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I recently installed
Chatterbox: Down to Earth
I recently installed
I recently installed Grammarly and I am pretty displeased with it. Honestly, I feel like it's a waste of my time. I copy/pasted a story I've been working on into the editor, and while there were a couple of things that it was right to change, many of the "mistakes" that it caught were things that were actually correct.
It told me to eliminate the Oxford commas that I had in there multiple times. Not okay. I will defend Oxford commas till my dying days.
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Some examples of its proposed corrections included:
"Ben tuned out the conversation," to "Ben turned out the conversation." What the heck?
"He wanted to know her, who she had been besides his mother," to "He wanted to know her, who she was beside his mother." Makes no sense.
"Sarah repeated it slowly, as if the words left a funny taste in her mouth," to without the comma after slowly. This seriously disrupts the flow of the sentence and bothers me to no end.
"Sarah knew he liked being able to choose things," to "Sarah knew he like being able to choose things." Just plain wrong. I don't know what it's thinking.
"The two sixth graders found this hilarious," to "The two-sixth graders found this hilarious." What even...?
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Anyway, I don't like it. It's a nuisance. Do any of you all use Grammarly? What do you think?
submitted by Abigail S., age 12, Nose in a Book
(May 28, 2017 - 9:27 pm)
(May 28, 2017 - 9:27 pm)
Grammarly user right here! Yeah, I agree it's a pain sometimes. I mean, it's really good catching my puny little errors like typos (I make a lot of those) and little grammar errors.
But yeah, you really have to watch what Grammarly on what it's telling you. But overall? I am pretty satisfied. I mean, I type so fast (my record was 104 wpm), that I misspell everything. Literally. As in, once I put "what" as "wat" and just now "satisfied" as "satisfed" or something.
Anyways, I like Grammarly, but it can be frustrating at times, that is for sure.
(May 28, 2017 - 11:09 pm)
After having used it a little longer, I've decided I don't care for it for my longer, fictional, pieces of writing, which sometimes have characters using incorrect grammar because that's how they speak. However, it is actually very helpful for catching typos when I'm writing something on CB, I'll give it that.
(May 29, 2017 - 10:37 am)
Yeah, story wise? I tend to use special grammar editors online. But when it comes to social media, forums, or the CB, I tend to rely on Grammarly a lot because I make a ton of errors as I said. It just depends on what you use it for the most!
(May 30, 2017 - 11:26 am)
Well, by looking at the mistakes it made, I'm never going to get Grammarly. Especially since some of the characters you're writing about don't use proper grammar. For small spelling mistakes, a simple spell check should suffice. But go Oxford commas!!!! I've always used them because I think they're necessary. One of my exams didn't use them and I was so confused on one of the questions because of the lack of an Oxford comma.
(May 29, 2017 - 11:02 am)
You have to have the Oxford comma! I get really mad when people all throw up their hands and are like, "nope, nope, no Oxford commas for us!". Drives me insane!
(May 30, 2017 - 11:25 am)
Is the Oxford comma the "I like sawdust,ice cream, and rhyming" vs "I lke sawdust ice cream, and rhyming" thingy? Because if so OXFORD COMMA ARMADA, and if not, whoops.
Also, my Captcha says gggr. DOn't you mean g,g,g,&r
(May 30, 2017 - 11:29 am)
Close. The Oxford comma is "I like sawdust, ice cream, and rhyming." v. "I like sawdust, ice cream and rhyming". There is a good Ted-Ed video that explains it better than I can and the benefits/cons of it. To some up the video; it's basically the difference of "Come to the party with Bob, a dj, and a clown" and "Come to the party with Bob, a dj and a clown". The first one makes it clear that you are to bring three separate people. The second could be taken the same way. Or you could take it to mean that Bob is both a dj and a clown and show up with only one person.
-Sorry about that written lecture. I'm a fan of Oxford commas.
Cricket media magazines use them, too, only we call them serial commas.
Admin
(May 30, 2017 - 6:02 pm)
A while back there was a court case, because milkmen wanted to get paid during other parts of their job, not just delivery. Their contract had a list of things that they wouldn't get paid for, but there wasn't an Oxford comma, so it wasn't clear. I can't remember what the court ended up deciding, but I just thought that was funny.
(May 31, 2017 - 9:27 am)
Hey Abi!
I use Grammarly too, and it's honestly terrific.
Terrific at detecting errors that don't exist.
I have one character speak and say, ex. "I'm saying this because Grammarly needs changes." Then have a sentance between, then have the other character talk, to which Grammarly believes it's the same character talking and wants to add a comma in place of the period after changes...
But for my little spelling errors, it's pretty useful, and, of course, you can always turn it off without uninstalling it, via the button shaped like the power symbol.
(May 30, 2017 - 1:07 pm)
Oh, and it tells me to delete most of my excess commas. And commas that I need.
(May 30, 2017 - 1:08 pm)