Which preposition to choose for referring to the means of doing an action (by, with, using, via, over)?

Question

What is the best option to say that I will send you an update and I will use email in order to do it? What sound more natural?

The same question, but to say that a file was compressed, and rar was used to do it

Is there any rule?

Perhaps the best option of all isn't listed: I will email you an update later. — J.R.♦, Jul 16 '18 at 10:34

score 1 · Accepted Answer · 2018-07-16 10:04:41Z

1

Though all the prepositions you are suggesting are used, the most common ones are by email and via email as shown here.

file compressed with is commonly used, other options like by or using are fine.

answered Jul 16 '18 at 9:59

user29952

Your answer seems to answer to the first half of the question. Though using the same method will achieve the second half of the question, you should do the work here so that the others will get the answer right away without having to do this method. – holydragon Jul 16 '18 at 10:03
And what is better with compression? It looks like the situation with file compression is much less clear - books.google.com/ngrams/… – DimanNe Jul 16 '18 at 10:03
@DimanNe - this is probably clearer: books.google.com/ngrams/… – user29952 Jul 16 '18 at 10:10
It's worth noting that those are the most common ones found in writing. Ngrams won't tell us what is uttered allowed in the hallways and in parking lots – although, in this case, I'm guessing it's roughly the same. – J.R.♦ Jul 16 '18 at 10:32
Please see this regarding Google Books Ngram Viewer results outside the 1800–2000 year range. – user3395 Jul 16 '18 at 14:08

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