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Definitely

On a lighter note, https://xkcd.com/2871/ -- John of Reading (talk) 08:11, 23 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion at Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Proposals/HyperlinkPatrol

You're invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia:Wikiproject Council/Proposals/HyperlinkPatrol. JustAnotherUndertaleFrantic -- Talk 23:22, 11 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Accidentally (vis Accidently)

Hi everyone. For several years I have been copy-editing articles using the tools provided here and re-visiting accidently many times over. I recently noticed that when editing a page, the red squiggly line beneath accidently no longer appears. I noticed this for a few weeks now and decided to look it up. It just so happens that actually it is true - https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/accidently says that it is a proper word "and it is sometimes cited as an error" albeit less common. Eugene-elgato (talk) 14:34, 29 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Related: a description of this language trend. I recommend fixing the non-standard "accidently", which my browser still proudly underlines in red. M-W is too permissive for my tastes, bordering on promiscuous. – Jonesey95 (talk) 04:29, 2 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

By the way I had put my idea here also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Lists_of_common_misspellings in case you wanted to comment there tooEugene-elgato (talk) 12:19, 6 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Help needed finding legacy punctuation like "--" "-->"

I'd like to fix typos like changing "--" to emdash, "-->" to → and similar changes in accordance with WP:MOS

Can you help me with the wikipedia text search? It doesn't seem to find instances of punctuation characters properly. Tonymetz 💬 21:28, 4 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

You would need to use insource: but there are major problems. One is that it is inefficient, because it has to scan millions of pages, and the search will not complete unless limited by adding other search terms. Another is that it would mainly find . Certes (talk) 21:53, 4 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

A search like this one works somewhat, timing out because of the issues Certes lists above. An editor would need to be very careful to inspect each instance of "-->" to see whether it should be converted to an arrow character, modified to be an HTML comment, converted to list markup, left alone because it is part of a quotation or title, or something else. I can't see automated find-and-replace providing valid replacements for the pages that turn up in these search results. Tread wisely. – Jonesey95 (talk) 22:21, 4 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

thank you that search was very helpful. the insource + !insource combo is a good starting point. Here is an example of what I'm trying to do Tonymetz 💬 22:33, 4 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

22:45, 4 April 2024 diff hist 0‎ m Dutch railway services ‎ replace --> with → current
22:43, 4 April 2024 diff hist 0‎ m PITX2 ‎ replace --> with → current
22:42, 4 April 2024 diff hist 0‎ m HOXD13 ‎ replace --> with → current
22:41, 4 April 2024 diff hist 0‎ m Adrenocorticotropic hormone ‎ replace --> with → current
22:40, 4 April 2024 diff hist 0‎ m Arosi language ‎ replace --> with → current
22:31, 4 April 2024 diff hist +2‎ m Eldorado Mountain ‎ replace --> with → current

Tonymetz 💬 22:46, 4 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

look at this work of art [1] Tonymetz 💬 23:12, 4 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I also opened up a discussion on WP:MOS [2] Tonymetz 💬 23:26, 4 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Try and

There are several thousand instances of "try and" in the mainspace. Most (but not all) of these should be "try to" (e.g., "try to fix it"). Could this be added to one of the standard lists of typos that need attention? WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:31, 21 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

In Wikipedia:Lists of common misspellings/Grammar and miscellaneous#T, there are already a large number of combinations listed, starting with

try and [verb] (try to [verb])
try and achieve (try to achieve)
try and add (try to add)
...

--Cyfal (talk) 13:36, 21 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Excessive false positives for a tool such as AWB with constructs such as "scoring a try and three goals", though some may be happy to add to their personal lists :-) Neils51 (talk) 14:23, 21 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I saw one of those while I was searching. There are also quotations that correctly reproduce the original grammar error. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:20, 21 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I've set it up in here if anyone wants to work on it with a tool that lets you mark false positives. I'd work on it myself but I think I have a blind spot for this one. Note to self, must try and learn when to use "try and" Ϣere SpielChequers 17:38, 21 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Is there a way to filter out quotations? WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:26, 21 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Not without a change to the code, and I wouldn't like to ask Edward to do that because I do see typos in quotations, sometimes translation errors and sometimes when I check the source. Ϣere SpielChequers 21:30, 21 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Fair enough. Thanks for explaining it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:32, 23 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]