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Is AutoCorrect making you boring or stupid?

The BBC has an interesting piece on the effect of AutoCorrect and word suggestions for quicker typing.

I dunno about ‘boring’ but AutoCorrect in Office does have a downside – it makes you and your typing fingers stupid.

If you type  stupdi   into Word it will fix it to  stupid  as soon as you press the spacebar or Enter key.  That’s great; but you and your fingers don’t learn from the mistake.

Many of us have common typing mistakes, bad habits we’ve picked up over time and a damn hard to break.   Microsoft Office and it’s AutoCorrect feature will fix your bad habit each and every time you do it – quietly and without you even noticing.

That’s great until you type in another program or on another device.  Then your  ‘stupdi ‘ mistake will start showing up.   Maybe you’ll wonder why you’re typing the wrong word when in MS Office it comes out alright?

Turn AutoCorrect Off?

It’s worth considering turning off AutoCorrect, especially for anyone learning to type or trying to improve their touch-typing speed.

Do that from Word Options | Proofing | AutoCorrect Options and uncheck all the options.

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