problemas con "deber"

Question

¡Hola!

Estaba hablando con un amigo y dije la frase seguiente. No pienso que sea gramatical.

"no me deberías decir donde se ubicó"

Soy anglohablante, y estaba tratando decir algo como:

"you shouldn't have told me where it was."

Por contexto, era una broma porque él estaba comiendo helado en la cafeteria. Después me fui para tomar algo. ¿Me puedes ayudar con la traducción gramatical de la frase arriba? Gracias,

Mi segundo intento : "no me deberías dicho donde se ubicaba"

Answer 1

I would have said:

No deberías haberme dicho dónde estaba.

You shouldn't have told me where is was.

I'm not a native, so you may want to wait for other answers.

Here's a technique I use quite often.

I type some Spanish into Google Translate. (my best guess at what should be)

I check if the English says what I want it to say. Even if it does I go on to the next steps because GT is often too forgiving of grammatical errors.

Then I click on the two-way arrow to swap the languages.

If the Spanish still says what I wrote originally then it is usually a decent indicator that I got it right.

If the Spanish changes, I try to understand the changes and I modify my Spanish sentence accordingly.

By the way, haber, which is used in the perfect tenses He, has, ha, hemos, etc. is just like any other verb in this regard. If it follows a conjugated verb it needs to go in the infinitive. And you can attach the pronoun to it.

thank you, this sounds good to me. there were so many verbs involved i was confused lol. i'll wait for more people to confirm this. - Estudiante77, Jul 13, 2017

I think it is OK, but you're smart to wait. I'll share a couple of other things with you by editing my post. - DilKen, Jul 13, 2017

wow, what a technique! - polenta1, Jul 13, 2017

I do exactly that, Ken, and then anything I have doubts about I try to track down on wordreference.com or linguee. (You'd think I'd make fewer errors. Sigh.) - AnnRon, Jul 14, 2017

Polenta: Of course it's just sort of a learning crutch. Sometimes I write emails with 30-40 sentences without doing this and then my errors show up. I can be understood, but I'll make maybe 10 errors, mostly gender and conjugations. - DilKen, Jul 14, 2017

Thank you very much! That's a very helpful technique, I'll certainly be using it. Best wishes :) - Estudiante77, Jul 15, 2017

I hope you enjoy the technique. Sometimes I just sit down with Google Translate and pretend I'm having a conversation. I type both sides of the dialog and try to get the English to day what I want it to say. :) Thanks for the best answer nod. - DilKen, Jul 15, 2017

Answer 2

You should tell me. Deberías decirme.

I should wait. Debería esperar

but in the past when you use "should have +past participle" it's :

You should have told me. Deberías haberme dicho.

I should have waited. Debería haber esperado.

Polenta, so if I wanted to say: I should have told you to wait, i could say: (yo) Debería haberte dicho esperar or Debería haberte dicho que esperar ? - FELIZ77, Jul 14, 2017

Debería haberte diche que esperaras. Tell someone to do something is decirle a alguien " que haga" algo. - polenta1, Jul 14, 2017

Remember that many people don't use the past subjunctive so you may hear. Debería haberte dicho que esperes but it's worng. Also remember that instead of esperaras you could say esperases. - polenta1, Jul 14, 2017

Thank you very much,, Polenta. I am happy to use the subjunctive and prefer the first form: esperaras :) - FELIZ77, Jul 15, 2017

Answer 3

Hello Estudiante,

I would agree with Ken. I believe that his translation is correct :

No deberías haberme dicho dónde estaba = You shouldn't (should not) have told me where it was.

I decided to write this out before reading Ken's post and arrived at exactly the same translation

Estudiante, I would use ubicarse more in place of situada not the verb estar,as in the example sentence you gave that Ken and I both translated independently using estaba

ex: El restaurante que se llama: 'Los tres pescadores' se ubica al sur del rio = The restaurant called' The Three Fishermen' is situated /located to the south of the river

I hope this helps you both!

Corrijan mi español si es necesario, por favor : )

Thanks Feliz. - DilKen, Jul 13, 2017

good job :) - 006595c6, Jul 13, 2017

You are welcome, Ken :) - FELIZ77, Jul 13, 2017

Thank you, Heidi :) - FELIZ77, Jul 13, 2017

Answer 4

"you shouldn't have told me where it was."

No deberías haberme dicho dónde estaba.
or
No deberías haberme dicho dónde se encontraba
or
No deberías haberme dicho dónde estaba ubicado/a.

Answer 5

No deberías haberme dicho dónde estaba.

You shouldn't have told me where it was.

Great!

I'm not a native, so you may want to wait for other answers.

No siree bob , this answer is the one!! good job

Thanks Heidita. I keep trying. :) - DilKen, Jul 14, 2017