This is a very mild rant, but if it be Mod’s will to move this to the Pit, so be it.
Anyway, I hate spell check. It’s a very misleading crutch and can lead to odd results for people who really rely on it or use it to “look up” a word by just typing it in the word processor.
Case in point. I’m working on a program right now and came across an array of assorted acronyms. The original author of this array named the variable “pneumonics”. This just makes me grit my teeth. Just to be sure I wasn’t losing my mind, I went to Word and typed in “mnemonics, pneumonics” and ran spell check. Naturally, both words check out ok. So I run over to dictionary.com really quick and look up pneumonic; it’s a term having to do with the lungs or pneumonia. Obviously the fellow who originally typed in the variable name had been unsure of the admittedly odd word that sounds like “nemoniks” and had typed stuff into word until something passed spell check. Gaaaahh!
I want a word processor with a real live integrated grammar/spell check that actually works, applies context to spelling checks and provides actual dictionary definitions when it shows you a word that is either mispelled or looks like it doesn’t belong in a given context! Every time I’ve used that crappy grammar check that has been included with Word for years and apparently hasn’t been actually ever tested or updated it only ever makes my document worse, not better. I.e., it introduces far more grammatical errors than it produces! Arrrrrgggggg.
Most of that’s implausible. A dictionary definition makes sense though - that’s what they do for the grammar checker (as in “AGH! Yes, I know a subject and verb should match, what I would like you to explain is what words you think they are in this sentance that you think they don’t, and how can I persuade you to look instead at the correct ones??”).
OTOH, co-workers with braincells would help too, neh?
I don’t mind the spell check, but I hate the grammar check. Especially when I write French papers, and the little cute doggy says, “Remember to make agreement between your adjectives and subjects!” Which 99% of the time I’ve already done. Idiot dog, thinks he’s all multilingual and shit.
Agreement between adjectives and subjects? That’s a pretty idiotically worded suggestion. I think the dog means either subject-verb agreement or adjective-noun agreement.
It becomes obvious every time I read our little local paper that several of those writers rely on spell check a lot more then they should. One would think that people who use the language professionally would actually know how to use it, but I guess that’s too much to ask. The next time one of those guys uses lead as a past tense of “to lead” I swear I’m going to send it back to him with a big red circle around it and a grammar book in the same package.
Today I lead
Yesterday I led
I have led
What I hate is that the MS Word spell check thinks that Canadian English is identical to British English.
Most of the time I keep it set on American English - the systematic spelling differences are fewer, i.e. it takes less time to include every “-our” word and misc. other things than it does to include every “-ize” word.
My spell check is a Webster’s New World Dictionary right by my computer, a genuine, hard-bound, honest to goodness book. If I want to check the proper spelling of council or counsel, I know it will be correct.
