What's the difference between に and で when speaking of time of an action?


What's the difference between に and で when speaking of the time of an action?
I know に is very specific about time, but I'm not sure when, or how to use で.
Can で only be used in certain instances?

Supposing we want to say "After eating breakfast, I will watch TV." What would
be the difference between these two:

> 朝ご飯を食べた後 **に** テレビを見る。(asagohan o tabeta ato **ni** terebi o miru)

vs.

> 朝ご飯を食べた後 **で** テレビを見る。(asagohan o tabeta ato **de** terebi o miru)

Thanks!




There are some interesting connotations in the Chiebukuro examples crunchyt
kindly pointed to which I think are worth going over in more detail. First,
the ～でする and ～にする forms:

> この仕事はあと **で** します。 I'll do this job later.
>
> この仕事はあと **に** します。 I'll do this job later.

Now, the fact that these are both allowable and both have the same (English)
translation doesn't mean they're freely interchangeable. Rather, the first
simply means that you'll do the job sometime in the future. The second,
however, implies that you have the option of doing the job now, but you're
putting it off until later -- "you choose 'later' from amongst other options,"
as crunchyt put it. (Incidentally, the Japanese word for "postponement" is
後回し. Yet the opposite of "postponement" is not 前回し, but 前倒し. In Japanese,
things rotate backward and fall forward. :)

Now for verbs other than する, で is the typical choice to follow あと. From
Chiebukuro:

> ご飯はあと **で** 食べます。 I'll eat later.
>
> ご飯はあと **に** 食べます。 (incorrect)

But what of the ～たあと form? If you Google for such phrases as 食べたあとで versus
食べたあとに, you end up with the same number (~8M) of results. Clearly both are
used commonly. What do we make of this?

Recall that に refers, as you know, to a specific point in time. で, on the
other hand, is more general, and indicates a range of time within which an
action takes place. For example:

> この本を３時間 **で** 読み終わった。 I finished reading this book in three hours.
>
> この本を３時間 **に** 読み終わった。 (incorrect)

From this contrast of specificity/generality we can conclude that ～たあとに shows
a tighter bond between the two actions, i.e. the second action takes place
very close to the end of the first. ～たあとで, by giving a range of time, is much
less specific about when the second action starts.

This rule of "immediate versus range" also applies to cases where the word
preceding あと is not a verb, but one of この, その, or あの:

> このあとに [right] after this
>
> このあとで [sometime] after this

There are of course cases when neither ～あとに nor ～あとで may be used, such as when
the first action is a prerequisite for the second:

> 歯を磨いてから寝なさい。 (not 磨いたあとで)

Or when the first action has a direct cause-and-effect relationship with the
second:

> このボタンを｛押したら／押すと｝お湯が出ます。 (not ボタンを押したあとで)




There are some interesting connotations in the Chiebukuro examples crunchyt
kindly pointed to which I think are worth going over in more detail. First,
the ～でする and ～にする forms:

> この仕事はあと **で** します。 I'll do this job later.
>
> この仕事はあと **に** します。 I'll do this job later.

Now, the fact that these are both allowable and both have the same (English)
translation doesn't mean they're freely interchangeable. Rather, the first
simply means that you'll do the job sometime in the future. The second,
however, implies that you have the option of doing the job now, but you're
putting it off until later -- "you choose 'later' from amongst other options,"
as crunchyt put it. (Incidentally, the Japanese word for "postponement" is
後回し. Yet the opposite of "postponement" is not 前回し, but 前倒し. In Japanese,
things rotate backward and fall forward. :)

Now for verbs other than する, で is the typical choice to follow あと. From
Chiebukuro:

> ご飯はあと **で** 食べます。 I'll eat later.
>
> ご飯はあと **に** 食べます。 (incorrect)

But what of the ～たあと form? If you Google for such phrases as 食べたあとで versus
食べたあとに, you end up with the same number (~8M) of results. Clearly both are
used commonly. What do we make of this?

Recall that に refers, as you know, to a specific point in time. で, on the
other hand, is more general, and indicates a range of time within which an
action takes place. For example:

> この本を３時間 **で** 読み終わった。 I finished reading this book in three hours.
>
> この本を３時間 **に** 読み終わった。 (incorrect)

From this contrast of specificity/generality we can conclude that ～たあとに shows
a tighter bond between the two actions, i.e. the second action takes place
very close to the end of the first. ～たあとで, by giving a range of time, is much
less specific about when the second action starts.

This rule of "immediate versus range" also applies to cases where the word
preceding あと is not a verb, but one of この, その, or あの:

> このあとに [right] after this
>
> このあとで [sometime] after this

There are of course cases when neither ～あとに nor ～あとで may be used, such as when
the first action is a prerequisite for the second:

> 歯を磨いてから寝なさい。 (not 磨いたあとで)

Or when the first action has a direct cause-and-effect relationship with the
second:

> このボタンを｛押したら／押すと｝お湯が出ます。 (not ボタンを押したあとで)

