P
Patricio Mason
Following a question raised on a professional forum I belong to (I'm a
translator), I believe I may have hit upon a peculiar issue with
Microsoft Office spellchecking tools for the Spanish language. As it
turns out, if you mistype the Spanish word "asi" (meaning thus, this
way, like this, so) as "asi" (it takes an accent on the i), then run
the spellchecking tools, the first choice offered by many Macintosh and
Windows versions of Office will not be "así" (the correct spelling)
but "axial".
If you then Google for terms and phrases that are supposed to use the
term "así" but have it replaced by "axial", you will notice a strange
proliferation of this peculiar construction, where terms such as "así
como" or "así sucesivamente" (from its meaning, you can gather that
"así" is extremely common) are showing up as "axial como" or "axial
sucesivamente", etc., which makes no sense.
My hypothesis is that since "axial" is showing as the first option for
a misspelled "así", many users are being led to make one and the same
mistake: merrily click "Change" or "Change All" to approve replacement
of the misspelled word with the wrong option.
The issue seems fairly widespread. These are just some examples from a
Google search:
El próximo año el porcentaje se elevará al 8 por ciento y axial
sucesivamente hasta llegar a la meta del 10 por ciento.
(http://www.lachsr.org/documents/extension/iniciativa_ilo-paho_esp.pdf)
Platón lo explica por la ausencia de la idea correspondiente, axial,
por ejemplo, la enfermedad surge por la idea de salud.
(http://html.rincondelvago.com/teoria-de-las-ideas_platon_2.html)
No es extraño, mis queridos amigos, que axial sea.
(http://www.galiciadiario.com/web/conte.php?ida=120)
Pero es extraño que lo dedujeras axial como axial- le dije con recelo.
(http://harrypotter.lsf.com.ar/phpbb...ghlight=&sid=9e22c86e086c5659266c7546be0d7e42)
In each of these examples, "axial" was supposed to be "así". As these
phrases stand, they make no sense.
As it turns out, the phenomenon has occurred before with spellchecking
tools for the English language, and has even been given a name: "the
Cupertino effect", referring to the fact that the common misspelling of
"cooperation" as "cooperatino" leads some spellcheckers to suggest a
change to "Cupertino". As a Google search will show, cyberspace is full
of examples of "Cupertino" being nonsensically substituted for
"cooperation", as in the following phrase in a World Health
Organization report: "Safe blood transfusion services are being
addressed in Freetown and Lungi, using WHO RB funds in Cupertino with
the Red Cross Society of Sierra Leone..."
Curiously enough, there seems to be no discernible rhyme or reason to
when "the axial effect" will hit. I've asked users of a range of
Macintosh and Windows versions of Office to try this, and their results
don't seem to conform to any apparent pattern, with same-number
versions producing different results.
I am reporting these findings to the developers, so if anyone can
contribute additional bits of information, they will be put to good
use.
Patricio Mason
Santiago, Chile
translator), I believe I may have hit upon a peculiar issue with
Microsoft Office spellchecking tools for the Spanish language. As it
turns out, if you mistype the Spanish word "asi" (meaning thus, this
way, like this, so) as "asi" (it takes an accent on the i), then run
the spellchecking tools, the first choice offered by many Macintosh and
Windows versions of Office will not be "así" (the correct spelling)
but "axial".
If you then Google for terms and phrases that are supposed to use the
term "así" but have it replaced by "axial", you will notice a strange
proliferation of this peculiar construction, where terms such as "así
como" or "así sucesivamente" (from its meaning, you can gather that
"así" is extremely common) are showing up as "axial como" or "axial
sucesivamente", etc., which makes no sense.
My hypothesis is that since "axial" is showing as the first option for
a misspelled "así", many users are being led to make one and the same
mistake: merrily click "Change" or "Change All" to approve replacement
of the misspelled word with the wrong option.
The issue seems fairly widespread. These are just some examples from a
Google search:
El próximo año el porcentaje se elevará al 8 por ciento y axial
sucesivamente hasta llegar a la meta del 10 por ciento.
(http://www.lachsr.org/documents/extension/iniciativa_ilo-paho_esp.pdf)
Platón lo explica por la ausencia de la idea correspondiente, axial,
por ejemplo, la enfermedad surge por la idea de salud.
(http://html.rincondelvago.com/teoria-de-las-ideas_platon_2.html)
No es extraño, mis queridos amigos, que axial sea.
(http://www.galiciadiario.com/web/conte.php?ida=120)
Pero es extraño que lo dedujeras axial como axial- le dije con recelo.
(http://harrypotter.lsf.com.ar/phpbb...ghlight=&sid=9e22c86e086c5659266c7546be0d7e42)
In each of these examples, "axial" was supposed to be "así". As these
phrases stand, they make no sense.
As it turns out, the phenomenon has occurred before with spellchecking
tools for the English language, and has even been given a name: "the
Cupertino effect", referring to the fact that the common misspelling of
"cooperation" as "cooperatino" leads some spellcheckers to suggest a
change to "Cupertino". As a Google search will show, cyberspace is full
of examples of "Cupertino" being nonsensically substituted for
"cooperation", as in the following phrase in a World Health
Organization report: "Safe blood transfusion services are being
addressed in Freetown and Lungi, using WHO RB funds in Cupertino with
the Red Cross Society of Sierra Leone..."
Curiously enough, there seems to be no discernible rhyme or reason to
when "the axial effect" will hit. I've asked users of a range of
Macintosh and Windows versions of Office to try this, and their results
don't seem to conform to any apparent pattern, with same-number
versions producing different results.
I am reporting these findings to the developers, so if anyone can
contribute additional bits of information, they will be put to good
use.
Patricio Mason
Santiago, Chile