Main Window of Stylewriter Software
The main StyleWriter window displays the text of your document and highlights style and usage problems it has found in your writing.
StyleWriter’s Patterns
StyleWriter contains over 35,000 word and phrase patterns, and it searches for these in your writing. When one of these patterns matches the words in your text, StyleWriter displays an appropriate message giving you advice on what it has found.
As you move to each match in your text, the matched text appears in the top of the advice window, showing the pattern that produced the match. StyleWriter groups the patterns into style categories. The category of the pattern appears in the top right corner of the advice window.
StyleWriter loads the patterns from the Pattern File when it starts up, and if you have added any custom patterns, it loads those from the Added Pattern File.
StyleWriter’s Menus
StyleWriter’s menus give you access to the various analysis, reporting, customising and help functions of the program.
StyleWriter’s Toolbar
StyleWriter’s toolbar gives you quick access to the most frequently used commands.
Advice Message
As you edit your document, use the advice StyleWriter gives on each of the problems it highlights in your text. StyleWriter contains over 35,000 word and phrase patterns, and it searches for these in your writing. When StyleWriter matches one of its patterns with the words in your text, it displays an appropriate message giving you advice on what it has found.
Where an advice message offers alternatives for you to use, it displays these in underlined text. If your word processor accepts DDE commands, these suggestions appear in blue underlined text. You can click on the one you want to change your text. If your application does not accept DDE commands, the alternatives appear in black underlined text and you have to make your changes using the Edit button.
Category
StyleWriter contains over 35,000 word and phrase patterns it searches for in your writing. These patterns are grouped into 26 Style Categories. StyleWriter displays the category of problem in the advice window to help you understand the problem.
StyleWriter’s Command Buttons
StyleWriter’s command buttons help you browse through the problems it has found.
StyleWriter’s Status Bar
StyleWriter’s status bar gives you an assessment of your key statistics at a glance. When your mouse cursor passes over a toolbar button, a prompt message appears in the status bar to tell you what the button will do.
StyleWriter’s Text Window
The highlighted words and phrases in your text show in different colours:
Bold Dark Red : are those you should change as StyleWriter advises. They are from StyleWriter’s Plain English Style categories, to do with improving the readability of your writing.
Normal Bright Red : show sentences longer than the Long Sentence Limit and those without a capital.
Bold Black : are from StyleWriter’s Word Usage categories, such as misused or confused words, where you may not have made a mistake. You should see if you have used the word correctly by looking at StyleWriter’s message.
Bold Bright Red : are spelling mistakes or errors in house style, and you should follow StyleWriter’s advice.
Grey Background : shows the match that the current advice message refers to.
yellow background : shows grey quoted text excluded from StyleWriter’s statistics if you have selected Exclude Quoted Text in the Options Menu.
Moving Through Your Text
You can scroll through the text to see what StyleWriter has highlighted by:
- pressing the Page Up and Page Down keys,
- pressing the Up and Down arrow keys,
- pressing the Home and End keys, or
- clicking your mouse on the Scroll Bar.
As you scroll through your text, StyleWriter highlights the words or phrases that match its patterns.
You can move from one highlighted word or phrase (each one a match on a pattern) to another by:
- pressing the Right arrow key or clicking the Next button to move to the next match,
- pressing the Left arrow key or clicking the Previous button to move to the previous match, or
- clicking your mouse on any highlighted word or phrase.
If there are two or more matches overlapping in your text where you click the mouse, StyleWriter will display the advice for the first one. To see the advice for the others, hold the Shift key while you click the mouse or use Next to move to the next match.
You can move through and edit the text StyleWriter has checked while it is still checking the rest of your document.
