Word.Tips.Net Welcome toWord.Tips.Net

Helpful Links

Tips.Net Home
WordTips Home

Ask a Word Question
Make a Comment

Tips.Net Store

WordTips FAQ
WordTips Premium

Learn Access Now
Free Printable Forms

Beauty Tips
Car Tips
Cleaning Tips
College Tips
Cooking Tips
Excel2007 Tips
ExcelTips
Family Tips
Gardening Tips
Health Tips
Home Tips
Legal Tips
Money Tips
Organizing Tips
Pest Tips
Pet Tips
Wedding Tips
Word2007 Tips
WordTips

Advertise on the
WordTips Site

Newest Tips

Arranging Document Windows

Specifying a Backup Location

Controlling Chart Gridlines

Merging Table Cells

Collapsing and Expanding Subdocuments

Zooming With the Keyboard

Initiating a New Search

 

Spelling Errors Resulting from Erroneous Spaces

Summary: Spelling errors can result from improperly ordering letters in a word, or from adding spaces where they shouldn't be. This tip examines how you can correct spelling errors when you add those extra spaces in the middle of words. (This tip works with Microsoft Word 97, Word 2000, Word 2002, Word 2003, and Word 2007.)

There are times when Sandy is typing and she mistakenly types a space in the middle of a word. For instance, she might type "qui ver", and Word's spelling checker will helpfully mark the incomplete words as wrong. This doesn't happen all the time, however. If Sandy types something like "t o" (when she meant to type "to"), Word doesn't catch this as a spelling error. Sandy wonders if there is a way she can configure spell check to catch this type of error.

The short answer is that you cannot; spell check doesn't consider single letters (such as "t" and "o") to be spelling errors. There is something you can try, however—AutoCorrect. If you analyze your typing and find that you often insert the extra space in two-letter words such as "to," then you can set up an AutoCorrect entry to replace "t o" with "to".

In creating an AutoCorrect entry of this type, you need to be careful of how you put the entries together. You should make sure that you always want to replace the sequence with something else. Of course, using the AutoCorrect entries for a while will disclose any potential replacement problems.

One you will particular want to watch out for is the letter "i" followed by another character. For instance, if you routinely mistype "in" as "i n" (with the space between the two letters), an AutoCorrect entry may seem in order. However, if you type "i n", as soon as you type the space then AutoCorrect capitalizes the "I" and when you type the "n" your new AutoCorrect entry will convert "I n" to "In". The upshot is you will never be able to have an AutoCorrected lowercase "in"; it will always end up as "In."

Tip #3822 applies to Microsoft Word versions: 97 | 2000 | 2002 | 2003 | 2007

Step Up and Take Control! Subscribers to WordTips know just how valuable a resource it is. WordTips Premium provides twice the number of exceptional, easy-to-understand tips every week in an ad-free newsletter, as well as substantial discounts on WordTips archives and e-books.
 
Check out WordTips Premium today!