Given an image above, which one is correct as a description for it?
A. He is working on his laptop.
B. He is working with his laptop.
Or, do A and B have different meanings?
prepositions
Given an image above, which one is correct as a description for it?
A. He is working on his laptop.
B. He is working with his laptop.
Or, do A and B have different meanings?
Best Answer
Either could be used and neither would be wrong. The meanings are similar, but there may be some slight differences.
Normally, I would use on. When I am word processing, or checking email, or working on a spreadsheet, I am usually inclined to say:
Typically, on is the preposition I'd choose.
However, there are cases where I might change that. Let's say my coworker Linda owns a computer at home, and I know for a fact that her hard disk crashed two days ago. (She's also borrowed a company laptop, but I'm not aware of that yet.) At 10 o'clock, I notice Linda's desk at work is still empty, so I ask Gary about this:
This works, because the phrase working with can be used to mean using. As another example, if I was in a wood shop, I might say:
if I'm not planning to use any power tools.
This is another one of those cases where prepositions are simply too flexible to say there is always one correct preposition to use.