Paratext Wordlist/Spell Checking Manual

Extracted text from Paratext7.1WordlistSpellCheckingManual-v1.0.pdf:

Paratext 7.1 Wordlist and Spell Checking Manual Paratext 7.1 Wordlist andSpell Checking Manual 1. Introduction 2. Getting Started 2.1 Approving spelling of common/frequent words 2.2 Checking words most likely to be misspelled 2.3 Checking similarly spelled words 3. Using Spelling in the Main Editor Window 3.1 Turning on the spelling checking option 3.2 Making spelling corrections 3.3 Red underline vs. Grey underline 3.4 Spell Checking the current book 3.5 Auto corrections in the editor window 4. Using the Wordlist tool 4.1 Views that are available for a wordlist 4.2 Finding a word or groups of words in the list 4.3 Setting the spelling status in the wordlist 4.4 Wordlist - Morphology 4.5 Wordlist - Hyphenation 5. Printing options 6. Miscellaneous Send/Receive Making spelling corrections Quick Edit window

1. Introduction An important goal for every translation project is to end up with text that is accurate and consistent. One way to ensure this is by validating every word found in the text. Up until now, the Wordlist tool has helped uncover some errors or inconsistencies in spelling. However, Paratext 7.1 introduces a new Wordlist tool which will go one step further in ensuring orthographic accuracy. The updated tool not only gives new options for working with the wordlist, but has also added the option to do spell checking in the main editor window of Paratext; a feature present in most text editors.

It is important to emphasize that this is a new Wordlist tool. While the look and feel may be similar to previous versions, most of the program has changed. With these changes, it is important to understand both what can be done, but also what should be done. in the past now

going through the wordlist was slow and tedious filters make finding words easier spell checking was done at the end of the project finding typos was difficult spell checking can become a daily task Paratext highlights suspicious words

Although there are many aspects to cover, the option to check spelling in the main text window is a fundamental change in how translators can improve their work. How does the new Wordlist tool make that possible? This manual will help a team get started but also cover the details on how to use the tool effectively.

2. Getting Started It is important to be familiar with various functions and to follow certain steps before investing a lot of time with any one aspect of spelling or the Wordlist tool. Following these steps will ensure better results and improved efficiency, from the beginning. What should be done first? Open the Wordlist and do the following: 1. Approve spelling of frequent words 2. Check the words Paratext thinks are wrong 3. Check similarly spelled words By doing these three first, as many words as possible will be marked as correct. It is the status as correct or incorrect which will impact spelling checking in the main editor window. These steps can be followed if there is already text that has been drafted. If there is no text then users will want to proceed to section #3.

2.1 Approving spelling of common/frequent words Words that occur many times in the text should normally be considered correct unless there is a specific reason to suspect an individual word. Marking the common words as correct is extremely helpful in getting a quick start with spell checking. In a few steps thousands of words can be marked as correct. 1. Click in the window of your project, to make it the active window. 2. From the Tools menu, select Wordlist... 3. From the Wordlist Tools menu select Approve Spelling of Common Words... Adjust the number of occurrences that must be present. The spelling status for any word with that amount of occurrences (and more) will be marked as correct. Paratext will alert you to the number of word status changes made by this procedure.

An ideal number to approve will be based on the project. A text that is very clean and nearing publication will have fewer errors and so the number to approve can be lowered. Users should also take into account the total number of words in the wordlist. Generally, if a text has 50,000 unique words, the approval will be less helpful than a text containing only 10,000 unique words.

2.2 Checking words most likely to be misspelled A new component of the Wordlist tool in Paratext 7.1 intelligently checks for suspiciously or incorrectly spelled words. The tool will present a list words, starting with the most suspicious. As words are indicated to be right or wrong Paratext develops a better idea of how to determine which are most suspicious. 1. Click in the window of your project, to make it the active window. 2. From the Tools menu, select Wordlist... 3. From the Wordlist Tools menu select Spell Check...

The suspicious word is always in bold. It is good practice to click on the suspicious word to see that word in its context before making any changes. If the highlighted word is... spelled correctly... incorrect but one of the suggestions in the line below is correct... incorrect and suggestions are not right (or not present)... then... click the check mark click on the correct suggestion click on the X to specify the spelling

If you click on one of the suggestions, Paratext will mark the original misspelled word as incorrect and also make the correction in Paratext. If there is more than one occurrence - a Search and Replace dialog will allow you to change each occurrence.

If there is one occurrence of the misspelled word and you click on a suggestion, Paratext will immediately make the correction in the text. This cannot be undone. If you click on the X, a dialog opens with suggestions. From that list, a word can be chosen or the correct spelling entered manually. [this is the same view/option as right-click in main window]

Some misspellings are random. However, many misspellings are a result of different writers having similar but not identical ideas about how a word should be spelled. Words are considered suspicious for one of the following reasons: Infrequent word is very similar to other correct or frequent words Differing only by diacritics from other words Unusual letter combinations Matches pattern of other words that have been corrected Usually but not always capitalized, inconsistent case Word cannot be broken into morphemes No known or guessable morphological analysis Continue viewing words until getting to the place where very few of the words are incorrect. At this point, it may not be worthwhile to review additional words since Paratext is not helping to find additional misspellings. However, once morphology or a greater number of words are identified, Paratext is able to improve the results and may come up with suspicious words not previously presented as suspicious.

2.3 Checking similarly spelled words The dialog for this check has changed, but the ability to look for similar word sets was present in previous versions of Paratext. There are three options for reviewing minimal pairs. 1. Click in the window of your project, to make it the active window. 2. From the Tools menu, select Wordlist... 3. From the Wordlist Tools menu select Find Similar Words...

The first box is for letters that may sound alike, or translators may be using one or the other to spell the same word. For example, if some speakers of a language tend to use the s in some words and others will use the letter z for the same word, then you would enter the following in the first box: s/z ex: daysdayz In second box enter letters which some spellers would tend to insert and others leave out. For example if some speakers include the in unaccented syllables and others dont, enter the following in the second box: ex: calna ~ calna If the language includes diacritics tick the Ignore all diacritics when comparing words box in order to consider words differing only in diacritics as similar. This option can be used by itself, with no entries in the other boxes. ex: algunalgn, cmo~como

Once you have entered the letters or set any of the above options, Paratext will show a list of all the pairs (or sets) of words which reflect the options entered. It is good to review each set of words, making the corrections when needed. It is also suggested that as many possible combinations be entered. Each language or team is unique when it comes to these types of orthographic inconsistencies.

3. Using Spelling in the Main Editor Window After marking as many words as possible correct, as discussed in section #2, spell checking can be done in the main editor window. During early stages of translation, it is recommended to only turn this on upon completion of a section or chapter. During stages of revision users might want to be checking the spelling of words at all times.

3.1 Turning on the spelling checking option From the Checking menu select Display Spelling or click on the ABC icon located on the main toolbar. Words which are considered suspicious will have a red squiggly underline.

The first time a person clicks on this icon a lot of good words will appear with the red underline.

Red underlines mean the word is either wrong or not marked as correct; these are the most suspicious. Grey underlines mean that the word has unknown status in the wordlist (but Paratext does not see any reason to call it suspicious). Grey underlines are hidden if they make up the majority of words.

3.2 Making spelling corrections If a word is underlined, that word is not yet recognized as a correct word. Right click on the underlined word... Paratext will show a list which includes the underlined word, along with a list of suggestions.

If the underlined word is... spelled correctly... incorrect and one of the suggestions is correct...

... then just click OK click on the correct suggestion, then OK

incorrect and there are no correct suggestions... click in box and type in correction, or click Cancel and make correction in text window Most of the time, it should be obvious which suggestion is the appropriate word to choose. However, the dialog window provides helpful information when deciding which word is the correct one for the current verse. the green check mark shows approved words the number of occurrences shows frequency verse references might confirm the spelling (look at books that have already been spell checked)

If you are having difficulty choosing the correct spelling it is often helpful to click on each spelling and review how it is used in context in the lower half of the pop up window. If no suggestions are given or it is not clear what to choose, it is best to click cancel and review the spelling in the main editor window. If the incorrect word also occurs in other books that are assigned to you, the replace dialog will come up, giving you the option to make that same correction in your other books.

3.3 Red underline vs. Grey underline At some point in the process, a team will start noting that there are two different types of underlines. Some words will be underlined in red and others will be grey. At first, only the red underlines will appear. When Paratext recognizes at least one half of all the words (in the text window) it will start using the grey underline to mark unknown words.

In this example, the word lihgt was corrected before, so Paratext knows it is not a valid word and underlines it with red. The word thare has a spelling status of undecided. The structure of the word is not inconsistent with other words in the language, so Paratext marks it as suspicious. The basis for this difference is discussed in section 2.2.

3.4 Spell Checking the current book The option to display suspicious words in the main editor window is very helpful for Spell Checking the current chapter. Once a book has been completed, a translator may want to Spell Check the entire book. This can also be done. 1. Click in the window of the project, to make it the active window. 2. From the Checking menu, select Spell Check current book... The Wordlist tool will open up a new window showing suspicious words in the current book. This result is exactly the same as described in the section: 2.2 Checking words most likely to be misspelled, the only difference being: in section 2.2 the Wordlist tool is displaying suspicious words in the entire text and now will only display words in the current book. Procedures to follow are the same as described in Section 2.2. The suspicious words will be limited to the current book but (if necessary) the translator will be able to make corrections in all of his/her assigned books. If a misspelled word occurs in a book not assigned to the current user, a warning message will say that not all corrections were made. If the translator for the books with errors not yet corrected runs the Spell Check tool, any word that has been identified as wrong will be at the top of the list of suspicious words. The correct spelling has already be determined so clicking on Apply Correction will correct the word.

3.5 Auto corrections in the editor window If a person or team has trouble with spelling certain words, the autocorrect feature in Paratext can be utilized. One example is changing teh > the. For more information on this option, search for autocorrect in the Paratext Help system.

4. Using the Wordlist tool The use of the various tools in the the Wordlist program is discussed in section 2 of this manual. Those tools are essential for getting a quick start in spell checking text. Even though the use of those tools is emphasized for getting started, those tools should continue to be used throughout the project. The goal for each project should be to have a wordlist with every word marked as either correct or incorrect. The more disciplined a team is in the use of the Wordlist tool, along with spell checking in the main editor window, the more consistent the orthography of the text will be.

4.1 Views that are available for a wordlist Both the columns to be displayed and the sort order can be chosen. To select from the options for viewing the wordlist, click the View menu. Columns Word and Count are always displayed Spelling - current status Hyphenation Morphology

Sort Order Word - Standard alphabetic order (default view) Stem - Review all words with the same stem. Useful if the language has affixes Word Count - Review very infrequent words Word Length - Review very long or short words End of Word - Review all words with the same suffix or ending Spelling Status - Review correct, incorrect, or undecided words

The sort order for Word, Status, Count, etc. can be changed by clicking the text in the column header. Click the header again to reverse the current sort order.

Scripture Range To review only the words found in one or more book(s) from the View menu, click on the View menu and select Set Scripture Range... If a range is applied to the list, the book or range will be in the Title Bar.

Word Count The total number of words displayed can always be found in the status bar. The number will vary if the range changes, or filters are applied.

4.2 Finding a word or groups of words in the list There are various ways to look for a particular word in the Wordlist tool. The most basic way is to simply scroll down the list. This is good for reviewing the entire list but not if a particular word needs to be found. Another way to find words has always been to use the Find tool, from the Edit menu. Filter box New to the Wordlist tool is the word Filter Box. When a word, or string, is typed in the Find Word box Paratext will immediately filter the results in the display window. From the thousands of words in a text, in a few seconds just a few will be displayed, as seen in this example.

Regular Expressions in the Filter box Using the filter box, regular expressions can also be used to find words that might be difficult to find. Any regular expressions must be preceded by the string regex: Examples: Regular Expression regex:c[aeiou] regex:c[^h] regex:\bc[^h] finds... words containing the letter c followed by one of these vowels words with c, not followed by the letter h words beginning with c and not followed by h

Here are the initial results of the final expression.

4.3 Setting the spelling status in the wordlist The spelling status is the key to accurate and efficient use of spell checking in Paratext. The sooner someone on the team works through the list of words in the project, the more the team will benefit in all stages of the translation process. The spelling status for words are changed in various contexts. The section on Getting Started could also be called.. get as many words marked as correct or incorrect as quickly as possible. The instructions in that section help to establish a good starting point for the team to begin spell checking in the main editor window. In short, words need to be identified as correct or incorrect. Reviewing the entire list (or book range) should be done periodically. When doing this, it is good practice to sort the list of words by Spelling - that way the words that are unknown (any new words) or incorrect words will group together. [tip box: If the status for a lot of words needs to be assigned, it it helpful to use the shortcuts keys. Ctrl+Y will set the status as correct and move the cursor to the next word.] Whenever a correction is made Paratext will remember the correction. It can be a correction in the main editor window, or with the Spell Checking tool, or clicking on the X in the wordlist. The example of the correction for the word light in section 2.2 and 3.2 is remembered. Since an incorrect spelling for the word has reappeared Paratext will suggest the correction that was previously made. Clicking on Apply Correction will change that word in the text, wherever it occurs.

There are times when a word is marked as correct and that word is usually capitalized. If the majority of cases are in upper case, Paratext may suggest that the lower case occurrences be reviewed. In the example below; Amen occurs 8 times and with 7 of those references it is capitalized. If you click on Show Verses only the verse(s) with amen appears in the context window. If you click on Accept, that will establish that both upper and lower cases of the word are acceptable. If the word in lowercase is not acceptable, then it must be fixed manually.

4.4 Wordlist - Morphology Morphology is the identification, analysis and description of the structure of words. (Wikipedia) A translator can specify how words in the text are broken down into stems and affixes. This information about morphology will help Paratext to mark a word as suspicious if it can not be created by a combination of known stems and affixes. In other words, the spell checking in the main editor window will be more accurate. From the View menu select Show Morphology

If a word has the the correct morphology specified click on the grey check mark in front of the word. It will turn green. If the morphology for the word is incorrect, click on the word in the morphology column and make the proper breaks, placing a + after every prefix and + before every suffix. These should be separated with a space.

In Paratext an affix is either a prefix or a suffix. Paratext does not currently support infixes. Infixes would have to be specified as alternate forms of stems. How else can specifying the correct morphology for words help me? In addition when Paratext is guessing the morphology of a word it will favor breakdowns into known stems and affixes.

If the morphology is defined in the wordlist, Paratext can use this with the interlinearizer, giving more accurate breakdown of words.

4.5 Wordlist - Hyphenation When preparing to publish a Bible, one of the considerations should be whether or not to hyphenate words. Hyphenation can reduce the cost of printing a Bible by reducing the amount of white space on a page. Not only does it reduce white space but gives the option of full justification. Hyphenation may also be necessary for languages with long words. From the View menu select Show Hyphenation

If a word already has the the correct hyphenation, click on the grey check mark in front of the word. It will turn green. If the suggested hyphenation is incorrect, click on the word and make the proper breaks, inserting or removing the equal sign (=) where necessary. As corrections to the hyphenation of words are made, the automatically-supplied hyphenation should get better, reflecting the kinds of acceptable breaks. At some point it might be clear that the automatic hyphenation is good enough. In that case, it is not necessary to validate the hyphenation of every word in the list. Print Draft will use both the validated and suggested hyphenation breaks. If you have certain impolite words that you do not wish to be broken off onto the next line you can use the filter box in the toolbar to find words containing these words and verify that the hyphenation does not create them as stand-alone words. Why would I not want to hyphenate words? Hyphenation takes time to do. Hyphenation can make a text less readable, especially for new readers. How can I test whether my hyphenation causes reading problems? Specify hyphenation as described above. From the File menu select Print Draft. Tick Hyphenate?. Select a narrow page size to force many lines to be hyphenated. Ask several readers to read portions of the text containing hyphens. Pay special attention to whether readers tend to pause, repeat words, or read an incorrect word when they come to the end of the hyphenated line. If there are problems investigate whether changing the location at which the words are hyphenated helps; for example it might be that only allowing hyphenation at the break between a root and its suffixes helps.

5. Printing options There are various options for printing with the Wordlist tool. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Print all words in the list Print only the filtered words Print current word - with verse text Print words and include status or count Print output to printer or html file

To print a list, from the File menu select Print...

Based on the options chosen, a window like the one pictured below will display a copy of the list to be printed. This list contains all the words with the string acc - a filtered list, which can be directed to a printer or to an html file.

If no filter is set in the Wordlist tool, (Find Word box) the option to print current word will also print all the verses for that word.

6. Miscellaneous Send/Receive What happens with shared projects and when more than one person makes changes to the wordlist? If the changes are to the status for different words, the changes will merge. Provided the send/receive is done with frequency, it should not be a problem when two or more people make changes.

Making spelling corrections In section 2.2, 3.2, 3.4 and 4.3 this manual talks about making corrections. The reality is that a user can make corrections in any of these places, in various ways. Spell Check tool (entire text or current book) Spell checking in editor window Spelling status changes in Wordlist tool

With each of these, or in each place: clicking on X in Spell Check tool opens the dialog with suggestions right clicking on a word in editor window opens dialog with suggestions clicking on X in wordlist opens the dialog with suggestions

In each and every one of these situations when a correction is made, Paratext will: change the spelling status to incorrect for the word changed at the same time mark the word chosen in its place to be correct (if not already correct) Paratext will remember that word X went to word Y if word X occurs again, word Y will be the primary suggestion

Quick Edit window In Paratext, whenever there is a list of references holding down the SHIFT KEY and double clicking the reference will open a Quick Edit window