[Grammar] Using of to link or not two nouns

[GuidoCa]

Dear Teachers,

I am never sure about the proper use of the preposition "of" to link two nouns.

Here I provide few examples:

Example 1)
"... to measure the traffic of calls." (It sounds better to me)
"... to measure traffic calls" (I am not sure if it is correct)

Example 2)
"She has the face of an angel"
"She has an angel face" (They both sound correct to me)

Is there a rule? Usually I use "my instinct", but I know is not always correct.
Thank you in advance

 

[bhaisahab]

1 "...to measure call traffic."
2 "She has the face of an angel."

 

[teechar]

"... to measure the traffic of calls." (It sounds better to me)
"... to measure traffic calls" (I am not sure if it is correct)

They have different meanings. I suspect you meant "call traffic" in the second.

 

[Tarheel]

Example 1)
"... to measure the traffic of calls." (It sounds better to me)
"... to measure traffic calls" (I am not sure if it is correct)

I don't think either of those is used. Also, it would be better to provide complete sentences. I would be able to understand your intent better.

 

[GuidoCa]

An example for the first sentence would be:

1) CDR data are used to measure the traffic of calls
2) CDR data are used to measure the traffic calls
3) CDR data are used to measure the call traffic

According to Teechar, number (3) should be correct. If so, this is (please correct me) a condition in which the noun (call) is used as adjective for another noun (traffic). In that case, we can apply the standard rule noun as adjective + noun.
Is that right?

if so, I still don't understand why sentence (1) is wrong. Since "of" is used to indicate a reference, in sentence (1) it would indicate which kind of traffic (calls) I measure with CDR data.
(Sorry for the stupid/confuse question, but I really want to understand this once and for all).

 

[bhaisahab]

#1 is not wrong, it's just not natural English. We don't say it like that.

 

[GuidoCa]

Ok I think I understood.... Thank you very much !

 

[Tarheel]

Ok I think I understand. Thank you very much !

Please note my correction. The use of the past tense there ("I understood") has you saying I did, but I don't. (I did understand, but I don't anymore.)

 

[GuidoCa]

Thank you very much !