"Try to" or "try verbing" in this case [duplicate]

Question

I tried to order/ordering a book on line but I did not succeed.

I think "to order" is better

I know the difference between "try to" or "try verbing" ("try to" means we made an effort but he did not work) ("try verbing" means try another way to do it to solve the situation) so the first seems better.

Answer 1

With the catenative verb "try", the meaning depends on the kind of subordinate clause functioning as its complement. For example:

[1] You should try to eat less.

[2] You should try eating less.

In [1] "try" means "endeavour", while in [2] it means "test the effectiveness of".

Now compare your examples:

[3] I tried to order a book on line but I did not succeed.

[4] I tried ordering a book on line but I did not succeed.

[3] is fine where, like in [1], "tried" means "endeavoured". But [4] is wrong since it makes little sense to say that your testing the effectiveness of ordering a book on line did not succeed.

Edited for accuracy and improved clarity.

Answer 2

Neither option is really better than the other. Both are correct grammatically and idiomatically; that is to say, both are commonly used by native speakers.

You could say that "to order" puts slightly more emphasis on the process of the order itself, while using "ordering a book" places slightly less emphasis on the process of ordering¹ and so gives slightly more emphasis to the failure, but this is a very minor thing. The two sentences are mostly identical in meaning.

^{1 - "ordering a book" spreads out the listener's attention to both the order and the book, which slightly de-emphasizes both.}