Using the spell-checker
Image: KnowledgeNumber1 via Wikimedia Commons (cc)
How often has the spell-checker saved you from a blunder, typo or solecism? How often has it caused one?
If your spelling is a total textspeak catastrophe, it can be a lifesaver, but the spell-checker is not an all-knowing oracle. It won’t pick up your mistake if you type a word that’s incorrect for the context, but still a word found in the dictionary.
In the sentence ‘I can’t here you from behind that partition’, the spell-checker will not produce its red squiggle under ‘here’ and tell you to change it to ‘hear’.
The spell-checker’s inability to distinguish homophones (words that sound the same but have different meanings or spellings) is its Achilles’ heel. Pairings such as principal/principle (for some reason people almost always choose the wrong one here – statistically implausible, but it’s really quite striking); it’s/its; there/they’re/their; poured/pored; lead/led throw up the most difficulties, but there are many others.
So what’s the solution? Well, computer programs are getting smarter all the time, and spell-checkers are developing more and more sophisticated capabilities. However, the rules that govern language use are intuitive as much as they are learned: there are so many instances of exceptions to the rule that the only solution is simply to know them. And that’s very difficult to program.
