What is the difference between : 1- He was working. 2- He has been working.  I am confused.
577
Non-na­tive speak­ers of­ten get con­fused about what the var­i­ous tens­es  and as­pects mean in English. With in­put from some of the folk here I've put to­geth­er a di­a­gram that I hope will pro­vide some clar­i­ty on the mat­ter.  I of­fer it as the first an­swer to this ques­tion. Con­sid­er it a liv­ing doc­u­ment. In­put is wel­come, and good sug­ges­tions will be  in­cor­po­rat­ed in­to the di­a­gram.    No­ta bene: What this is not is a dis­cus­sion of whether there are  more than two tens­es in English. , to which this ques­tion is not in­tend­ed to sup­ply ar­gu­ments one way or the oth­er.  Here, the aim is to pro­vide an overview of what con­struc­tions English-speak­ing peo­ple use for con­vey­ing in­for­ma­tion about ac­tions re­fer­ring to past, present, and fu­ture, and to pro­vide it first and fore­most to pre­cise­ly the peo­ple who are like­ly to use "tense" as a catch-all term in their search, rather than to lin­guists who know bet­ter.  Break­ing News There is now an ex­cel­lent ELU blog ar­ti­cle ti­tled  . It is high­ly rec­om­mend­ed read­ing.
65097
a. His two previous books  b. His previous two books   .............   His 2 latest previous books His 2 previous latest books His previous latest 2 books His latest previous 2 books His previous 2 latest books His latest 2 previous books  I am wondering what is the difference could be between these in meaning?  Which one do you use? which one you don't use?  I think just especially native speakers or learned ones in English can provide the most proper answer.  Thanks
111511
It had now been two weeks since he had left the house.   Is this use of since correct? Is the tense of the verb after it correct?
93140
What is the difference between the following two sentences?      She goes to the forest three times per week.        She goes to the forest three times a week.
58044
Both are in the present perfect, but one uses the verb 'to go' and the other 'to be'. Is there a rule for this?  Is there any chance that the differences between "I have been" vs. "I have gone", are differences in English dialect (I don't know if this is the right word).  Edit Could I say that North American English speakers use "I have gone", and maybe U.K speakers say "I've been"? Or vice versa.
34402
What is the difference between the following:  Things started to work again. Things started working again.
111101
What is the difference in meaning between these two sentences?        This feature is now disabled.   This feature is disabled now.
13453
I was just wondering, how can we differentiate "are you done?" and "have you done?", and what is the appropriate way to use each?
115684
Should I write 'I have been reading a book now' or 'I am reading a book now'? I started to read one week ago and I haven't ended yet. Thanks for help
60908
As I know we can use both structures to talk about past ability , but is there any difference between them?  A. He could climb the mountain  B. He could have climbed the mountain
70123
A) He was arrested by police. b) He had been arrested by police.  In newspaper reporter want to tell about past event that has already happened.  In above statements Reporter conveyed same meaning, that police have arrested criminal and he is still in there custody.  I am aware that above sentence are In past Tense i.e. former is in simple past and later is in Past perfect. And also in Passive voice  My question is that why reporter purposely used was and had been in sentence? instead of that he could have used Present perfect. e.g he has been arrested by police.  Also Some times reporters does not use simple past before using past perfect.  e.g. He had been arrested by police when I was reached on the spot.
14411
Here I know I have one present perfect and present perfect continuous sentence.   I have lived in Europe for 2 years. I have been living in Europe for 2 years.   Can you use both of them interchangeably? What is the exact difference between them? To me both suggest that the person is still living in Europe.
51667
What's the difference between these two sentences? And which one's grammatically correct?
43530
Which one of the following is the correct one?   I should have seen it glow. I should have seen it glowing.   Or are both correct? Would you parse them please?
66106
I'm not a native English speaker. I am having difficulty with some words. Could anyone please tell me if there's any difference between the above mentioned short sentences, as I'm a little confused.
85892
I have seen people use both forms below. Which is correct? If both are, in which situation is each better used?  I am a software engineer based in New York. I am a software engineer based out of New York.
101879
I have just finished my homework.   I just finished my homework.      I think there must be a difference in meaning. Could anyone tell me the difference in meaning sentence 1 and sentence 2?