Word Translation Guide 4th Ed. query

[kaushik.pal.calling]

Hello,

Chapter "Minor Problem Types Strategy" page number 137 of Word Translation Guide 4th Edition has a DS question which reads:

How many days after the purchase of Product X does its standard warranty expire? (1997 is not a leap year.)
(1) When Mark purchased Product X in January 1997, the warranty did not expire until March 1997.
(2) When Santos purchased Product X in May 1997, the warranty expired in May 1997.

My doubt is: Can we deduce anything reagrding the warranty period from the first statement? It just says the warranty did not expire until March 1997. It will expire day later.

Can someone kindly calrify?

Thanks
Kaushik

[tim]

We can deduce that the warranty expired in March 1997. That is the intent of the wording of this one..

[pravin22jd]

I think the most confusing part here is not the calculation but understanding the meaning of 'until'
From answers in the book, it seems that when you say until 1st of March, you are not including 1st of march while counting days....
29 days (the least possible warranty: from 31st of January to 1st of March) = 1 + 28 + 0 = 19
89 days (the greatest possible warranty: from 1st of January to 31st of March) = 31 + 28 + 30 = 89

I tried to find more on meaning of until and it seems there is no clear understanding when until date in mentioned.
PFA few links
http://www.quickanddirtytips.com/educat ... e-the-date
Above link concludes that until includes the date but recommends to consider other case also, so this is not helpful from GMAT perspective.
Its not clear from below online dictionaries as well...
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/until
http://www.macmillandictionary.com/dict ... tish/until
http://www.diffen.com/difference/Unless_vs_Until

Could you please let me know what is rule of thumb on GMAT about meaning of 'until' ?

[RonPurewal]

"Until X" means, basically, that something happened up to point X, but not afterward.

E.g.,
I worked until 6 p.m.
--> I worked up to 6 p.m. I didn't work after 6 p.m.

During Ramadan, Muslims don't eat until sundown.
--> They don't eat before sundown. They eat at sundown.

The warranty did not expire until March.
--> The warranty was valid up to (some time in) March, at which point it expired.