Learn Spanish (Latin America): Si el programa está lento, reinicio el sistema. - If the program is slow, I restart the system.

Si el programa está lento, reinicio el sistema.

If the program is slow, I restart the system.

Breakdown of Si el programa está lento, reinicio el sistema.

estar

to be (location/state)

Questions & Answers about Si el programa está lento, reinicio el sistema.

Why are both verbs in the present tense in this sentence?

This sentence is a real conditional, meaning it talks about a likely situation or a regular habit. To express this, you just use si (if) followed by a present tense verb (está), and put the result in the present tense too (reinicio).

Why do we use está instead of es for 'is slow'?

We use está (from estar) because the program being slow is a temporary state. It is acting slow right now. If you used es (from ser), saying el programa es lento would mean the program is always or naturally a slow piece of software.

Programa and sistema both end in '-a'. Why do they use the masculine word for 'the' (el)?

It is a common exception! Many Spanish words ending in -ma (like el programa, el sistema, el problema, and el idioma) originally come from Greek and are masculine. That is why they take el instead of la.

Is reinicio the standard word for 'restart' when talking about computers?