As far as the eye can see
Posted on 18th June 2012
Make Word work for you with some find and replace tips for tricky typos.
I was recently proofreading a thesis about education when I noticed that learning had been misspelled as leaning. I could have continued through the document and amended any further instances of this as I encountered them, but even for a proofreader, the omission of an 'r' to make a word that is still a word can be hard to spot. Instead, I used the nifty CTRL+H trick and searched for all instances of 'lean' (be it leaner/leaners/leaning/leaned) and replaced them with 'learn'.
A word of caution though: it's often wise to check each instance one by one as sometimes the 'other version' may be correct - perhaps a learner was leaning against a metaphorical wall... Or Pret a Manger has a new manager.
What this did inspire me to do though was to compile a list of common errors (with the help of friends on Facebook and Twitter) in a handy list of words to look out for where a little typo can make a big difference. Whether you're a proofreader, or having to check your own work, this list can work as a useful reminder of words to look out for where Word's spell check just won't help.
If you think I have missed an important one off the list, drop me an email and I will add it on...
- lean/learn
- manger/manager
- pubic/public
- complaint/compliant
- casual/causal
- costumer/customer (less common but I've seen it a few times)
- form/from
- lager/larger
- contacts/contracts
- handing/handling
- word/world
- trials/trails
- quality/qualify
- combing/combining
- aboard/abroad
Written by Kate Haigh.