Ask for an answer...

[Jacques Hausser]

It's perhaps not a brand new topic, but I floundered again, being confused with "ask" and "answer" commands, so I let off some stream.
I was always bothered - and I'm not the only one - by the semantic of these commands. In both cases, the script asks a question, and the user has to answer. But the "answer" command is viewed as an order to the user, when the ask command is viewed as a demand from the application. Two points of view for two commands which in fact have very similar meanings. It seems logical that these commands should be either described from the application's side or from the user's side, and not the actual mixture of both.
It would be (semantically) straightforward to change the meanings of the extand commands, but a nightmare to re-actualize old code. So, synonymizing (english?) only one of them, solutions could be:

1) if you prefer the point of view of the application:

"answer" could be replaced by "request"-- for a demand needing a yes-or-no answer
"ask" -- no change; for a demand requesting a more detailed answer, e.g. your birthday…

2) if you prefer the point of view of the user

"answer" -- no change; for a yes-or-no answer
"ask" could be replaced by "reply" -- with something more detailed.

I'm sure that most of you, native English speakers, could find better solutions…I'm looking forward for them !

Jacques