CR4 Spellchecker - What's Happened ?

Yes, I've noticed it - No, I don't know why it happens. I think it's only happened on PMs.

[FWIW - IE7, on both XP Home (SP3) and XP Pro (SP3)]

Hears an egg sample ;

Massages seam to reefer too the txt with in ?

Yup! Got similar:

Only while in the PM system.

I get a funny spell checker on this submit pane...

It sort of goes into alien mode and has this eye that moves back and forth.... spooky!!

Oh! on second thoughts, its always done that!!

Hey folks, thanks for the screen shots... that is very helpful and now I have a good feel for the problem. Unfortunately, I'm not sure how to reproduce it so I can't fix it yet.

Do you recall if the spellchecker works on a given message if you try it a second time, or, when it shows a problem on a given message, does it stay that way?

I would be very interested in knowing of any post that fails every time, even if it is a "fake" message where you're just trying to break the spellchecker. Forward them to me as a PM and I'll check it out.

Thanks
- Mark

Hi Mark,

I just went back to a PM I'd known to fail. The Message (several posts long) had contained an "error" at one stage. My original reply also produced an "error" upon spellchecking (a different error). I tested replying with a different message and couldn't get the error. Odd, because the error pop-up refers to seemingly random words of the text being replied to. I have seen similar on other messages - first check gets an error message, second check may/may not get an error message.

I'll check with my correspondents that it's OK to copy a chat to you, and forward it to you when we get a result.

Kris

"I'll check with my correspondents that it's OK to copy a chat to you, and forward it to you when we get a result."

Braveheart, thou. Just be sure to tell him that all MACs have been changed to protect the perps. And please give me a minute to finish-up this Perl script that autohacks all the DNS sites. We like our privacy.

I'll check with my correspondents

I like to at least play along with the illusion .

Hi Everyone

I have at least one always-fails test case, so this should be enough for me to start the debugging process. Feel free to PM me others if you can, but now that I have one example the need for more examples is definitely reduced.

I wish I could say when this will be fixed but it may take me a little time to focus on this. Thanks for your patience
- Mark

Sorry I can't send you a screenshot of the symptom I'm experiencing. I can't because there's nothing unusual to see. I don't get those error popups because I live a charmed life: I use Linux.

When I press the spell-check icon I get the usual notice popup. It's when I dismiss the popup that the weirdness begins.

The checker just keeps checking the spelling forever. Even when I deliberately misspell words (yes, I know it can't discern my motives -- or can it???), the misspelled words are not found. It just twiddles its electronic thumbs until I click the spell-check icon again. That stops it and life goes on as usual.

Thanks for looking into this.

-e

(Psst: I can save you some wasted effort by telling you that this behavior is a new-feature beta in WinDoze and will be available permanently in SP4.)

Just had a similar one to europium, in #9.

Got this:

forever, while just replying to a post in a thread (Virus? HELP!).

First time I tried, after closing the spellchecker, IE crashed when I tried to "Preview Comment". Started again, got the same "hang" on spellcheck, but managed to post ok.

....methinks it's on ice while Mark fondles its bits.

Methinks you should behaaaaaave.

That brings up an interesting point - how "P" are CR4 "PM"s?

I've always assumed that Admin can listen in - I have never said anything I wouldn't want Admin to hear, but I just don't know. If Mark's still listening, maybe he can advise ... ?

"...how "P" are CR4 "PM"s?"

--

Depends on who's listening. In your case it seems that you've been living two lives. One life, you're Thomas A. Anderson, program writer for a respectable software company. You have a social security number, pay your taxes, and you...help your landlady carry out her garbage. The other life is lived in computers, where you go by the hacker alias "JohnDG" and are guilty of virtually every computer crime we have a law for. One of these lives has a future, and one of them does not.

Admins have the capability, but not the time or the will, to view mail messages that were not addressed to them. Some CR4 members do abuse the mail message (aka PM) system (sending spam, threats, etc), and so there is a "Report!" method for notifying admins of these problems. We then look at the offending piece and probably also other mail sent by the alleged spammer. This is consistent with our privacy policy.

At the end of the day, any computer system that you enter information into must store that information in a database, and that implies that people with access to the database can see the information. It applies to CR4, and pretty much every other web site or system you'll run into.

Thanks
- Mark

Hello Mark,

Spellchecker had a problem with this post. It reported an error and simply quit working.

Hi ba/ael

You have to have some sympathy for a spell checker on an engineering web site.

Engineers are so full of originality/imagination (Full of IT) and the English language is so full of inconsistencies in its rules. (Should that be it's). It has to result in confusion for both parties.

It is about time it was the spell checkers turn to be confused!

Victory at last!

BAB

Hell BAB,

I agree wholeheartedly and I do have some sympathy, but Mark asked for examples so I was just giving him one. In general, I seem to have had problems when using a lot of equations and oddball expressions which are not really words at all.

Its is correct unless you mean "it is", but then you already knew that, didn't you?

Just a few moments ago (please note posting time) it opened and ran...and ran...and ran.... no errors found, no messages, just kept running on...so I had to close it. I'm assuming it is now offline...possibly being worked on?

If miss-spellings in this post, it's not my fault.

No, it only does that when it's overwhelmed by too many mispellings.

How Minnie Miss Pellings cant her bee yawn a too lyin' mass age? But still the checker kept right on checking and checking....

While Mark has the spell-checker in surgery, there's a work-around that's a little extra work but worth it (or not, depending on how badly you don't want the world to know that, like me, you can't spell worth a shit):

Write your posts in M$ Weird or Open Orifice (Linux), then copy and paste them to the Edit box.

Personally, I like this approach because I can adjust the layout, check my spelling (I do give a shit) and insert pix and graphics where I want them. Doesn't mean the Editor will oblige, but what the hell. Sometimes it works.

Oh yeah, and you get more than a postage-stamp-sized edit box to work with.

Hello Kris:

I to have noticed this anomaly. By the way, it also happens in open forum.

The symptoms I had.........The thing was freezing up when I clicked to do a spell check. Sometimes I found if I did not leave the cursor where I wanted my signature to be written, it would pop a little error window. IE. If the cursor was left in the main block of typing rather than below it.

I wrote to Chris Leonard about it and was first told it was OK. Then a few hours later was told there was a fault. Quite what the fault is or was I do not know.

For about three days I have been writing my posts in OE and pasting them into CR4. I used spell check just now and it worked fine.

Hello all,

I used the spell check several times tonight. Went to use it two minutes ago and it would not work. Just kept throwing error messages at me.

It's all my fault. I'm such a lousy speller that the darn thing has to work overtime, all the time. It's just tired. Oh! No! it's Bricky again. I'm going to take that vacation now!

Hello Bricktop:

I thorght the spel cheker wos thinken mush th sam bout me! I sumtims got evry uver word almos rite!

In an earlier post I said it happened only in open post. I meant to say it happens in open post as well. And, as someone said today, several times it has started, the writing box goes blank, and that's it.

Hi Folks

I think this problem is fixed. Let me know if you see an error like these:

Thanks
- Mark

Like as in this ? I don't recall the second one you show. Do I have to pay you to supply the 'Infected' label, or is it free ?

Yes, if you get ANOTHER one of EITHER of those errors then let me know by posting here, otherwise I will consider the problem fixed as of this morning (when I posted above).

Thanks
- Mark

Perhaps I was not clear, Mark. Having been the only one here to post an image (very)similar to your first picture, I wondered if I had a fault on my system, or whether it was just something within CR4. Clarification would be appreciated. Thanks.

It's you.

But you're the only one I've ever......

Gosh!!!! You too???

Hello Kris,

Ther myst defineately oS a preblom with the spel checker.

I thought the same as you, that it was at my end. But, I wrote to Chris and he said there is a problem. OK?

Take care..........

Thanks for the reassurance BB

Hello Kris,

I thank you for this thread! When I first mentioned it to chris he said there was nothing wrong. Then got back to a few hours later to say there was something wrong. I tend to always blame myself under similar circomestances!

Take care................

I'm still hoping that europium will be vigorously scrubbing himself with Detol and a wire-brush .

If you were Punjabi I'd say you were a Sikh man!

Hi Kris

Ah, sorry for the confusion. The image in my post was a copy of your image... I'm was just trying to let other people know what to look out for.

Thanks
- Mark

Cheers Mark,

I was fairly sure, but the wider world might not have been.

Yes me too noticed this problem,

This thread make it for sure that even the members from English speaking natives need OR do the spell check,