american english - Is "currently-installed" a proper compound adjective?



I'm in the process of working on technical documentation and the phrase "currently-installed" came up. The context of the orginal sentesnece is as follows:



"You are not licensed to use the currently-installed product."



Normally I see this written as "currently installed" but I was told the other way is correct because it is a compound adjective. Which form is correct?



Answer



From Grammarbook.com's rules about hyphen use:



An often overlooked rule for hyphens: The adverb very and adverbs ending in -ly are not hyphenated.


Incorrect: the very-elegant watch


Incorrect: the finely-tuned watch


This rule applies only to adverbs. The following two sentences are correct because the -ly words are adjectives rather than adverbs:


Correct: the friendly-looking dog


Correct: a family-owned cafe



So because currently is an adverb ending in -ly, the compound adjective currently installed does not need to be hyphenated.


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