daniela

I was reading Making Light today and I ran across an interesting link. There have been many discussions on WF about the near uselessness of MS Word's grammar checker (which isn't necessarily a bad thing because it gives copy editors something to do and teaches writers to get off their butts and study grammar). Now an associate professor at the University of Washington has come to the same conclusion and offers up some amusing examples on his website (well, it's funny if you know basic grammar).

Enjoy!

Microsoft Word Grammar Checker Are No Good, Scholar Conclude

--DM--

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"When you catch an adjective, kill it. No, I don't mean utterly, but kill most of them—then the rest will be valuable." - Mark Twain

Gauda

I honestly can say I do agree. In fact, they're worse than no good...they're crap. It's so annoying right-clicking and having to press "ignore" countless times. Some of their synonoms suck too...in fact, most of them do. I know that I can no longer depend on Microsoft word for my grammer problems.

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daniela

You can change the settings so it won't flag everything. For example, I like to use sentence fragments sometimes so I went to Tools-Options-Settings and unchecked the appropriate boxes ("Fragments and Run-ons" and “Fragment - stylistic suggestions").

--DM--

Edit: I forgot a step. It goes Tools-Options-Spelling & Grammar-Settings.

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"When you catch an adjective, kill it. No, I don't mean utterly, but kill most of them—then the rest will be valuable." - Mark Twain

Ilan Bouchard

Luckily, Microsoft Word doesn't have a grammar check on my mac. Or maybe it's a feature I turned off. Either way, I haven't seen the green line in a while, for better, not worse.

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Ruthless comments encouraged!

MetalDog

I don't have a problem with it. It has its limitations, but as long as you're aware of them it can be a useful second set of eyes.

Unflagging the gender specific and business oriented aspects of it, I let it catch fragments, passive voice and run on sentences in particular. I feel free to ignore the wavy green line, but sometimes I love fragments /too/ much and seeing the hoards all underlined encourages me to explore other ways of saying the same thing. I've often ended up with a much tighter piece after a rethink.

If you relied on it to know all your grammar for you, you'd be screwed. As long as you know its limitations, it's not too dreadful a thing to have lurking in the background as a reminder not to get sloppy.

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~MetalDog
"So, I figured that if I was going to react, I may as well overreact..."
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Luis Santos

nothing like good old book, on shelf