5 exercises — practise listing contributing factors with "what with".
0 / 18 completed
1 / 18
Which sentence correctly uses "what with" to introduce two contributing factors joined by "and"?
"What with the holiday freeze and the reduced on-call rotation, the release was pushed to January" correctly uses "what with" once, followed by a list of noun phrases joined by "and". Option B incorrectly repeats "with" before the second item. Option C splits "what with" apart with the wrong word order. Option D reverses "with" and "what", which is not the fixed phrase.
2 / 18
Which sentence correctly uses "what with" followed by a gerund phrase as one of the contributing causes?
"What with the vendor migrating their API and the new compliance review, onboarding took twice as long" correctly follows "what with" with a gerund clause ("the vendor migrating") and a noun phrase, both valid after this connector. Option B uses the bare infinitive "migrate" instead of the required gerund. Option C adds the unnecessary infinitive "to be". Option D breaks up the fixed phrase "what with".
3 / 18
Which sentence correctly places the "what with" clause of causes at the start of the sentence, before the main clause it explains?
"What with three data centers reporting elevated latency, the team declared a sev-2 incident" correctly opens the sentence with the "what with" cause clause, followed by a comma and the main clause. Option B places "what with" incorrectly at the end of the cause clause. Option C awkwardly interrupts the main clause with the reason in the middle. Option D adds an unnecessary comma directly after "what with".
4 / 18
Which sentence correctly uses "what with" to list three cumulative causes for a delayed launch, keeping parallel gerund forms?
"What with the API rate limits, the schema migration failing twice, and the holiday support gap, the launch slipped a week" keeps the second item as a noun-plus-gerund phrase ("the schema migration failing") parallel with the surrounding noun phrases. Option B uses the infinitive "to fail" instead of the gerund. Option C uses the finite past tense "failed", which breaks the noun-phrase pattern required after "what with". Option D reorders the noun and gerund awkwardly.
5 / 18
Which sentence correctly uses "what with" for a single, informal cumulative cause in a Slack status update, distinct from the more neutral "given"?
"What with everyone still onboarding this week, code review turnaround has been slower than usual" correctly uses the informal cumulative-cause phrase "what with" before the noun-plus-gerund clause. Option B incorrectly merges "given" and "with". Option C incorrectly merges "what" and "given". Option D adds an unnecessary "that" at the end of the cause clause.
6 / 18
John commented on a code review: 'The database connection timeout is happening what with increased user traffic and the recent deployment of the new analytics module.' Which option best reflects John's intended meaning?
'What with' indicates that John intends to present two contributing factors joined by 'and'. Option 1 accurately captures this. Options 2 and 3 misinterpret 'what with', suggesting a direct cause-and-effect where none is explicitly stated. Option 4 incorrectly frames the sentence as merely listing items.
7 / 18
Sarah drafted a PR description: 'The server errors were occurring what with insufficient memory allocation and a faulty caching mechanism.' What is the primary purpose of Sarah's use of 'what with' in this sentence?
'What with' introduces a clause that provides additional details regarding the reasons for the server errors. The sentence explicitly states that insufficient memory allocation *and* a faulty caching mechanism are contributing factors. Option 2 misinterprets this by making one cause primary and omitting the other. Options 3 and 4 suggest incorrect phrasing or inappropriate usage of 'what with'.
8 / 18
John commented on a code review: 'The database connection timeout is happening what with increased user traffic and the recent deployment of the new analytics module.' Which option best reflects John's intended meaning?
'What with' indicates that John intends to present two contributing factors joined by 'and'. Option 1 accurately captures this. Options 2 and 3 misinterpret 'what with', suggesting a direct cause-and-effect where none is explicitly stated. Option 4 incorrectly frames the sentence as merely listing items.
9 / 18
Sarah drafted a PR description: 'The server errors were occurring what with insufficient memory allocation and a faulty caching mechanism.' What is the primary purpose of Sarah's use of 'what with' in this sentence?
'What with' introduces a clause that provides additional details regarding the reasons for the server errors. The sentence explicitly states that insufficient memory allocation *and* a faulty caching mechanism are contributing factors. Option 2 misinterprets this by making one cause primary and omitting the other. Options 3 and 4 suggest incorrect phrasing or inappropriate usage of 'what with'.
10 / 18
David sent this Slack message during a standup: 'The build failed what with the updated dependencies and the lack of automated testing.' Which option best captures David's intention?
David used 'what with' to indicate that the updated dependencies *and* the lack of automated testing were both contributing causes to the failed build. The key is recognizing that 'what with' connects these two items as cumulative factors, not a single cause-and-effect relationship. Options A and C misinterpret this connection.
11 / 18
Elena sent this email to the team regarding a recent performance issue:
'The API response times were slow what with increased load and the inefficient database queries.'
Which of the following best describes Elena's intent using 'what with'?
Elena uses 'what with' to highlight a direct cause-and-effect relationship. The phrase indicates that increased load *and* inefficient queries are jointly responsible for the slow API response times. It's not an apology or a suggestion; it's simply describing the situation as caused by multiple factors. Option A is too simplistic – 'insufficient' doesn't fully capture the nuance.
12 / 18
Mark left this comment on a code review:
'The error occurred what with a missing validation check and the lack of proper input sanitization.'
What is the primary grammatical function of 'what with' in Mark's comment?
'What with' connects two gerund phrases – 'a missing validation check' and 'the lack of proper input sanitization' – indicating they are both causes for the error. It establishes a parallel structure, demonstrating that these two elements were jointly responsible. Options A and B are incorrect as it doesn't introduce an independent clause or provide a definition.
13 / 18
Ben drafted this description for a pull request:
'The application crashed what with insufficient memory allocation and a race condition in the thread synchronization.'
Which of the following sentences correctly uses 'what with' to describe cumulative causes?
'What with' is best used here to smoothly introduce two related causes. 'Due to' provides the most grammatically correct and natural phrasing for this situation when listing cumulative causes. Options A, C, and D all use less appropriate constructions—'given' or simply 'because of' don't effectively connect the clauses in a way that reflects the intended meaning.
14 / 18
Chloe reported an issue during a standup meeting:
'The service was unavailable what with network connectivity issues and the recent database migration.'
What is the primary function of 'what with' in Chloe's statement?
Chloe uses 'what with' to concisely present two reasons why the service was unavailable. It indicates a joint responsibility – both network connectivity problems and the database migration contributed to the outage. Options A and B misinterpret the function of 'what with' as an apology or technical explanation respectively.
15 / 18
A developer is reviewing a pull request for a new feature. The code includes several comments explaining the rationale behind design choices. Which sentence best illustrates how to use 'what with' to introduce related factors in this context?
Option 1 correctly uses 'what with' to introduce a related factor ('each architectural decision') that contributes to the overall problem. The other options use 'what with' in ways that don't fit the scenario of explaining design choices within code review commentary.
16 / 18
A Slack message describes a bug fix. Which sentence best demonstrates the correct use of 'what with' to list cumulative causes?
'What with' followed by a gerund phrase (optimizing the database query) correctly lists cumulative causes. Option 1 uses 'what with' incorrectly without a gerund. Options 3 and 4 are not appropriate for describing technical fixes in Slack.
17 / 18
A developer is writing a PR description to explain the changes made to a module. Which of the following sentences correctly uses 'what with'?
Option 0 correctly utilizes 'what with' followed by a gerund phrase ('improved error handling') to describe a change. The other options employ 'what with' in ways that are not grammatically correct or relevant to the context of a PR description.
18 / 18
During a standup meeting, a developer reports an issue. Which sentence demonstrates the most appropriate use of 'what with'?
Option 0 uses 'what with' correctly to introduce a cause ('a misconfiguration in the server') related to the reported incident. The other options present 'what with' in contexts that are not suitable for a standup update.
What will I practise in ""What With" for Cumulative Causes — IT Grammar Exercise"?
Practise using "what with" to list several contributing factors that together explain a delay or outcome, in incident summaries, status updates, and Slack
How many exercises are in this module?
This module has 18 multiple-choice exercises, each with instant feedback and a full explanation of the correct answer.
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Every exercise is written by the CoderSlingo team, drawing on real workplace English used in IT roles, then reviewed for accuracy and clarity.