Thursday, 26 August 2021
The Improvement Context
Back on Day 181, I wrote about applications and organisations “improving away features”. As it happens, today, it was Microsoft Word that provided me with the perfect example. Quite often, when a feature disappears, I ask in frustration whether it was really the improvement? The other question I ask is whether I was the only person using it? Hence perhaps why the change happened.
When I write these posts these days, I use Grammarly. And, up until today, MS Word’s built-in “Grammar & Spelling” checker received the improvement.
By the way, Grammarly is great for improving grammar; I recommend it for people who are lazy with commas 😏. However, there are times when a passive sentence, written well, is not identified as such. It might be because nothing in the sentence lends itself to making it an “active” sentence. Microsoft Word and Yoast SEO (the website plug-in) helps, amongst other things, assess an article’s readability.
My process was thus: first, I would write the post, and depending on my level of confidence in my writing, I would activate Grammarly while I type or after I’ve typed it. Once Grammarly is satisfied, the content goes into the website template, and in there, I try to get green “bullets” from Yoast SEO for readability. There is the odd occasion when readability says there are too many passive sentences.
Not wanting to make the reading experience too tedious for the reader, I go back to the Word document and use Word’s “Spelling & Grammar” checker. Its ruthless stance on active and passive helps me narrow down the offending sentences when I run the check paragraph by paragraph, then line by line. If possible, the line is either massaged or beaten into submission – you will be active! Ahh, that’s the improvement it’s after.
The Feature
Today, with new eyes, I head back to a sentence that had refused submission, hoping to try again and perhaps cajole it into activity. Once reworded, I seek out my harshest critic in Word. What? Where’s it gone? The “Tell Me” function in Microsoft is lovely mostly. It usually remembers what you’ve previously used, so where is it? I didn’t reboot. Hmmm. The loss of it in Tell Me almost feels like gaslighting. You’re sure it was there, but perhaps it wasn’t.
Okay. Let’s tackle this from a different angle, the long way. Tools, Spelling & Grammar, Huh? Alright. Maybe there’s been an update in O365 for MacOS, which has reset things. Oh, no! Please don’t tell me that it is not there (drum roll) “the improvement”. So, how do I get the old stuff to show the even longer way? You know, back to basics.
A search using my friendly browser turned up an article updated not so long ago, 12 July 2021, by Anne Hennegar at Time Atlas on Word Readability Statistics and Alternatives. Anne writes about how to ensure all your settings are correct. Done. All preferences are in place. Now, back to Tools, Spelling & Grammar – still nothing. There seems to be this new thing called “Editor”, and while it looks fancy is no help whatsoever.
That’s a bit harsh. It did help me pick up a couple of capitalisation errors, some spaces after full stops/ periods. Editor also didn’t like a semi-colon I used somewhere, but Grammarly thought it was fine. Since I set the Grammarly preferences to default to Australian English, Grammarly thought it was fine. On the other hand, Word lets me believe I’ve selected Australian English, but it still has a couple of subtle American English-isms that irk me.
Disclaimer
Now, I’m just playing around, but there is an element of frustration. The average Australian will have you believe that other language quirks are “meh”, and it doesn’t annoy them. It’s part of the Australian “brand”, not to get annoyed but to poke fun. There’s some level of annoyance if you’re corrected, and the improvement isn’t noticeable, particularly when it comes to nicknames.
And you’d be letting the team down by saying something was more significant than a “meh”, and for the most part, it doesn’t. But everyone has at least one gripe; what makes it difficult to spot is that different Australians have one annoyance – and who said we’re not a diverse nation?
However, there’s this beautiful thing called technology, and if I don’t understand the meaning of a word, I can look it up. I don’t see sense in making everyone the same; fun is the differences, and changing it wouldn’t be the improvement we’re seeking.
So, type colour any way you want; a spell checker will know what you mean and correct it as complementary to your culture. There are cultural nuances, too; I’ve written about one on Day 188.
Back to what’s the improvement. Now, where do I go to tackle passive sentences? Yoast SEO tells me they exist but doesn’t tell me which ones. Hmmm, maybe I’ll dump them into a plain, unformatted WordPress page; there are a couple of “spelling and grammar” check things in there.
Then
Now with The Improvement
Today's Cards
The Cards - The Improvement Analysis
Carryover Cards
Two cards carried over from yesterday; Laziness moved from Feelings to Influence, Going with the Flow moved from Goal to Future Energy.
Cross
Travelling in the Recent Past was my journey to O’Reilly’s Rainforest Retreat. It allowed me to get to Abundance. And We are the World is in the Distant Past gave rise to today’s Abundance. Abundance, however, is influenced by Laziness.
As I sit here on vacation, I can see how Laziness and Abundance work together, looking out at the beautiful scenery. The Abundance of beauty, energy, love, relaxation and Laziness to do anything with any of it. Focussing on writing stops me from soaking in the beauty of where I am. Ahh.
Ordinariness as the Goal is simply just enjoying life and worrying about something as “trivial” as the improvement of Microsoft Word’s spelling and grammar feature!
In the end, Future Energy will be Going with the Flow.
Base
My Feelings are of Exhaustion at all levels of my being, physical, emotional and spiritual. Maybe it’s the physical exercise 🥱, and it’s fighting to let go or finding a sweet spot between my self-inflicted merry-go-sorry.
At least today, the Others’ Views is an easy one to identify because it’s the Completion card, and we’re leaving O’Reilly’s. Aha! That’s why I’m exhausted; I don’t want to go 😢.
Hopes & Fears has Turning In. The good thing about coming up here and getting close to nature is that it reinvigorates my desire to meditate. Therefore, I hope this is true, and I can put it into practice when I get home. The sad thing is Turning In might not happen, and that’s the fear.
Finally, the Outcome is Compromise. Maybe we’ll squeeze a short walk in before we get home? Now that’ll be the improvement I had in mind.
References
- Osho, Osho Zen Tarot – The Transcendental Game of Zen, St Martin’s Press, ISBN 0-312-11733-7
- Queensland Health Coronavirus Vaccines page
