exercises — practise specifying respects and reasons with "in that".
0 / 5 completed
1 / 5
Which sentence correctly uses "in that" to specify the respect in which a design decision is efficient?
"The new indexing scheme is efficient in that it avoids a full table scan on every query" correctly uses "in that" to introduce a clause explaining the specific respect in which the claim is true. Option B drops "in", leaving a bare "that" which does not carry the same explanatory meaning. Option C wrongly substitutes "in which", a relative pronoun structure that needs a different clause pattern. Option D omits the required subject "it" after "in that".
2 / 5
Which sentence correctly uses "in that" to draw a precise distinction between two caching strategies?
"Write-through caching differs from write-behind in that it persists data to the store before acknowledging the write" correctly follows "differs...in that" with a full finite clause. Option B is missing "that" after "in". Option C replaces the finite clause with a gerund phrase, which does not fit "in that". Option D drops "in", losing the required fixed structure.
3 / 5
Which sentence correctly uses "in that" without confusing it with a purpose clause using "so that"?
"The API is unusual in that it returns partial results even after a timeout, so that clients can still render something" correctly uses "in that" to explain the respect in which the API is unusual, and separately uses "so that" for the purpose of the design. Option B swaps the two connectors, attaching purpose meaning to "in that" and explanatory meaning to "so that". Options C and D garble the two fixed phrases together, producing ungrammatical strings.
4 / 5
Which sentence correctly negates the clause introduced by "in that" to describe a limitation?
"The migration script is incomplete in that it does not yet handle the legacy schema version" keeps standard clause word order after "in that", with "does not yet" in the normal position before the verb. Option B, C, and D all scramble the negator "not", the auxiliary "does", and "yet" into non-standard orders that a native speaker would not produce.
5 / 5
Which sentence correctly uses "in that" in a formal comparison between two deployment strategies in an ADR?
"Blue-green deployment is safer in that a failed release can be reverted by simply switching traffic back" is the correct, standard use of "in that" to specify the respect in which the strategy is safer. Option B substitutes "for that", which is not a standard English connector. Option C incorrectly stacks "in which that" together. Option D tacks on a redundant, dangling "since it" that duplicates the causal meaning and leaves an incomplete clause.