Lessons for Editbot - Additions to Dictionary, Technical terms, etc.

1. 54

   janderson99posted 7 years ago

   Use this thread to add suggestions for Editbot. Technical terms and alternate spellings:
   
   => Omelet and Omelette are accepted spellings (UK vs US
   => Tendinitis (also tendonitis), meaning inflammation of a tendon BOTH acceptable
   => TE/100 g is a scientific term for antioxidant concentration (not THE)
   => barbecue (US) vs barbeque (UK and Oz)  hence BBQ - editbot -please allow both.
   => up hill vs uphill - both acceptable
   => down hill vs downhill - both acceptable
   => race course vs racecourse - both acceptable
   => over do vs overdo - both acceptable
   => over inflate vs overinflate - both acceptable
   => the whole cake vs the hole cake (Editbot suggestion) - clearly an error!!
   => South East vs Southeast  - both acceptable

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   1. 94

      Jean Bakulaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      What is edibot? I just saw the symbol on one of my hubs. I went into edit mode, and it said I could see up to one correction, but there weren't any. I must have missed this new feature?

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      1. 54

         janderson99posted 7 years agoin reply to this

         see http://hubpages.com/forum/topic/133104

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         1. 94

            Jean Bakulaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

            Thank you .

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      2. 43

         bondaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         Hubpages, please disable 'edit bot' from all my hubs.  thank you.

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         1. 80

            texsheltersposted 7 years agoin reply to this

            They won't do it. I already ask and go the answer. PTxS

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   2. 94

      jansharesposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      I had "barbeque" in one of my hubs and it was chopped by the edit bot and changed to "barbecue." Chopped barbeque. lol, lol.

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   3. 0

      calculus-geometryposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      Editbot should stop putting hoity-toity accent marks on words like applique, saute, Pokemon, etc. since nobody Googles words with accent marks in English. Many professional publications in English omit them for commonplace words of foreign origin (usually French). As long as the author is consistent in his spelling, these words are correct sans accents.
      
      I concede that spelling them super-duper-correctly with the accent marks looks nice on the page when you skim, but it may kind of irritating to people when they are reading deeply.   Like reading an article about Pokémon's recipe for sautéed crème brûlée crêpes with crème fraîche.

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      1. 96

         Sue Adamsposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         But I like that. It would be a shame to lose all accents. They help retain correct pronunciation. In the above example, the average American would read
         
         "sauteed creme brulee crepes with creme fraiche." as:
         
         "souteed cream broolee creaps with cream fraeesh."   :-)

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         1. 94

            Margaret Schindelposted 7 years agoin reply to this

            +1

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   4. 82

      classicalgeekposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      rain water and rainwater

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      1. 43

         bondaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         The bot-tom line is to 'un-bot' the edit bot. Thank u.

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   5. 82

      lex123posted 7 years agoin reply to this

      An option should be there for the Editbot to go away after its work is over, (after we make the suggested corrections.)

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      1. 88

         DzyMsLizzyposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         + 10K to the 10th power!

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   6. 88

      DzyMsLizzyposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      And--I was just going through some hubs and reviewing the latest batch; 99% of which are on comments.
      There was a glaring misspelling that editbot failed to notice.
      Someone typed "whicked," (no such word)  when by context, they actually meant "wicked."
      But inconsistent little editbot made no attempt at any correction, even though 8 of the 9 comment errors were in that person's comment...

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   7. 73

      Matthew Meyerposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      Marina just posted an update related to EditBot here.
      http://hubpages.com/forum/post/2767050

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   8. 43

      bondaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      HUBPAGES, you have editbot on my hubs that have no mistakes.  please remove them.  so much has been said, but Hubpages still has no idea how writers feel, none at all.

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      1. 91

         Millionaire Tipsposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         Not all of the writer's are unhappy with the service. I am not unhappy with it. I appreciate that they are helping me make my hubs and the site the best they can be.

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      2. 92

         Kylyssaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         It's far too soon to judge the Editbot service. It needs to be tested out and tweaked to perfection. Give it at least a few months before bashing it. Meanwhile, you could help out by pointing out the specific flaws that bother you in one of the threads intended for that purpose using screen shots and concrete descriptions.

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2. 95

   FatFreddysCatposted 7 years ago

   I've got "editbot" symbols on three of my hubs thus far and in all three, it's corrected misspellings in comments left by others, not in the actual Hubs. So....what's the point of this again? (shrugs)

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   1. 94

      Jean Bakulaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      Hi Freddy,
      Same for me, the corrections are all in the comments by other people.

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      1. 96

         Glenn Stokposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         Freddy and Jean, good for you. It means you have no errors in your hubs. You both obviously were diligent with publishing a clean hub. But comments left by others can hurt your ranking with bad grammar and spelling errors. Google reacts negatively to errors no matter where they are. So thanks to the new editbot, errors in comments now get corrected so we no longer need to delete poorly written comments.

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         1. 94

            Jean Bakulaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

            Hi Glenn,
            I don't understand how to fix the errors in other people's comments. I went through all the hubs with the robot on them, and did find one word I kept spelling wrong. But how can I fix the comment area ones?

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            1. 92

               Jodahposted 7 years agoin reply to this

               You don't have to fix them Jean. Editbot has already done it. If you want to reverse the edit, you click on the tick next to the word.

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            2. 96

               Glenn Stokposted 7 years agoin reply to this

               Hi Jean, The editbot fixes the errors in comments for you. You simply have control over accepting the correction or changing it back to the way it originally was typed. If you don't agree with the change, just remove the checkmark.

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3. 54

   janderson99posted 7 years ago

   Another batch for the bot:
   saute vs sauté  - both accepatble
   cheese cloth vs cheesecloth - both accepatble
   offence (noun UK) vs offense (US) - both accepatble
   bath tub vs bathtub - both accepatble
   troop ship vs troopship -  both accepatble
   grand daughter ve granddaughter - both accepatble
   bath water vs bathwater - both accepatble
   pre-empt vs preempt - both accepatble
   longtail vs long-tail - both accepatble
   half way vs halfway - both accepatble

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   1. 86

      Richard-Hposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      Isn't it 'acceptable'?

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      1. 66

         makingamarkposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         You beat me to it Richard!

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      2. 88

         DzyMsLizzyposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         yes

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4. 92

   PurvisBobbi44posted 7 years ago

   My were corrections in the comments not counting one of mine which was a compound word and I made two words out of it. I should not blog when I am tired I suppose.
   
   This new tool is really nice for tired writers like me.
   
   Bobbi Purvis

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5. 60

   sunilkunnoth2012posted 7 years ago

   Interesting tips. On scrutiny, I could find that most of the corrections were made on the comments left by the readers. Anyhow, it is a good system to keep our articles neat and clean.

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   1. 92

      The Dirt Farmerposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      Yes, that happened w/one of my hubs. The spelling of a word in a comment was corrected. lol Now that's thorough!

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   2. 68

      Huntgoddessposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      Yes, most of the edits were in comments posted by readers.
      
      I am reversing them.
      
      I would never be so presumptuous or arrogant. Not to mention just plain rude.

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      1. 92

         Sherry Hewinsposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         If I made an error in a comment, and Editbot has corrected it, I would appreciate the correction. On my hubs, I am leaving minor grammar and spelling corrections in comments, as long as they don't change the meaning of the comment.

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6. 96

   Sue Adamsposted 7 years ago

   Add to dictionary:
   Pronunciation
   Pronounciation
   both correct

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   1. 66

      makingamarkposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      Really?  I think not.
      
      http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.p … ounciation

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      1. 96

         Sue Adamsposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         https://www.google.nl/search?q=pronunci … p;ie=UTF-8
         
         https://play.google.com/store/apps/deta … H9adPYuagB

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         1. 89

            Marisa Wrightposted 7 years agoin reply to this

            I have to disagree with you Sue, pronounciation is an incorrect variant.

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            1. 88

               DzyMsLizzyposted 7 years agoin reply to this

               +1

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   2. 93

      SheilaMilneposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      Pronouncation doesn't exist in the Cambridge English dictionary
      
      See also
      http://www.english-for-students.com/Pro … ation.html

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7. 91

   LongTimeMotherposted 7 years ago

   I have more than 30 hubs showing these little suckers, and I'm not enough of a control freak to bother checking them all.
   
   The two I did check had corrections in comments. Hardly worth the effort checking those.
   
   It will really annoy me if automatic changes have been made within my hub content, changing my Australian spelling to Americanisms ... but I may never know because there's no way I will waste time (and precious satellite download) opening 30 hubs to check.
   
   So ... I would like to request a different coloured (yes, coloured, not colored) bot to indicate if changes have been made within my content. Give me two bots if there's changes in both content and comments.
   
   Thanks.

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   1. 84

      stricktlydatingposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      It does change Australian to US, just like the spell checker does. I got picked up for my spelling of jewellery.

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      1. 92

         Jodahposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         I was surprised that it didn't change content in my "How to Talk Aussie" hubs which consist of mostly slang and colloquialisms. I have so many editbots there is no way I have time to check them all..as you said LTM with this stupid satellite Internet (bloody NBN)...we have the speed of a third world country now.

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8. 66

   makingamarkposted 7 years ago

   I'm still dismayed to that HubPages still cannot spell the correct French version for 'museum' - I'm still getting "Musée d'Orsay" in the live version even after the Editbot has been through!

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9. 66

   makingamarkposted 7 years ago

   Editbot needs to have a long hard think when it gets to capitalisation of words......
   
   ....because some of the capitalisation will be acronyms without periods between every letter - which is a completely conventional way of writing many words e.g. USA, UK etc.

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10. 91

    LongTimeMotherposted 7 years ago

    To give credit to the bot designers for something, I'm pleased to see it didn't try to make corrections to things like Bumageddon - or What Bumosaur Is That?
    
    lol.

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11. 66

    makingamarkposted 7 years ago

    My list of things that need sorting
    
    1) We need a way of saying we've checked a hub - otherwise we will be rechecking every single editbot change in future or completely ignoring it because it's not author oriented enough.
    i.e. we need to be able to sign off changes made by Editbot so a hub goes back goes back to having a clean sheet with no changes made - and then we can tell when there is new stuff to review.
    
    2) Why can't it work like the "Find" function in browsers so that you can arrow through to the next change rather than having to scroll slowly so you don't miss it
    
    3) I removed one comments and clicked editing done. This was not recognised in the published version. Editbot MUST meet the same standards for editing as every other edit done - i.e. it changes the live version.
    
    Conclusion: functionality was not tested on people with lots and lots and lots of hubs.

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12. 66

    makingamarkposted 7 years ago

    Classic!
    
    My response to a comment on one of my hubs. Blue is my perennial mistype and was corrected. The red - in the same sentence - was ignored!
    
    I've taken a look at the one you;re [you're] referencing and I thiunk it might be more appropriate for another lens I'm developing.
    
    So one for the database....
    
    "thiunk" should read "think"

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    1. 93

       SheilaMilneposted 7 years agoin reply to this

       I've found two similar instances.
       
       One picked up "text book" and said it should be "textbook" while missing a typo I'd made: "ramonce"
       
       Second example in comments, it insisted "home town" should be "hometown" (I beg to differ) but missed the next word "therfore".
       
       I'm wondering if it sees only one error per sentence.

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13. 91

    Millionaire Tipsposted 7 years ago

    I have reviewed my edits, and it seems that the bot does good work.    While it does seem strange to change other people's words without their knowledge/permission, I like to be able to fix pesky typos in the comments. Hopefully most are things the writer would have corrected if given the chance.
    
    Anyway, the words that were picked up were mostly common misspellings. It also picked up these words as incorrect.  I think this might be a battle between spell checkers. Are these two words or one? I think the bot wants all of them to be one word, but I am pretty sure that another spell checker might call them two words.
    dustpan
    tablecloth
    nighttime
    overanalyze (ha, this one has the red underline, but spellbot said it was one word!)
    
    Also a question.  "try and" was changed to "try to".  I know that is grammatically correct, but doesn't that help us with SEO since many people do say "try and"?  I thought the point was to put in words that people will type in the search engine, and if enough make this error, then it really isn't an error any more, is it? It is a choice to say something differently than the rule makers.

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    1. 66

       makingamarkposted 7 years agoin reply to this

       Excellent point re. last para!

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    2. 91

       Millionaire Tipsposted 7 years agoin reply to this

       Another error that has been pointed out in other forums is the use of the word a or an in front of words that don't start with vowels, but with words that sound like vowels, like "honest".  Right now, editbot is changing those to "a" when "an" is correct.

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    3. 91

       Millionaire Tipsposted 7 years agoin reply to this

       So, what is our plan now?  When Editbot changes a word to an alternative correct word, should we let it stay or revert back to the original?  I am particularly thinking of all the words I have that are two words but were changed to one word. The new word isn't incorrect, but  I'm pretty sure they are okay as two words, and I would have to research them all to make sure that I a right.  Microsoft Word doesn't have a problem with them.

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       1. 89

          Marisa Wrightposted 7 years agoin reply to this

          If the new word isn't incorrect, why go to the effort of changing it back?

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          1. 92

             Kylyssaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

             Writing is communication and some people prefer to use their own voices. If a writer's words are already grammatically correct, what's the point of altering his or her voice?
             
             I get that HubPages is trying for uniformity, but changing things that are grammatically correct just to try to make all the writers sound the same may alter the voices of some writers. I think it's important that HP remember that most people who write without money as their primary motivation do so to have their voices heard.
             
             Also, wouldn't it be better for the editbot to fix more things that are incorrect rather than changing things that are already correct? Plenty of the repairs to grammar editbot has made in comments on my hubs sit in sentences with worse errors left untouched in them.

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          2. 91

             Millionaire Tipsposted 7 years agoin reply to this

             That is why I am not sure.  But the answer to your question is that the old one wasn't incorrect either.

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14. 92

    Kylyssaposted 7 years ago

    It needs to recognize that "try and" is correct in the right context.
    
    
    

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15. 91

    lisavollrathposted 7 years ago

    Editbot is editing 3 year old comments on my hubs, which I think is a waste of energy.
    
    HP, as short for HubPages, was changed to hp, which is incorrect.

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16. 92

    Kylyssaposted 7 years ago

    Editbot needs to leave alone the names of websites in the link list feature.
    
    
    
    
    As you can see, the website's name has been changed by the editbot.

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17. 95

    FatFreddysCatposted 7 years ago

    OK, I'm tired of Mr. EditBot already. He's popped up on probably three quarters of my Hubs by now and in almost every case he's correcting typos in the comments left by others. I'm not even gonna bother looking at them anymore.

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    1. 95

       PegCole17posted 7 years agoin reply to this

       Ditto

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18. 93

    heidithorneposted 7 years ago

    Like for many of you, a sufficient amount of the EditBot corrections occur in the comments which is okay. But I don't want to have to get penalized by Mr. EditBot for some commenter's error.
    
    Here's my issue: I've agreed with some of the very minor corrections (1/hub on maybe a dozen or so hubs) and went in to make the corrections. Saved with Done Editing button and it STILL shows up as needing a correction. But then when I click the "show correction" button, it says there are no corrections AND it still shows up with Mr. EditBot (as we seem to lovingly call him) in my list of hubs. I did the Check for Violations to see if that would clear him out. Nope. Guessing this is a "work in progress" bug that will need to be addressed.

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    1. 0

       RTalloniposted 7 years agoin reply to this

       Yes for sure on the possibility of penalization due to commenters' errors.
       
       Hmmm…that deal with the "no corrections" must be what I ran into…will wait and watch as I expect the wrinkles will get ironed out.

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       1. 93

          heidithorneposted 7 years agoin reply to this

          RTalloni, I think I'll make my necessary corrections and, as you suggest, let's let HP get the wrinkles ironed out. This is a massive project for them for sure. Thanks for chiming in!

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19. 93

    heidithorneposted 7 years ago

    One more thing... what if the EditBot corrections are completely incorrect? How do we post a request for review? I'm hoping those procedures will be forthcoming in an email update from HP. A couple of the corrections are quite amusing. Example: I said "one self publishing platform" and it corrected to "oneself publishing platform."
    
    Also, if I would like to correct errors in comments I've made on my hubs, how do I do that? Again, waiting for some instructions from our friends at HP.
    
    Gonna be a fun week for HP! I'm sure their Help email inbox is overflowing already.

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    1. 93

       SheilaMilneposted 7 years agoin reply to this

       All you have to do is remove the tick from the box and it will go back to the original.  It will stay highlighted for you but readers will not see the highlight.

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20. 94

    Kristen Howeposted 7 years ago

    Heidi, I can so relate. In one of my hubs, (I forgot which one), I've noticed the bot changed hone in to home in. I quite disagree with that I think. lol

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21. 54

    janderson99posted 7 years ago

    More suggestions for Editbot
    
    byproduct vs by-product - both OK
    entree vs entrée - both OK
    long tail, longtail and long-tail are all OK bot wants all changed to long-tail - this is silly
    
    meal time and mealtime both OK
    
    "Hone in" began as an alteration of home in, and while some people regard it as an error. It is a very common, though, especially in the U.S. and Canada. 
    Please add to the dictionary.

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    1. 94

       Jean Bakulaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

       Most of my corrections were hyphenated words too. Also, I fixed all the errors last night, and have a lot more today. I think this is a waste of time, since we all have spell check. I would rather have a feature that does not allow plagiarism, and doesn't let people copy and paste our work. I've seen it on other sites, and it would be a more reasonable change.
       
       This seems like another desperate attempt to appease Google which won't help anything. Also, the robots don't go away, much like the red "C's" I find really annoying on my stolen articles when I've had them taken down. The robots should come down once we have reviewed the hub, because if there were too many corrections in one, we will have to keep wasting more time to go back to each hub.

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       1. 89

          Marisa Wrightposted 7 years agoin reply to this

          Jean, you don't need to fix anything - if the editbot has changed it, you just leave the box ticked and the bot's version is what readers will see on the Hub.   If you don't like the change, just untick the box and it goes back to your original version.
          
          Unfortunately you're right, the editbot icon is like the red copy icon - it doesn't go away even after you've looked at and attended to the warning.  However on an existing Hub, new mistakes aren't going to pop up, so if you know you've checked them all, then you don't have to go back and look again.

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          1. 66

             makingamarkposted 7 years agoin reply to this

             Well that rather depends on whether you update your hub on a regular basis - as some of us do - because of the nature of the topic.
             
             If Hubpages had predicated its approach to Editbot on the basis that all hubs are produced on a task and finish basis it's in for a big surprise

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          2. 94

             Jean Bakulaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

             Hello Marisa,
             I know I don't have to do anything unless I want to change it back to what I originally wrote. But after I fixed a lot of hubs, more robots kept coming. There's no way to recall if I checked each one. I'm moving some articles I wrote on other sites to here, so it's really bad timing. Most of the spelling issues are in the comments area. I try to proofread a hub twice before I publish. Then I read it once more the next day, because once your eyes see a mistake, they often don't notice it after the first reading.
             
             It will be OK (sigh), as you say, most of the hubs are older anyway and I have already checked them. Adding new ones is a slow process. Take care, nice to "see" you.

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22. 60

    biggirloaklandposted 7 years ago

    Maybe have the bot ignore everything between quote marks.  It's changing the Spanish word "te" to "the."

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    1. 54

       janderson99posted 7 years agoin reply to this

       TE is also an abbreviation  for Trolox equivalent - used to measure antioxidant strength. Also converted to THE (all caps) !!!

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       1. 94

          Jean Bakulaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

          I am also finding "corrections" from spellings that are not wrong, mostly hyphenated things, but some British spellings I adopted without realizing it since I've been writing here. I still think once we have corrected the hub, the robots have to go. We can't keep returning to the same hubs over and over again. I'm sure that will fall on deaf ears, but I see others agree. Nobody seems to think these changes through enough before they are thrust upon us. I see no reason why I have to correct com- mentors who are bad spellers. Many are texting from small phones and such, and are just typos. They have nothing to do with the quality of our work.

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23. 95

    Ramkitten2000posted 7 years ago

    Editbot should leave proper nouns alone. I found a number of edits that were incorrect, many of them having to do with names of people and places and other proper nouns. I found quite a few other Editbot errors as well.

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24. 54

    janderson99posted 7 years ago

    Editbot wants to change German and other names of authors which are the sources for images. This issue need to be addressed otherwise the attribution will be incorrect.

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    1. 89

       NateB11posted 7 years agoin reply to this

       Yes, I ran into this problem too; it changed the name of an image source, which, of course, can't be changed if you want it to be accurate. Also tends to add "to" after the word "try", sometimes accurately, sometimes not.

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25. 54

    janderson99posted 7 years ago

    Editbot should stop changing all instances of "try and" to  "try to". While this is better grammar there are many instances where 'try' is followed by 'and' which are quite sensible
    e.g.
    try and try again
    there are many flavors to try and enjoy in the ice-cream shop
    etc.

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    1. 66

       makingamarkposted 7 years agoin reply to this

       Agreed - I think this is one correction which can go.
       
       I think I'm going to start unticking mine!   People can join in if they like....

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    2. 77

       WriteAngledposted 7 years agoin reply to this

       Furthermore, the Oxford English Dictionary cites the form "try and" as an acceptable, if colloquial, alternative to "try to".

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       1. 66

          makingamarkposted 7 years agoin reply to this

          and as we know the Oxford English Dictionary is the complete authority on all things related to the English language!

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       2. 54

          janderson99posted 7 years agoin reply to this

          I had to drop 2 comments by Paul E for 'try and' s

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    3. 89

       NateB11posted 7 years agoin reply to this

       Yes, that's what I mean. Sometimes "and" after "try" is correct.

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       1. 88

          DzyMsLizzyposted 7 years agoin reply to this

          I had some of those corrections as well, but sometimes, technically correct or not, 'try and' just flows better with poems.  So on those, I denied the correction.

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26. 66

    makingamarkposted 7 years ago

    "a European artist" NOT "a european artist"
    
    Europe is a proper name.

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    1. 67

       justholidaysposted 7 years agoin reply to this

       EditBot is probably an amateur of Roman languages (european artist --> in our area european has become an adjective in this case).
       
       

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       1. 66

          makingamarkposted 7 years agoin reply to this

          Yes - but if HubPages wants to be taken seriously as an international website then it better apply itself to International English
          
          I think you'll find British English is used by way more people than American English and forms the basis of most International English.

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27. 91

    LongTimeMotherposted 7 years ago

    And today I have 50 hubs with bots showing. Silly me. It seems I write hubs that attract comments ... which is clearly not a good thing for anyone wishing to avoid the annoyance of being 'forced' to check 50 hubs.
    
    Maybe I'll just turn off the comments on all my hubs. It is the only way I can think of to tell which hubs might have words changed within my actual text.  Seems ridiculous to have to do that though!!

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    1. 92

       Jodahposted 7 years agoin reply to this

       I know the feeling LTM, there is no way I can check all mine. i just selected some randomly. Only one I checked had a word altered within the hub, all the rest were in comments. Of course I have only checked about 20 out of almost 100.

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       1. 91

          LongTimeMotherposted 7 years agoin reply to this

          I think I'll wait a few more days and see if ALL my hubs end up with bots on them before deciding what to do, Jodah. Not happy though.

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28. 66

    makingamarkposted 7 years ago

    I'm just wondering whether HubPages is going to find that one of the unplanned side effects of Editbot is that a lot of people turn off their comments so they can stop being bothered by an irritating little tike of a bot which will insist on correcting comments by other people - real people who make typos and can't correct them due to a system which only allows them one go at getting it right!
    
    So that would equal less content on HubPages.......
    
    How is that a "win" for us all?

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29. 83

    psycheskinnerposted 7 years ago

    I revert all changes in comments as I would object to someone making any changes to something I wrote on a site. But it will get very difficult to keep track with no method to marked a botted hub as checked.

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30. 89

    NateB11posted 7 years ago

    My observation is that most of the corrections made by editbot were legitimate; especially in the comments; for some reason many people don't use apostrophes for their contractions, editbot caught a lot of those. One of the corrections it made that I'm okay with either way, is combining two words into one; for instance, care provider turns into careprovider. My understanding is that both versions are acceptable.
    
    It's my feeling that editbot will have a good effect on the site as a whole; seems like it will clean up some of the worst offenders of the English language.

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       DzyMsLizzyposted 7 years agoin reply to this

       I wonder if, conversely, it will catch people who think an apostrophe creates a plural form; "There were 3 pear's on the table." instead of "pears."

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          NateB11posted 7 years agoin reply to this

          I think maybe that could happen.

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31. 83

    psycheskinnerposted 7 years ago

    If you let people comment, IMHO you take the comments as written. I will no longer be commenting on hubs due to the potential for an incorrect edit leaving "me" saying something I never said. Examples in this thread show how something can be taken for a typo when it is actually a reference to a website or brand with a creative spelling.

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    1. 0

       calculus-geometryposted 7 years agoin reply to this

       I'm coming to the same conclusion.  Although most of the comment edits were fine, I did find one that was incorrect and changed the meaning of the commenter's original correct sentence.  I too would rather not comment at all than have my words even slightly mangled.  Editbot is not cut out to proofread technical content.

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32. 54

    janderson99posted 7 years ago

    licence changed to license
    
    In American English, license is both a noun and a verb, and licence isn't used. For example, one who is licensed to drive has a driver's license. In all the other main varieties of English, licence is the noun, and license is the verb. Editbot please licence this for the rest of the world.
    
    PS: Looks like Editbot has run out of Bandaids. I have edited all me little loverlies  - so no more gems from me until the next time, au révÖir !

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33. 81

    Greekgeekposted 7 years ago

    While I find some of the corrections annoying, and "try and --> try to" has got to go for reasons many have said, I offer two thoughts.
    
    1) Several people have mentioned Editbot being a penalty. Is it really applying any kind of penalty? Or is it just a bot which goes through all our hubs with an automated spellchecker, leaving us with veto power?
    
    It seems to me that the hope is it will correct the bulk of spelling errors across hubpages.com, raising the domain's quality rating overall in Google's eyes, and then Hubbers can go through and fix those few places where Editbot is mistaken, thus providing an extra round of deliberate, active quality control.
    
    2) Some people are asking whether we ought to retain common mistakes and colloquialisms to mimic what people literally type into Google. However, Google search does not operate literally. It guesses what people "really mean" and provides it.  It's been at least a decade since targeting bad grammar and misspellings was a viable SEO technique.
    
    On the other hand, Panda and its ilk are hunting for universal indicators that content is edited, curated, and passed through some kind of quality control. Googlebot cannot easily assess the accuracy of content, so it looks for shortcuts to judge competence. Just like university admissions officers trying to sift through piles of applicants, it may take into account good grammar and correct spelling as a shortcut in deciding which pages to rank up or down.
    
    Whether American Google looks for American spellings, while UK Google privileges British spellings, I have no idea. That sounds to me like one of those nitpicky factors that's adjusted as Google refines its algorithm, so probably not worth worrying about.

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       Glenn Stokposted 7 years agoin reply to this

       Very well said. I agree with each point you made. As for the last point, I actually read in one of Google's blogs a while back that they rank American spelling higher for search done in America and British spelling higher for search done from the U.K.  It's called geo-location ranking, and it makes sense.

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    2. 89

       NateB11posted 7 years agoin reply to this

       Yes, pretty much what I was thinking, particularly about improving overall quality of the site.

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       1. 94

          Jean Bakulaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

          I don't think it's a bad thing. I just wish the robots would go away once we have made a change or decided not to make one on a specific hub. Between robots and red C's for copied hubs, it's getting harder to just glance at our account pages and see if we have blue or red arrows on our hubs. That's the whole point of writing here, except for those of us who mostly are here because we love to write.

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34. 88

    DzyMsLizzyposted 7 years ago

    Along these same lines, some consistency must be had!!!
    
    I had 'editbot' "correct"  the word "decor" to "décor" in two separate places with the same text capsule.
    
    Yet, when "corrected" to editbot standards, the spell-checker within the text capsule marks it with a red underline as being incorrect!!
    
    [i]MAKE UP YOUR MINDS, PLEASE!![/i
    
    Edit Update:
    
    Two other 'autocorrect' errors that have either/or acceptable uses:
    
    back story vs. backstory
    air fare vs. airfare
    
    Both are correct/acceptable, yet both were marked as errors.  The former for being used as a single, compound word, the latter for being used as two words.

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    1. 88

       DzyMsLizzyposted 7 years agoin reply to this

       Here's another inconsistency error, which the forum-bot would not let me add to the updates, because I made the post 'over 4 hours ago.'  (And which I do not understand, as usually, once the time has passed to edit a forum post, the 'edit' link no longer appears, but it was still there...a glitch?)
       
       I have had a number of date references flagged for use of apostrophes:  "1960's" vs. "1960s." 
       The edit bot wants to see the latter; the spell-checker flags that as incorrect, and wants the apostrophe!!!! 
       
       It also flagged "lower case," and wants it all as one word, when either is correct. 
       Further, it failed to catch a typo with an extra "f" in the word "different."
       
       What's it going to be, folks??  Perhaps the bugs should be worked out prior to release of new features.

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       1. 89

          Marisa Wrightposted 7 years agoin reply to this

          I had exactly the same thing with my 1960's being corrected by Editbot to 1960s, which another spell checker considers is wrong!

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          1. 88

             DzyMsLizzyposted 7 years agoin reply to this

             Right, Marisa--and in this case, the spell-checker to which I refer is HP's own spell-checker within the hub  capsules!!!!
             (MS Word, where I normally write my originals, doesn't care either way.)

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          2. 94

             Jean Bakulaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

             I have years changed from 1960's to 1960s as well

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35. 77

    WriteAngledposted 7 years ago

    Europe is a proper noun and thus European, which is derived from it, is a proper adjective.
    Both proper nouns and proper adjectives must start with a capital letter.
    
    The only potential exception to this, although not accepted as an exception by everyone, is if the proper adjective has taken on a specialised meaning. Curiously though, while the term french fries appears to be widely accepted with the adjective starting with a lower case letter, majority usage still prefers the use of a capital letter in Brussels sprouts.

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    1. 67

       justholidaysposted 7 years agoin reply to this

       I was referring to the French writing in this case. In French and all other Roman languages we do NOT write capital letters except for proper nouns and when one begins a new sentence. That is why I said the EditBot must be a Roman language lover.
       
       Also for Brussels sprouts the capital letter remains because it is a proper noun, not an adjective. They should read: sprouts of/from Brussels (the town) - in French: choux de Bruxelles - even though they do not originate from this town.
       
       As for French fries, I think I always write with the cap letter even though they are in reality Belgian, hehe

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       1. 77

          WriteAngledposted 7 years agoin reply to this

          OK then. However, in this context Brussels is being used adjectivally in English. There is a formal adjective, Brusselian, analogous to Parisian for example, but unlike the latter it does not seem to have found much popularity.

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       2. 66

          makingamarkposted 7 years agoin reply to this

          Since when did Europe stop being a proper noun?

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          1. 67

             justholidaysposted 7 years agoin reply to this

             Since the EditBot's birth?
             
             Agreeing with your previous comment as well Katherine. I'd say that I've seen American English a lot on the Internet, most are average commercial sites oriented towards American customers. But if you browse Belgian sites (governement, commercial, etc.) you'll find out that, when they have English pages, they use British English only. Same applies to French, Tunisian sites and so on...
             
             

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36. 96

    Sue Adamsposted 7 years ago

    On the upside, EditBot teaches us a lot.

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    1. 60

       sunilkunnoth2012posted 7 years agoin reply to this

       Sure, you are right. It does teach a lot.

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       1. 77

          WriteAngledposted 7 years agoin reply to this

          It has nothing to teach me. I suppose I am lucky because I belong to the generation for whom correct grammar and spelling was mandatory from the age of five, when we started school. The current level of illiteracy, even among people who have by some miracle been awarded university degrees, is truly frightening.
          
          Maybe I should add that as the child of immigrants from Poland, who ended up in the UK with the Free Polish Army in WW2, I started school not speaking a word of English because my parents only spoke Polish at home. I had nobody at school trying to "integrate" me, but had to sink or swim on my own. I was one of the first in the class to learn to read and write. Perhaps there is something to be said for challenging children rather than making everything easy for them!

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          1. 88

             DzyMsLizzyposted 7 years agoin reply to this

             Agreed!  This 'dumbing-down' to make it easy for any illiterate dolt to obtain a college degree is astounding in its short-sighted stupidity.

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    2. 54

       janderson99posted 7 years agoin reply to this

       On the downside it patches things that don't need to be fixed, by imposing unnecessary alternatives such as many compound words and US/British spellings.

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37. 92

    Sherry Hewinsposted 7 years ago

    The vast majority of corrections are in my comments. The few that are in my hubs, I have no argument with.

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    1. 43

       bondaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

       Newspapers and magazines used to have 'style books.'  i don't know if they still exist.  The Guardian could have a different style from, let's say, the New York Post.  Style books guided reporters on how to write stories, and to understand why editors changed a few things.  What HP is doing to us is dictatorship because no style or English is supreme.  Leave our hubs alone.

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       1. 54

          janderson99posted 7 years agoin reply to this

          Hubpages has a style guide
          
          http://hubpages.com/learningcenter/HubP … iting-Tips
          
          which will be compulsorily applied via Hubpro Basic (Ugh)
          
          Changes will be imposed "that reflect the HubPages Style Guide, e.g., providing a consistent style, free of broken videos, pixelated photos, and excessive bolding and italics"
          
          see
          http://blog.hubpages.com/2015/08/19/int … y-updates/

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          1. 66

             makingamarkposted 7 years agoin reply to this

             It's always struck me that style guide was written by somebody rather more used to editing print publications than online text.
             
             Print and web reading have completely different requirements to facilitate an easy read.

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38. 66

    makingamarkposted 7 years ago

    I've now had to correct two "corrections" which fouled up on proper names in foreign languages - the latest being Maori. (It decided 'Te" should really be spelt 'The')
    
    The HubPages Editbot must NOT undermine the credibility of Hubs by changing proper names in other languages. That just
    * makes content look amateurish
    * undermines the credibility of the author
    * provides some considerable incentive to move content to sites which do not edit the author!
    
    I suggest that HubPages needs to devise a tool so we can indicate when something is a proper name and the EditBot needs to be revised so that it does not correct words which are identified as proper names.

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39. 54

    janderson99posted 7 years ago

    Here's a Classic
    
    The Subtopic Title is
    
    Omelets and Egg Dishes
    
    Yet Editbot changes Omelets to Omelettes AND Omelet to Omelette

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    1. 89

       Marisa Wrightposted 7 years agoin reply to this

       I understand your concerns about Editbot making edits that change meanings, but honestly why are you upset about alternative spellings?  The Editbot has changed the word from one correct version to another correct version, what's the big deal?
       
         If the Editbot changes omelet to omelette, it makes no difference to the sense of your Hub - and it means the word "omelette" is spelled consistently across all Hubs. Which in this case is a particularly good thing, because in British English, "omelet" is a spelling mistake.

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       1. 54

          janderson99posted 7 years agoin reply to this

          Most of the changes on my hubs are unnecessary and a complete waste of time. Omelet and omelette are both OK, and so why impose the changes. I am sure Google could not care less. So why force useless changes. The topic is Omelet and all the articles are changed to Omelette - WOW makes a lot of sense!!! What upsets me is all the changes are forced upon us, which I have to individually review and accept or reject, and the Bandaids don't go away when you review them - so it is a nightmare to manage. Not the way it should be done. IMO. Enough from me - all my input a total waste of time. Bye.

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          1. 89

             Marisa Wrightposted 7 years agoin reply to this

             I know that's your view, but concentrating on alternative spellings is not the way to prove it's flawed, since they matter so little.  All the examples of trivial changes is cluttering up this thread and taking the attention away from the issues that DO matter.  It gives HubPages the excuse to say Hubbers are making a fuss about nothing.

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             1. 91

                LongTimeMotherposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                Hmm. Hang on, Marisa. You're overlooking the fact janderson99 is the original poster ... and the first post says, "Use this thread to add suggestions for Editbot. Technical terms and alternate spellings"
                
                So concentrating on alternative spellings is not 'cluttering up this thread'.
                
                There's plenty of other threads about other issues ... but this seems the perfect place to make suggestions about little things that might make the bot slightly less annoying.
                
                Maybe you have the threads confused.

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                1. 89

                   Marisa Wrightposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                   No I don't - I thought it was silly to include alternative spellings right from the beginning of the thread, because it diverts attention from errors that ARE important. 
                   
                   And BTW I just can't bring myself to use the word "alternate" in that context, guess I'm just old-fashioned!
                   http://www.dailywritingtips.com/alterna … ternative/

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                   1. 91

                      LongTimeMotherposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                      lol. I rarely use it, but I'm aware many do - even in our part of the world.
                      
                      I actually like this thread, and hope hp pays attention to it. If they'd stop changing perfectly acceptable alternative spelling, many of the bots would vanish from my stats page. To me, that's important.
                      
                      ______
                      
                      North American
                      another term for alternative.
                      "a novel set in an alternate universe"
                      
                      synonyms: alternative, other, another, second, different, possible, substitute, replacement, deputy, relief, proxy, surrogate, cover, fill-in, stand-in, standby, emergency, reserve, backup, auxiliary, fallback;

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                      1. 88

                         DzyMsLizzyposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                         Good job, LTM!
                           And in other contexts (stage and retail, e.g.):  understudy; secondary; relief; adjunct; 

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40. 80

    texsheltersposted 7 years ago

    It is "Tao Te Ching" not "Tao 'the' Ching" which sounds like a racial epithet. PTxS

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    1. 66

       makingamarkposted 7 years agoin reply to this

       I've had to correct numerous 'te' which has been converted to "the"
       
       Talk about undermining content integrity and making it look like it was written by an ignoramus!
       
       Personally I think there should be a total ban on 'te' being converted to "the"

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    2. 0

       calculus-geometryposted 7 years agoin reply to this

       That's hilarious!  I also had an incorrect "te" correction, though not as funny. A word ending in "te" was in bold except for the "te" part (my formatting error) and editbot changed it to end in "the" making "Rate" into "Rathe."

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    3. 89

       NateB11posted 7 years agoin reply to this

       Lol. That is a major error. Definitely need to get rid of the -te- to -the- thing.

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       1. 54

          janderson99posted 7 years agoin reply to this

          TE is a well known abbreviation for  Trolox Equivalent which is a measure the the strength of antioxidants. Strangely Editbot converted all  TE to THE (??).
          =>>>  I converted all instances of TE in my hubs to Trolox Equivalent .
          
          Incidentally you can use Google to find all instances in your hubs to make corrections.
          enter this search term -> example to search for 'TE'
          site:[your subsomain URL] TE
          
          you get a nice list of results which you can go through one at a time. Chrome has a nice search facility for finding TE (and other terms) within the hub itself, and Editbot will highlight them.
          
          PS Use quotes to avoid Google using Alternate Spellings. For example "barebeque"
          
          Some search for my pet peeves show some interesting trends
          
          Omelet  639 which Editbot hates and corrects
          Omelette 823
          
          New York Times has
          49 recipes for “omelet”
          1 recipe for “omelette”
          
          Barbeque 1,110  which Editbot hates and corrects
          Barbecue 3,540
          
          PS I am not holding my breath hoping for changes in Editbot dictionary any time SOON. There has been a deafening silence from HP about this!!!!!

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          1. 0

             calculus-geometryposted 7 years agoin reply to this

             For what it's worth, "barbeque" is incorrect, it's just a persistent misspelling that some dictionaries say is an alternative spelling.  It is not in the OED.

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             1. 54

                janderson99posted 7 years agoin reply to this

                Aussies like me love their barbeques, which we buy from Barbeques Galore - BBQ Better - Australia's leading retailer. Where do you think the abbreviation BBQ comes from? Perhaps it should be BBC - whoops that abbreviation is already taken. OED =>> (also barbeque)  Cheers
                
                PS Barbeques Galore is a US chain of retail stores specializing in barbecue grills, accessories and consumables (20 stores in US)

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                1. 0

                   calculus-geometryposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                   The abbr. BBQ is phonetic, like "EZ" for easy.  Just because there are donuts called "krispy kremes"  doesn't mean "krispy" and "kreme" are correct alternative spellings.  Editbot is right to change your  spelling to barbecue so you should let it go.  There are bona fide problems with editbot, but your insistence that certain spelling variations are correct is not among them.  And "omelet" really should be "omelette."

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                   1. 54

                      janderson99posted 7 years agoin reply to this

                      I won't go on and on. The key point for me is that there are genuine alternative spellings that everyone uses throughout the world. Google autosuggest includes both and so the big G is OK with them. BOTH spellings are OK, and so leave them alone (allow both - why not?). Currently thousands of people who choose to use Omelet or barbeque have their hubs altered to the other spellings. All these poor people have to go through their hubs and manually click back to the other alternative one a a time all for nothing, for no useful purpose. Sooooo unnecessary.  This is 'thought police' on steroids gone crazy with a bot. Cheers, I'm going fishing, now the wind has dropped.
                      
                      

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          DzyMsLizzyposted 7 years agoin reply to this

          I did find an instance in a comment of 'te' correctly changed to "the."  I also found a "the" correctly changed to "they."
          
          HOWever, it totally missed  "sais" that should have been "said."
          
          Inconsistent, it is.  (To use Yoda's style of speaking.)

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41. 94

    Margaret Schindelposted 7 years ago

    If the purpose of Editbot is to please Google, then serious consideration should be given to replacing accented letters with non-accented letters rather than vice versa. While I agree that the accents are correct and I use them in print, they are not optimal in digital content for a number of reasons. More importantly, they also are bad for SEO. As one example, I tried googling both "decor" and "décor" and found that the former yielded "About 427,000,000 results" while the latter yielded only "About 141,000,000 results" - a significant difference.

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42. 84

    Sam Montanaposted 7 years ago

    Edit Bot has pointed some very minor spelling problems in a couple of my articles which is fine, but how can I fix spelling errors when Edit Bot finds them in comments?

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    1. 89

       Marisa Wrightposted 7 years agoin reply to this

       Sam, if you look, Editbot has ALREADY corrected them.  If you're happy with the correction, you leave the box ticked.  If you want to reject the correction, untick it.

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       1. 84

          Sam Montanaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

          Okay, so when does the edit bot symbol go away?

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          1. 73

             Matthew Meyerposted 7 years agoin reply to this

             You can view the official announcement thread here.
             http://hubpages.com/forum/topic/133104

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             1. 92

                Sherry Hewinsposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                Does that thread answer the question "when does the symbol go away?" If it does, the answer is not easy to find. I am actually fine with all of the changes edit bot has made, but will the symbol eventually go away?

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                1. 73

                   Matthew Meyerposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                   Marina responded to several questions, including plans to add features to remove the icon.
                   http://hubpages.com/forum/post/2765701
                   http://hubpages.com/forum/post/2765702
                   
                   Here is that specific response.
                   http://hubpages.com/forum/post/2765699

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                   1. 92

                      Sherry Hewinsposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                      Sorry to be a pain in the behind, but that wasn't really helpful. Can't you just answer yes or no? Can't you just say that after so many days or weeks, if we accept the changes the symbol will go away (or not)?

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                      1. 96

                         Glenn Stokposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                         Yes, after the next update to the editbot.
                         
                         See the latest news: http://hubpages.com/forum/topic/133237

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                         1. 92

                            Sherry Hewinsposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                            Thanks Glenn Stok - I just discovered that thread, and came back to post it here in case anyone else missed it. That is good news indeed.

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43. 97

    Thomas Swanposted 7 years ago

    So I went through the editbot changes to my hubs. Most changes were good, some bad, some terrible.
    
    BAD:
    1. Putting an umlaut over the "i" in the word "naive" is unnecessary.
    2. It changed the last name of "Georg Wilhelm Steller" to "Stellar". Please teach editbot to not screw up names!
    3.  I used a technical term in a hub. The technical term is "affect infusion". This was wrongly changed to "effect infusion". It's "affect" because it's referring to emotions.
    
    TERRIBLE:
    1. The bot completely ruined my "20 Words That Dont Exist (or Shouldn't)" hub. Quite naturally, it changed my examples of "Irregardless", "Expresso", and  "alot", to the correct words. However, the point of the article is to show people what the wrong versions of these words are!

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