Special Edition Using® Microsoft® Office Word 2003

A Closer Look at the Grammar Checker

Word's grammar checker, like all contemporary grammar checkers, follows rules that identify potential writing problems. Word's grammar checker has gradually been refined; however, it still cannot “understand” your documents the way a friend, co-worker, or English teacher would, so it's best to have modest expectations.

On a good day, the grammar checker might pleasantly surprise you—catching things you would never have noticed. On another day, it may flag many “errors” that are, in fact, not errors at all. Later, you'll learn to personalize the grammar checker to catch only the types of errors you actually make, with fewer false alarms.

Checking Your Document's Grammar

As you learned earlier in this chapter, ...