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Subject:Re: What if they can't spell? From:Dick Margulis <margulis -at- fiam -dot- net> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Mon, 03 Sep 2001 08:23:26 -0400
Bevan,
I heard an interview on NPR the other day with the editor (or perhaps an
editor) of the new Encarta Dictionary. She said they included some
hundreds of common misspellings (displayed with a line struck through
them so they would not be mistaken for regular entries), specifically to
help people through the difficulty you describe. She indicated that they
selected the words based on some sort of published database.
This brings up two thoughts. First, you could read the frontmatter of
that new dictionary (or check it out online) to see if you could find a
link to the same database. Second, you could use a similar strategy in
your index or add it to your help engine.
Dick
Bevan Mccabe wrote:
>
> With an index, you could conceivably add common misspellings (hmm, did I
> spell that right? :-) of words to accomodate these situations. However, I
> wouldn't want to do that, as it would lessen the time I have for more
> important tasks, and users might get the impression that their misspelling
> is in fact correct.
>
> I presume there is some data out there for commonly misspelled words.
> Are there any other situations where the user's difficulty with spelling
> might prevent them from getting the help they need? Any ideas for solutions?
>
>
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