5 ms·

Why It’s So Hard to Catch Your Own Typos

31 points by mikeleeorg 12y ago

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
visakanv 12y ago
Summary: Because you aren't reading it "cold", you're reading it with confirmation bias. You're reading it already knowing what the intent and purpose is, so your brain glosses over the details and fills in the blanks.
js2 12y ago
The last tip, seeing it in a different context definitely helps. Another thing you can try is reading in reverse. I find a context change helps when reviewing my code for bugs. I like to publish my commits to a web-based code-review (I use Gerrit, but it doesn't matter) even if I'm not adding a reviewer. Just looking at the diff in my terminal doesn't seem to be enough of a context change (perhaps because I use the same font/color scheme in my terminal and editor). Reading the diff in Gerrit, I often catch something I'd missed. (Embarrassingly, I've more than once caught a mistake after I've sent a patch to a mailing list.) I suppose I could just use gitx for the context change.
kazinator 12y ago
Why it's so hard to catch your own typos is that, being the amazing hacker that you are, you're too cool for word processors with spell (and grammar) checkers. You've tried the command line spell checkers, but they all irksomely need to be taught to ignore various tokens emanating from your markup language, requiring you to drag a custom dictionary from account to account, system to system, or else do it all over again. Plus all spell checkers of all kinds choke on the technical language you use, especially the acronyms and strange names: OSPF, ISDN, XML, Yacc, GCC, C++, ... All have to be painstakingly marked as valid, to be ignored (as long as you're on the same computer with the same dictionary for the same spell checking application). Spell checking technical writing is a pain in the butt, and so sometimes it doesn't get done.
rumblestrut 12y ago
I enabled the ability for my Mac to speak text to me. I highlight several paragraphs, use a keybinding to start it reading the text, and then follow along while it reads the words. It's amazingly helpful.
RyanMcGreal 12y ago
> Stafford says this evolved from the same mental mechanism that helped our ancestors’ brains make micro adjustments when they were throwing spears. I'm not going to lie: knowing this makes my hours spent daily in front of a keyboard feel just a little bit more badass.
roblambert 12y ago
My favorite proofreading tip is to have the computer read writing back to me. The computer won't skim over sections. It will explicitly read every word. Your ears will pick up things that your eyes won’t. Grammar issues such as messed-up tenses become super-obvious when you do this. Obviously this doesn't always help with misspellings and it rarely helps with punctuation. (FYI, on a Mac it is easy to setup a key command to read back selected text in System Preferences > Dictation & Speech > Text to Speech)
TrainedMonkey 12y ago
Same effect also works on "find differences" type of puzzles. Before you know where they are pictures look the same and you need to focus your attention on small part of the picture with few features. Once you know where differences are they immediately jump out to you. I suspect same cognitive information bias is part of the reason most people believe themselves to be more intelligent than average.
tjradcliffe 12y ago
While proofreading my novel (shameless plug: http://www.amazon.com/Darwins-Theorem-TJ-Radcliffe-ebook/dp/B00KBH5O8K/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1408040140&sr=8-1&keywords=darwin%27s+theorem http://www.amazon.com/Darwins-Theorem-TJ-Radcliffe-ebook/dp/...) I wrote a bit of Python to do the following: 1) break the original text file up into about 200 chunks of a few hundred words each (always breaking on paragraph boundaries) 2) randomize the chunks 3) display each chunk with the font faded to almost invisible in a UI with a "play" button that revealed one... word... at... a... time at an appropriate reading pace (more on which below.) I kept the original document open in an editor and made changes as I found them (there was also a "pause" button, obviously!) The application kept track of what chunks had already been proofed. The randomization of chunks helped ensure I never got caught up in the story, but the word-at-a-time reading was what really made it powerful. There were still a few typos that crept past (there always are) but only two or three have been found by readers. The important thing is maximizing the degree of surprise you have at discovering the next word. By tuning the reading rate appropriately I could digest one word and have a few tens of milliseconds pause before the next one showed up. This forced my attention to focus on what that word would be, and brought stylistic problems to the fore as well as simple typos. The process is not fast: there is a "speed of light" for proof-reading that seems to be about 10 pages per hour (which is about what professional proof-readers do) and I found I could only reasonably do a few hours per day, but that was still only a couple of weeks to proof a 140,000 word novel. This was also done after running the thing through various automated grammar checkers (LanguageTool was the most useful: https://www.languagetool.org/ https://www.languagetool.org/) which caught a lot of more mundane errors. I also had a decent editor and excellent feedback from first readers, which is indispensable, but much more of the process can be automated than is generally believed. It is a truism that authors can't proof their own work, but with the right attitude, reasonable tools and a modest amount of human backup it appears to be practical.
- daniel-levin 12y ago
  What did you do about proofreading bits of your manuscript that you couldn't break apart into randomised, individual units? How did you make sure all your punctuation and grammar was correct? For example, placing commas appropriately in a sentence that only a human can understand. Surely this is also part of the proofreading process?
throw_away 12y ago
What I don't understand is how there can be so many simple spelling errors (not the there/their kind, but rather the theer or hte kind) when it seems like more or less every browser on every platform has a spell checker running. Do people simply not see the red dotted lines? Or do they just not care?
- itsybitsycoder 12y ago
  Most spell checkers are missing a ton of words, especially abbreviations/short forms and technical terms. If you're writing a document where every line has a red underline somewhere under it, and a quick glance shows you that all (or nearly all) of those red underlines are wrong, ignoring them or disabling the spell check can seem like the easier solution.
  - throw_away 12y ago
    Most cases I see aren't exactly filled with technical terms.
- hfsktr 12y ago
  There are probably a ton of variables but I bet some people don't even realize that the red line means anything. Let's say literally everyone did know it though. Just having to right-click is enough to dissuade me. For people who have to look at a keyboard when they type, do they proofread what they typed? Typing in anger/annoyance and getting your text out there faster is the biggest reason I can think of for my own typing. I wonder also if being used to txt/chat abbreviations makes you ignore typos and move on more.
alok-g 12y ago
Some observations: 1. When proof-reading in print rather than on-screen, I catch three times more typos. Not fully sure why. 2. Giving gaps between writing and reading (even as small as 24 hours especially if you spend time doing something else in the middle) helps quite a bit, and not only with typos but also with the message itself.

31 points by mikeleeorg 12y ago

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

Summary: Because you aren't reading it "cold", you're reading it with confirmation bias. You're reading it already knowing what the intent and purpose is, so your brain glosses over the details and fills in the blanks.

js2 12y ago

The last tip, seeing it in a different context definitely helps. Another thing you can try is reading in reverse. I find a context change helps when reviewing my code for bugs. I like to publish my commits to a web-based code-review (I use Gerrit, but it doesn't matter) even if I'm not adding a reviewer. Just looking at the diff in my terminal doesn't seem to be enough of a context change (perhaps because I use the same font/color scheme in my terminal and editor). Reading the diff in Gerrit, I often catch something I'd missed. (Embarrassingly, I've more than once caught a mistake after I've sent a patch to a mailing list.) I suppose I could just use gitx for the context change.

kazinator 12y ago

Why it's so hard to catch your own typos is that, being the amazing hacker that you are, you're too cool for word processors with spell (and grammar) checkers. You've tried the command line spell checkers, but they all irksomely need to be taught to ignore various tokens emanating from your markup language, requiring you to drag a custom dictionary from account to account, system to system, or else do it all over again. Plus all spell checkers of all kinds choke on the technical language you use, especially the acronyms and strange names: OSPF, ISDN, XML, Yacc, GCC, C++, ... All have to be painstakingly marked as valid, to be ignored (as long as you're on the same computer with the same dictionary for the same spell checking application). Spell checking technical writing is a pain in the butt, and so sometimes it doesn't get done.

rumblestrut 12y ago

I enabled the ability for my Mac to speak text to me. I highlight several paragraphs, use a keybinding to start it reading the text, and then follow along while it reads the words. It's amazingly helpful.

RyanMcGreal 12y ago

> Stafford says this evolved from the same mental mechanism that helped our ancestors’ brains make micro adjustments when they were throwing spears. I'm not going to lie: knowing this makes my hours spent daily in front of a keyboard feel just a little bit more badass.

roblambert 12y ago

My favorite proofreading tip is to have the computer read writing back to me. The computer won't skim over sections. It will explicitly read every word. Your ears will pick up things that your eyes won’t. Grammar issues such as messed-up tenses become super-obvious when you do this. Obviously this doesn't always help with misspellings and it rarely helps with punctuation. (FYI, on a Mac it is easy to setup a key command to read back selected text in System Preferences > Dictation & Speech > Text to Speech)

TrainedMonkey 12y ago

Same effect also works on "find differences" type of puzzles. Before you know where they are pictures look the same and you need to focus your attention on small part of the picture with few features. Once you know where differences are they immediately jump out to you. I suspect same cognitive information bias is part of the reason most people believe themselves to be more intelligent than average.

tjradcliffe 12y ago

While proofreading my novel (shameless plug: http://www.amazon.com/Darwins-Theorem-TJ-Radcliffe-ebook/dp/B00KBH5O8K/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1408040140&sr=8-1&keywords=darwin%27s+theorem http://www.amazon.com/Darwins-Theorem-TJ-Radcliffe-ebook/dp/...) I wrote a bit of Python to do the following: 1) break the original text file up into about 200 chunks of a few hundred words each (always breaking on paragraph boundaries) 2) randomize the chunks 3) display each chunk with the font faded to almost invisible in a UI with a "play" button that revealed one... word... at... a... time at an appropriate reading pace (more on which below.) I kept the original document open in an editor and made changes as I found them (there was also a "pause" button, obviously!) The application kept track of what chunks had already been proofed. The randomization of chunks helped ensure I never got caught up in the story, but the word-at-a-time reading was what really made it powerful. There were still a few typos that crept past (there always are) but only two or three have been found by readers. The important thing is maximizing the degree of surprise you have at discovering the next word. By tuning the reading rate appropriately I could digest one word and have a few tens of milliseconds pause before the next one showed up. This forced my attention to focus on what that word would be, and brought stylistic problems to the fore as well as simple typos. The process is not fast: there is a "speed of light" for proof-reading that seems to be about 10 pages per hour (which is about what professional proof-readers do) and I found I could only reasonably do a few hours per day, but that was still only a couple of weeks to proof a 140,000 word novel. This was also done after running the thing through various automated grammar checkers (LanguageTool was the most useful: https://www.languagetool.org/ https://www.languagetool.org/) which caught a lot of more mundane errors. I also had a decent editor and excellent feedback from first readers, which is indispensable, but much more of the process can be automated than is generally believed. It is a truism that authors can't proof their own work, but with the right attitude, reasonable tools and a modest amount of human backup it appears to be practical.

daniel-levin 12y ago
What did you do about proofreading bits of your manuscript that you couldn't break apart into randomised, individual units? How did you make sure all your punctuation and grammar was correct? For example, placing commas appropriately in a sentence that only a human can understand. Surely this is also part of the proofreading process?

throw_away 12y ago

What I don't understand is how there can be so many simple spelling errors (not the there/their kind, but rather the theer or hte kind) when it seems like more or less every browser on every platform has a spell checker running. Do people simply not see the red dotted lines? Or do they just not care?

itsybitsycoder 12y ago
Most spell checkers are missing a ton of words, especially abbreviations/short forms and technical terms. If you're writing a document where every line has a red underline somewhere under it, and a quick glance shows you that all (or nearly all) of those red underlines are wrong, ignoring them or disabling the spell check can seem like the easier solution.
- throw_away 12y ago
  Most cases I see aren't exactly filled with technical terms.
hfsktr 12y ago
There are probably a ton of variables but I bet some people don't even realize that the red line means anything. Let's say literally everyone did know it though. Just having to right-click is enough to dissuade me. For people who have to look at a keyboard when they type, do they proofread what they typed? Typing in anger/annoyance and getting your text out there faster is the biggest reason I can think of for my own typing. I wonder also if being used to txt/chat abbreviations makes you ignore typos and move on more.

alok-g 12y ago

Some observations: 1. When proof-reading in print rather than on-screen, I catch three times more typos. Not fully sure why. 2. Giving gaps between writing and reading (even as small as 24 hours especially if you spend time doing something else in the middle) helps quite a bit, and not only with typos but also with the message itself.