temps au convenable

[wintry pivot]

Please be patient

Our volunteers look into many questions every day; sometimes it takes them a little while to answer.

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Make it descriptive, including relevant context, but also to the point. This way you improve your chances of getting a more relevant and specific answer.

temps au convenable

[sonic bridge]

This is called the past infinitive and it's used after conjunctions and verbs when the subject is the same

'After having put the phone in her bag, she left.'

It's just that French is a lot more willing to use the past infinitive than English which is why you'd (normally) say, 'After she had put the phone in her bag, she left.'

[coarse roost]

There is no subject tho

In first

[sonic bridge]

There is, it's « elle »

The first part is a subordinate clause whose subject is the same as the main clause

For example, if I were say, « Je pense l'avoir trouvé », what I'm really saying is « Je pense que je l'ai trouvé ». It's just that, because the subject of the main clause and the subordinate is the same, I can switch the subordinate clause with the past infinitive

[brittle vector]

Just want to point out that in English, it would not be shocking to hear/see "after having put her phone in the bag, she left"

You can draw a pretty easy connection between the two constructions in this case

[sonic bridge]

Same thing here. The sentence is:
« Après qu'elle avait mis le portable dans son sac, elle est partie. »
Because the subject in the subordinate is the same as the subject in the main clause, French would rather use the past infinitive.

[sonic bridge]

Right but I wasn't saying that English would never use the past infinitive, it's just that it would be way less common than in French in the same way that you can find subordinate clauses whose subjects are the same as the subject in the main but they're going to be rarer compared to English

[brittle vector]

Sure, but pointing out the English usage is more helpful for understanding right now

[sonic bridge]

The past infinitive is only used for verbs that denote action so if you have two clauses where one is in the imparfait, for example, the past infinitive cannot be used as a substitute in spite of it being a past tense

[sonic bridge]

Fair enough

[coarse roost]

Alright ty

[sonic bridge]

Do note that if you are turning the past infinitive into a clause, you'd have to keep the sequence correct

« Après avoir fini son travail, elle part. »
–> Après qu'elle a fini son travail, elle part.
« Après avoir fini son travail, elle est partie. »
–> Après qu'elle avait fini son travail, elle est partie.

In the first sentence, the past action of the present tense is the passé composé.
In the second sentence, the past action of the passé composé is the plus-que-parfait.