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Grammar Check in Microsoft Office |
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Green
wavy lines under sentences in Word means the software thinks there might be
something wrong with the grammar. But it
is only a guide so remember: - The
presence of a green line doesn't mean there is something wrong - the grammar
checker might be mistaken. - The absence
of a green line doesn't mean the sentence is right - or that it necessarily
makes sense. In other
words the Word grammar checker is not the final arbiter of good grammar or
sense. It is only a guide - and a rough
one at that. As several academics have
been saying recently - there's no substitute for reading what you've typed. If there is a green line you can click on the autocorrect icon
(if available) or right mouse click on the sentence to see what the problem is
and, sometimes, see suggested changes. FRAGMENT
- CONSIDER REVISING This is
the most common grammar comment many people see. It can mean an incomplete sentence without a
subject or verb. It can sometimes mean
such a convoluted wording that the software can't work it out. In
either case there's no suggested changes - you have to re-write the sentence
yourself or tell Word to ignore the sentence altogether. S If
there's a spelling mistake in a 'bad' sentence then you can get both red and
green lines. Right-clicking
on the misspelled word will only show the spelling options - not the grammar
ones. It's best to fix the spelling
first because that might change the grammar test results. Or you
can right-click on part of the sentence with the green line only to go to the
grammar options immediately. GRAMMAR
OPTIONS Drill
down to Tools | Options | Spelling and Grammar to see some options for the
grammar checker. There
you'll see the options are broken into two parts - grammar and style. This can be a fine line at times but if you
click on the settings button you can see all the options in one list. The top
options (at least in Word 2003) adjust some tests that people differ upon. Whether you put a commas
before the last item in the list, having punctuation with quotes and the old
debating point - one space between sentences or two. There's no right answer to any of these;
choose the settings you want or leave them as "don't check". Under
Style you may want to choose some of the options to alert you to common
mistakes. I find
that in editing a document it is easy to lose track of sentence length so I
turn that check on. Some other checks don't concern me so I leave them off -
the choice is yours. Feel free to look down the Grammar and Style list of options and
select the ones that suit you, the way you write and common mistakes you might
make. NO
CHECKING In
previous versions of Word you had a language called 'No Proofing' which told Word to not do any spelling
or grammar checking on text with that attribute. You'd
use this for lists of names, programming code or anything that's not really
suitable for grammar / spell checks.
Poetry is another example of 'No Proofing' unless you want Word to start
correcting John Donne's grammar or ee cumming's capitalization! No
Proofing stops the green and red lines getting in the way. In Word
2003 that has changed - now you leave the language unchanged but check a box
'Do not check spelling or grammar'. You
find this under Tools | Language | Set Language. The 'Do
not check..' option is also available as a Style
setting, so you can create a style that includes the option to not do language
checks. You'd use this for things like
programming code where you can set the font etc plus stop Word from doing
grammar checks.
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