How Does Editor Software Analyze Documents?

Editor reads a text composed in a word processor and compares every word and phrase against a database of problem terms.  The text must already be spell-checked; Editor will look for additional misspellings.  Editor's special database derives from extensive analyses of student and professional writing and from a long-term study of usage manuals, of specialized dictionaries and glossaries, and of academic and other professional handbooks of writing and editing.

Editor does not interface directly with any word processor and does not make changes to a writer's original document.  Unlike a word processor's built-in spelling or grammar checker, the program does not allow the writer to accept or reject a suggestion simply by clicking a mouse or pressing a key.  Instead, Editor asks for consideration and judgment of its comments, promoting informed copyediting and revision rather than hasty fixing up.

In addition to its diligent stylistic analysis, Editor has unique routines that check words in context for homonym mistakes, plural-possessive confusions, and frequently misused terms like effect and affect, than and then, loose and lose, and its and it's.  Other routines look for common errors in mechanics—in spacing, punctuating, and quoting; in the use of abbreviations, hyphens, dashes, parentheses, ellipses, and numbers; and in citations and references.  In matters of mechanics and style, Editor bases many of its judgments on the MLA Handbook and similar academic resources.

When Editor finds a writing problem in a text, it prints a message locating and identifying the problem.   (Click here to see what Editor's output looks like.)  Each problem category is linked to a reference screen that explains the problem and gives examples of correct and incorrect usage.  An onscreen Writer's Manual provides additional information and advice on writing as well as on using the program to improve a text.   (Files to make a printed version of the Writer's Manual, if desired, are included with the program.)  Taken together, the usage and mechanics reference screens and the Writer's Manual constitute an extensive library of writing problems and solutions.

An Editor feature suggested by a professional writer and editor helps writers find awkward or unnecessary repetitions of short phrases and longer passages in their work.

The program makes a plain-text draft of the document with sentences numbered for easy reference.  Printing a copy of this draft and marking it up based on Editor's comments and the writer's judgments is a good way to edit the document.  The writer decides which of Editor's suggestions to adopt, then transfers those decisions to the original text in the word processor.  The editing process can be carried out entirely on screen, if desired, but not from within a word processor.

Teachers have found that the editing-and-markup process promoted by Editor software teaches students sophisticated editing skills.  The software can be custom-tailored in a number of ways for individual and group uses.

Last revised Aug 1 2008