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Monday, September 23, 2013

European Commission Directorate-General for Translation - English Style Guide

I find it interesting that people from all over the world use the preferred Australian English spelling in their local region. The reason is often the same as that which applies to us in Australia. The Microsoft spellchecker does not provide the preferred spelling, but simply allows multiple spelling variations (e.g. organise and organize), where both are considered correct. However, even though both are considered correct, there is usually a preferred spelling.

Sometimes I get feedback from users which I find others may be interested in. Joseph from France passed on a link to European Commission Directorate-General for Translation - English Style Guide, which I found contained a considerable amount of useful information. It seems I still have a great deal to learn about the English language and I find examples in style guides can be very useful.

Keep in mind the style guide is for the European community, and there as some differences from the preferred Australian English spelling, such as 'spelled' and not 'spelt'. So if you find a spelling which doesn't quite look right to you, check the spelling using Word Check.

Thank you Joseph for your support and sharing the information on the Style Guide.

Kelvin Eldridge
www.Australian-Dictionary.com.au

Thursday, September 19, 2013

Is the preferred Australian spelling e-zine or ezine?

This one is actually too close to call with total confidence. The usage of both in Australia is very similar.

Using Search Australia which only returns results for domain ending in .au, the number of results returned are:

e-zine: 11,300
ezine: 12,900

According to the Macquarie dictionary ezine is the preferred spelling with e-zine a secondary spelling. According to the Oxford dictionary the spelling is e-zine. The Oxford does not suggest a secondary spelling.

It does appear where there is no confusion when including or not including the hyphenation, there would be a preference towards ezine. For example in Australia the preference is email and not e-mail.

In this case, given ezine is used nearly 10 per cent more in Australia, and the Macquarie and the Oxford differ, I'd have to go with the Macquarie. As a result ezine will be added to the preferred Australian English spelling dictionary.

Kelvin Eldridge
Online Connections
www.OnlineConnections.com.au
Call 0415 910 703 for computer support.
Servicing Templestowe, Doncaster, Eltham and the surrounding area.

Monday, September 16, 2013

Internet Explorer 10 spellchecker does not check words with upper case spelling.

I'd like to advise clients of my dictionary files that Internet Explorer 10 does not currently provide the ability to spellcheck words in upper case. That is, all words spelt using upper case will appear to be correct. The only current workaround I can currently think of for this is if you want to check the spelling of a word, first type the word in lower case and then retype the word in upper case.

Kelvin Eldridge
Online Connections
www.OnlineConnections.com.au
Call 0415 910 703 for computer support.
Servicing Templestowe, Doncaster, Eltham and the surrounding area.

Monday, September 9, 2013

The Neighbors TV show coming to Australia. Surely they could fix the spelling!

I recently saw the American comedy 'The Neighbors' advertised which is coming soon to an Australian TV channel. I don't recall which TV channel. What really concerned me was the spelling of 'Neighbors'.

Most people won't think this is a big deal, but to me this is irresponsible. The TV networks really should reconsider the spelling. If you think it doesn't make a difference I'll share this story from my high school years. The principal took the class and gave a spelling test. I had most of the words correct but missed a few. I then worked out the correct spelling but there was one word the teacher said I'd spelt incorrectly still. I couldn't work out which one.

The word was chaos which I spelt as kaos. Now having grown up with Maxwell Smart anyone will realise that Kaos was a word I'd see most days on TV. After a while it became part of my spelling without me realising. At least now I don't spell chaos incorrectly.

I can't help feel concerned for the younger generation who will now be presented regularly with the spelling 'neighbor'. I wish it wasn't so, but there is little I can do to influence the situation.
 
Actually there is something I can do which is to encourage people to watch the show direct from the USA. That way you can emphasise the spelling is because you're watching a show from the USA. I just tested the hola.org service which enabled me to watch the show on the computer. Connect your computer up to the TV and have some fun watching American shows complete with their variation of the English language. At least watching the show direct from the States may reinforce why there is a spelling difference.

Kelvin Eldridge
Online Connections
www.OnlineConnections.com.au
Call 0415 910 703 for computer support.
Servicing Templestowe, Doncaster, Eltham and the surrounding area.

Thursday, September 5, 2013

University of South Australia - Branding and Style Guide errors.

I came across the University of South Australia Branding and Style Guide and thought it may be useful to provide a link for others. The university recognises the importance of branding and style. What did surprise me was the number of small errors on the site which could mostly be picked up by the preferred Australian English dictionary files I provide.

The University of South Australia operates in a competitive tertiary education sector where reputation, name and image are valuable assets.... Read More

The following are the pages on the site and the issues I’ve identified.

http://w3.unisa.edu.au/styleguide/typography/default.asp - etc -> etc.
http://w3.unisa.edu.au/styleguide/photography/guidelines.asp - eg -> e.g., makeup -> make-up
http://w3.unisa.edu.au/styleguide/photography/external.asp - acknowledgment -> acknowledgement
http://w3.unisa.edu.au/styleguide/text/genadvice.asp - spell-checkers -> spellcheckers
http://w3.unisa.edu.au/styleguide/text/addressing.asp - eg -> e.g.
http://w3.unisa.edu.au/styleguide/text/capitalisation.asp - eg -> e.g.
http://w3.unisa.edu.au/styleguide/text/spelling.asp - spell checking -> spellchecking
http://w3.unisa.edu.au/styleguide/text/punctuation.asp - serveral -> several
http://w3.unisa.edu.au/styleguide/text/punctuation.asp - be.g.inning -> beginning
http://w3.unisa.edu.au/styleguide/text/webemail.asp - webpage -> web page
http://w3.unisa.edu.au/styleguide/text/web.asp - percent -> per cent
http://w3.unisa.edu.au/styleguide/text/documents.asp - Familyname -> Family name, Firstname -> First name, Thankyou -> Thank you, absolutey -> absolutely, webpage -> web page
http://w3.unisa.edu.au/styleguide/text/writingprofiles.asp - ie -> i.e.
http://w3.unisa.edu.au/styleguide/materials/default.asp - powerpoint -> PowerPoint
http://w3.unisa.edu.au/styleguide/materials/brochures.asp - eg -> e.g.
http://w3.unisa.edu.au/styleguide/materials/electronic.asp - eg -> e.g.


Apart from the issues mentioned, you may find the UniSA house style to be a useful guide. Perhaps the only guidance I may feel differently is the example with regards to ‘résumé and resume’. My own feeling is the use of accents for ‘resume’ would normally not be required because the context should provide sufficient clues so that they are not needed. Others may feel differently. I don’t claim to be an expert and continue to improve my own use of the preferred Australian English spelling.

- Kelvin Eldridge
www.OnlineConnections.com.au
Call 0415 910 703 for help with your computer problem.
Servicing Templestowe, Doncaster, Eltham and the surrounding area.

MyAnswers: How to easily remove password protection from a PDF document.

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Kelvin Eldridge
www.OnlineConnections.com.au/myanswers/
(An Online Connections service.)