BF.C, I offer my services...

[MikeyD]

I worked in a typehouse (back where there still were typehouses) for more than two decades. Proofreading's a real job, and a real demanding job. And a job for which I am entirely unqualified. You can read a single line ten times over an on the eleventh passs that extra 's' at the end of the word is suddenly there! D'oh! And if its also your job to correct the grammar as you go along - you might prefer to take the easy way out and hang yourself! :eek:

[thewood]

I work in a job where i write articles that are published all over the place. I have an editor and a proofreader assigned to me. Go back and look at some of my posts for errors. And that is with me trying very hard. I've had one article go out without editing. My wife read it and declared I should be beaten senseless with a dictionary.

[c3k]

Ah, the sound reasoning of seasoned profesionals. So, it would seem that even professional writers, which I am most obviously not, have need of someone to double check their work. In this day of "self correcting" word programs it seems even more likely that the wrong word, not just a mistakenly spelled or used word, may get through.

So, since the many posters here have successfully concluded that the only qualifications I bring to the job of checking BF.C's printed manuals would be my ability to read and write English (to a debatable degree) and my willingness to lend a helping hand whilst foregoing any recompense, are there any PROFESSIONAL proofreaders willing to volunteer?

Thanks,

Ken

[thewood]

My wife actually proofreads a lot of my stuff. She would gouge her eyes out with rusty nails before reading a CM manual, no offense intended.

[ElectricWraith]

Originally posted by c3k:

Tsk, tsk, tsk. Are we really about to compare forum posts to a published book? If so, LET LOOSE THE DOGS OF WAR!! However, I don't think ANYONE - least of all me - would want a roving forum editor to swoop into ongoing threads to add the errant apostrophe or correct a misused synonym.

Thanks,

Ken

If we're going to quote the Bard, let's not mangle one of his finer lines, shall we?

The proper quote is "Cry 'Havoc', and let slip the dogs of war!"

I believe you were saying something regarding pedantry?

[Mord]

Originally posted by MikeyD:

I worked in a typehouse (back where there still were typehouses) for more than two decades. Proofreading's a real job, and a real demanding job. And a job for which I am entirely unqualified. You can read a single line ten times over an on the eleventh pass<font color = red>s</font> that extra 's' at the end of the word is suddenly there! D'oh! And if its also your job to correct the grammar as you go along - you might prefer to take the easy way out and hang yourself! :eek:

I caught your's on the first pass...HA!

Mord.

[ August 29, 2007, 01:47 PM: Message edited by: Mord ]

[ElectricWraith]

Originally posted by Mord:

I caught your's on the first pass...HA!

Mord.

your's

Uhh...hrrmm.

[Mord]

Hey! I never said a thing about BFC's spelling...therefore I am exempt from ridicule...even if I take my undies off!

Mord.

[hoolaman]

Originally posted by ElectricWraith:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by c3k:

Tsk, tsk, tsk. Are we really about to compare forum posts to a published book? If so, LET LOOSE THE DOGS OF WAR!! However, I don't think ANYONE - least of all me - would want a roving forum editor to swoop into ongoing threads to add the errant apostrophe or correct a misused synonym.

Thanks,

Ken

If we're going to quote the Bard, let's not mangle one of his finer lines, shall we?

The proper quote is "Cry 'Havoc', and let slip the dogs of war!"

I believe you were saying something regarding pedantry? </font>

[John Kettler]

As someone who both writes and edits, I agree with MikeyD. Further, the task is made, IMO, more difficult by the increasing reliance on spell checkers and syntax checkers, not to mention the massive general societal deterioration in written communication skills, a trend worsened by advertising spelling and SMS, and the relaxation/ignoring of once ironclad rules of grammar and syntax. The related technical problem is that the software is generally not only woefully inadequate in what it knows, but is also frequently wrong.

When proofing my own articles using the spell checker in Apple Works 6, for example, for every good catch the thing makes, and it has saved me from numerous exhaustion related slips, I wind up skipping lots of perfectly good words the thing doesn't recognize and for which it "helpfully" suggests wildly inappropriate substitutions. StyleWriter on the PC (used for a recent Trust book project) has become my nemesis. What it "likes" is so narrow that it kills all kinds of

perfectly valid, grammatically correct constructions, severely constraining the writer's ways of stating things. Just try selling it on, say, "Having once been a mighty Roman general, Maximus fled to the outer provinces and there built a new identity--as the gladiator who never showed his face." StyleWriter will immediately flag the first three words, and it'll be downhill thereafter. Combine this with a customer who uncritically accepts StyleWriter's pronouncements, and I guarantee migraines. Generally, anything more complicated than simple past tense makes the program gag, causing it to spew out warnings about passive construction and such. Something as mundane as "have swum" is all it takes, never mind complex, lengthy sentences. Proust would never make out of StyleWriter's starting gate, and I think Shakespeare would take a drubbing, too.

In closing, even excellent markups won't save you.

I've had a harmless "lipoma" transmogrified into a potentially fatal "lymphoma" (much to the consternation of the man I interviewed, who had the lipoma)--when I had it right in my submitted copy. Also, if doing proofing, unless you can close the loop you may well find yourself needing to not only revisit the corrections you just made, because some got missed by the typist, but likely dealing with new ones. This becomes nightmarish when trying to make deadline with everyone involved tired. Frankly, I miss my financial printing days when one person read the original copy and the other marked corrections on the photographic galley. Some of you may remember the lingo.

"All caps bold, centered ANNUAL REPORT THE XYZ HOLDING COMPANY...Italics, upper and lower, Report (up) to the Shareholders (up)..."

We consistently got clean finished copy this way, but admittedly, this was hardly the same volume and complexity associated with reorganizing and restructuring often turgid text to make it user friendly and readable. Still, it shows what's possible. It helped, too, that the original was sacrosanct, rather than being reworked on the fly.

Regards,

John Kettler

[Mace]

Originally posted by John Kettler:

not to mention the massive general societal deterioration in written communication skills, a trend worsened by advertising spelling and SMS, and the relaxation/ignoring of once ironclad rules of grammar and syntax.

OMFG!!! U R SO RITE!!! sux0rs!!!

[John Kettler]

Mace,

Exactly!

Regards,

John Kettler