Spel Chequer wish list

[B_Online]

Is it possible to include a spell checker with Actinic, one that would highlight errors as you type? I read that there is no real call for one, well how do you all make sure there is no spelling errors, does nobody ever make a spelling error, or do they get someone to read through everything? I expect most people copy and paste into ‘MS Word’ then back into Actinic or even Dreamweaver for that matter, there is a definite need for one. How embarrassing is it to have someone tell you there is a spelling mistake in your live site after spending months on it.

On another issue, in Developer V6 I notice when you preview an invoice or packing list or data entry, there is no option to print or any other option, you have to close the preview window to print the invoice etc, almost every time I have had to open up the invoice again to make sure I was looking at the correct one. This is very annoying at times. Has this been sorted in V7 or can it be sorted for V8?

[TraceyG]

Hi John,

I added your requests to our wish list.

[Mike Hughes]

You could always buy one. Spellex do one that can spell check anywhere your cursor is. Put your cursor in the actinic description text box and press F11 and it will check your spelling there. Put it on a web page and it will check the spelling on the web page. I just tried the free trial and it works very nicely (picked up a couple of typos on my home page I'd better go fix).

see: http://spellex.com/index.html

Mike

[jpungar]

A spell checker in the site search would be nice, like google has where it offers alternatives if a user types in a slightly wrong word.

[B_Online]

You could always buy one. Spellex do one that can spell check anywhere your cursor is. Put your cursor in the actinic description text box and press F11 and it will check your spelling there. Put it on a web page and it will check the spelling on the web page. I just tried the free trial and it works very nicely (picked up a couple of typos on my home page I'd better go fix).

see: http://spellex.com/index.html

Mike

"You could always buy one" so I suppose every wish list comment people should forget it and go and buy the patch somewhere else? I have paid quite a lot for Actinic Developer, sage link and a load of other things needed to get Actinic sites up and running, and I am ready to buy the latest V7 then V8 and I’m sure the next after that too....I could also buy many new add-ons which would cost me even more, but if I wait, those add-ons find their way into Actinic as part of their new features. I could also use another free eCommerce package with all those add-ons for free, but I like Actinic's non-webbed based control.

Photoshop, Dreamweaver and Word all have a spell checker’s in them; but only Word has one that is easy to use. Getting a site to look professional is quite hard for most people, and the grammar and choice of words let down many sites and puts potential customers off from buying from that site. Would you buy from a site that has bad grammar and miss-spelt words? Why would you trust them with your order if they can’t even get their own site right? Bad spelling is a sign of a very small company, or even a ‘one man band’.

I’m sure the link you suggest would be fine, but then you have to be online to use it, it might be easier to copy and paste into Word, which is not the best thing to do plus it’s another 3rd party option, you have to have Word.

Thanks for your comment Mike, I have loads of respect for people like yourself who are willing to help others and I know from many of your previous posts that you are genuinely trying to help others, the thing is you might not have to much trouble with spelling, but I’m afraid I and many others do, because even when I think I have spelt things correct or just copied from text, I still have to check the spelling through a 3rd party program.

I’m sure Actinic will not mind these types of comments because how will they ever progress or know what their customers want, if fact this is exactly what they want, feedback, that’s what the forum is for. This forum has helped me get rid of some stress over the past few weeks…I need to get a life…lol

Thanks Tracey

[Mike Hughes]

The one I linked to does work offline as well as online, but I guess you missed that. It's very easy to use just needing to press F11 (or another hotkey if you prefer).

Having found some typos on my website I do agree that a spellchecker is useful, only if you want it in actinic you'll probably have to wait a year or two. If it's a serious problem and you want to fix it now then you might find my suggestion can help.

Whatever actinic does, the spellchecker would be useful if it could check the templates too. My own typo was in the anchor text for a link that exists in one of my primary templates. Not somewhere a spell checker might usually check but an online check did.

Mike

[jont]

On-the-fly spell checking has to be the solution for Actinic with its position as an out-of-the-box web solution for creating web pages and the shopping carts.

I would hazard a guess that most users of Actinic software are part web designer, part copywriter, part programmer etc etc with one person creating the whole site and not employing stand-alone copyrighters and proof readers. Of course, an itegrated spell checker will not create good copy or really sort poor grammer (Word makes a half-hearted attempted but is still laughable) but any assistance such as correct spelling via Atcinic would be welcomed by all to keep everything under one easy-to-use package.

[Jan]

Mole End are developing a spell checker for Actinic, it will be available in the summer.

As a note to b_online, Actinic take note of every request for a new feature that appears in here, if you look through the forum you will see posts to this effect. Popular requests are likely to appear in future versions of the product (in my humble opinion). I think that it is very useful for people to share knowledge of workarounds in here, not everyone can wait for the next version of Actinic. I don't really feel that what plugins or workarounds are available will rule decisions made by Actinic on what to include in future versions of the product. Nice as they are, Actinic don't plan the products future around what plugins are availlable, if something needs to go into the product it will no matter how many plugins exist with the same or similar functionality.

Regards,

[anf1y]

You could always buy one. Spellex do one that can spell check anywhere your cursor is. Put your cursor in the actinic description text box and press F11 and it will check your spelling there. Put it on a web page and it will check the spelling on the web page. I just tried the free trial and it works very nicely (picked up a couple of typos on my home page I'd better go fix).

see: http://spellex.com/index.html

Mike

Thought I'd try the suggestion above and it looked good at first, then - oops! - problem is it's US and didn't like my English spellings.

Anf

[Mike Hughes]

problem is it's US and didn't like my English spellings.

Press F10 and you can select 'British English' (as they like to call it).

I've now run this on a few of my main pages and it's already highlighted some errors I hadn't spotted. Quite a useful tool.

Mike

[B_Online]

My apologies to Jan and anyone else that I might have upset…I will have to think before I write when trying to put my point across in future. And no I’m not called Tracey; I should have written ‘Thanks to Tracey for your reply’. Contrary to any rumour that I may have a weekend fetish…lol

[crofter]

Spel Chequer wish list

Why can't the Yanks be honest and call it 'American' because it certainly isn't English anymore.

[Miranda Stamp]

The bar of chocolate method

Last time I did a major re-hash of my web site, I simply posted a request on a forum frequented by mums (eg ukparents.co.uk, baby-greenhouse.co.uk, hunnybee.co.uk) offering a bar of chocolate to the first 5 to spot a typo. Far more fun, some of these ladies take it all very seriously and I get a huge long list of all sorts of minor errors (not just typos). I have found most of thses ladies are really keen to win chocolate; one forumite recently, on supplying a major chain of shops got stock position checks in stores throughout most of the country by the bar of chocolate method, which was far quicker and involved minimal manpower .

[jont]

Now I know why the girlfriend has just bought a new Dictionary and Thesaurus Very clever idea though and at minimal cost, ingenious

[David N]

I have always gone on my own web site going section by section. Select all text on one page. Copy it then paste into word and select check spelling. then go back into Actinic and amend the errors.

easy