Ein technisches Problem macht mich nervös.

A technical problem makes me nervous.

Breakdown of Ein technisches Problem macht mich nervös.

• machen: to make
• nervös: nervous
• mich: me
• das Problem: the problem
• technisch: technical

Questions & Answers about Ein technisches Problem macht mich nervös.

Why is Problem capitalized while technisches and nervös are not?

In German all nouns are capitalized, regardless of their position in the sentence. Adjectives and other parts of speech remain lower-case (unless they start a sentence). Here Problem is a noun, so it gets a capital letter; technisches and nervös are adjectives, so they stay lower-case.

Why does technisches end in -es?

technisches is an attributive adjective modifying Problem, which is a neuter noun in the nominative singular. After an ein-word, adjectives follow the mixed-declension pattern and take -es for neuter nominative singular:

• Gender: neuter
• Case: nominative (subject)
• Number: singular

Hence: ein → technisches → Problem.

What case is ein technisches Problem in, and how can I tell?

It’s in the nominative case because it functions as the subject of the sentence (the “doer” of the action). In a simple German main clause, the subject normally comes before the verb: Subject (Ein technisches Problem) – Verb (macht) – Objects.

Why is the article ein used, and what would change if I used das instead?

ein is the indefinite article (“a/an”), indicating any technical problem in general. If you switch to das (the definite article), you refer to a specific, already known problem:

• Ein technisches Problem macht mich nervös.
  (Any technical problem makes me nervous.)
• Das technische Problem macht mich nervös.
  (That particular technical problem makes me nervous.)

Why is the verb machen used to express “making someone nervous”?

German often uses machen in a causative sense, just like English “to make someone [happy, sad, nervous, etc.].” The structure is:
Subject (cause) – macht – Person (accusative) – Resulting state.
In your sentence:

• Ein technisches Problem (cause)
• macht (makes)
• mich (me)
• nervös (nervous)

Why is mich in the accusative case rather than dative?

Here machen is transitive with respect to the person affected. It requires a direct object (accusative) for who is being “made” into a certain state. That’s why you use mich (accusative) instead of mir (dative).

Why is nervös not given an ending like attributive adjectives?

Because nervös is used predicatively (as a complement after the verb), not attributively (directly before a noun). Predicative adjectives are never inflected in German:

• Attributive: ein nervöses Kind (nervöses has ­-es)
• Predicative: das Kind ist nervös (nervös stays plain)

Can I front mich for emphasis (“Mich macht ein technisches Problem nervös”)?

Yes. You can move objects to the start for emphasis, but you must keep the verb in second position:

• Mich macht ein technisches Problem nervös.
  Still, the neutral word order is Subject–Verb–Object, so the standard sentence is more common.

How would I express the same idea in the past tense (Perfekt)?

In spoken German you’d normally use the Perfekt:

• Ein technisches Problem hat mich nervös gemacht.
  In written or formal German you can also use the Präteritum:
• Ein technisches Problem machte mich nervös.

How else can I say “I’m nervous because of a technical problem” with a different structure?

You can rephrase using wegen + genitive or other verbs:

• Ich bin wegen eines technischen Problems nervös.
• Wegen eines technischen Problems werde ich nervös.
• Ein technisches Problem sorgt dafür, dass ich nervös werde.