by Linda Cameron, editor Mid-Columbia Macintosh User Group

Almost every program that you use to type text into has a spell checker; some are very good while others leave a lot to be desired. Even if the spell checker is pretty good, it still takes a very long time to customize the user dictionary so it recognizes words you use regularly that aren’t included in its own dictionary.

Some expensive programs (like Microsoft Word) have other tools which makes typing easier—such as the AutoCorrect feature. You are able to add “shorthand” text which you invent, and when typed into a Word or Entourage document, it expands into another word or sentence. If I type “macmail” into a document, it changes to “lindacameron@mac.com.” It is more time consuming to type in the whole E-mail address than a short word I can remember. MS Office has this cool AutoCorrect feature built in, but what if I want to be able to use shorthand or automatically correct frequently mistyped words in all programs?

Spell Catcher is the answer. Spell Catcher has been around for many years. It used to be part of the Casady & Greene product line. Unfortunately, Casady & Greene recently went out of business. Now Spell Catcher X can be found at http://www.spellcatcher.com/ and versions can be bought for Mac OS X and OS 9 plus Windows.

The most beautiful thing about Spell Catcher, is that you can use it with all your applications. Your custom dictionaries and shorthands can be added to, as needed, on a daily basis without having to duplicate the same entries with every application you use. I have been using my own custom dictionaries and glossaries for years and I continue to add to them. I often use the Canadian or British spellings for some words—”centre” rather than “center.” There are dozens of extra dictionaries that can be downloaded and added to Spell Catcher.

I use Spell Catcher interactively. It can be set up so you have to run the spellcheck manually, but I prefer to have an alert as I type. The shorthand is also interactive and will automatically correct misspelled words or expand my shorthands. I have gotten into the habit of not bothering to capitalize the word “I” because I set up Spell Catcher to automatically capitalize it. Saves time and possibly prevents some carpal tunnel injuries.

Spell Catcher can be configured to work differently with different applications. The features I have mentioned so far make Spell Catcher a “must have” utility, as far as I am concerned. But there is more. Have you ever copied and pasted text from an E-mail into another document you wanted to print out? You know what happens. The text is a mess with the line endings all out of whack. If you have Spell Catcher installed, you can select the text you want to clean up and go to the Spell Catcher menu, select Modify, then another hierarchical menu pops out where you can select one of several options—in this case—”make paragraphs.”

Other options include making all text lowercase, uppercase, Title Case, changing multiple spaces to single spaces or tabs, smartening quotes, or quoting for E-mail. It sounds more complicated to describe than it is. It all takes only a couple of clicks with the mouse. And it is all very handy to have these features available in every application.

The quoting for E-mail may seem unnecessary if your E-mail program already quotes text, but many times I have had to use web based E-mail for one reason or another and the quoting feature comes in handy, because I generally like to quote a phrase, then add my comments, and quote another phrase, then comment.

Spell Catcher also has a nice Thesaurus which I use regularly. Anytime I come across a word I don’t understand, I can quickly get the dictionary definition of it or just switch to thesaurus and find other words that can be used in its place. Having the word selected in my document and looking at the dictionary or thesaurus for Spell Catcher, I can choose another word to replace it with. Spell Catcher will paste it in for me.

Spell Catcher installs by dragging and dropping the application from a CD or downloaded disc image into your applications folder. The first time you open Spell Catcher X 10.1, it asks if you want to install the Input Menu. I definitely want that. It is what makes it easy to use Spell Catcher’s features at any time. I also make sure Spell Catcher is in my Startup Applications, so that it is always available each time I boot up my computer.

A couple of things could be improved, in my opinion. I often add shorthand text to my custom Shorthand file. In fact, the shorthand feature in Spell Catcher is the biggest appeal for me. The way it works now, it takes about 7 steps to get a new entry added to my Shorthand file. Most other features of Spell Catcher have a keyboard shortcut that will go right to it, but not the Shorthands feature. I would be thrilled to be able to pop up an optional floating palette that lets me add selected text to my Shorthand file with just another field to type exactly what I want it to change to.

I also don’t think I should have to tell it to capitalize since it should just insert what I type.

The other thing I think could be improved is making Spell Catcher easier to install. I am afraid that some “newbies” might be intimidated having to know where everything is to get the input menu and have it open automatically when booting up the computer. However, that said, there is a tech support forum at the Spell Catcher website and any problems you run into that are not already mentioned in the FAQs, will be addressed by the author of the program.

You can purchase Spell Catcher as a download for about US $40. You can also get it on CD for US $10 more. http://spellcatcher.com

© 2004 Mid-Columbia Macintosh User Group