251–260 of 335 posts
Shameless plug: Some time ago I authored a Sublime Text (2/3) plug-in that highlights use of passive voice and "weazel words" (i.e., words to use sparingly and words). To install from Package Control, just search for "Writing Style" :)
You know what's fun? Pasting in text from Ernest Hemingway and seeing what he did wrong. But seriously, this is a nice, simple way to point out some general rules of thumb for improving writing, although I would love for it to be less proscriptive. Not every long sentence is a bad sentence, not every passive-voice sentence is a bad sentence, and not every adverb is a bad adverb. Oh, and by the way, the copy editor in…
> You know what's fun? Pasting in text from Ernest Hemingway and seeing what he did wrong. I was thinking about giving some Joyce a pass through this...
9 of 46 sentences are hard to read. 19 of 46 sentences are very hard to read. 12 adverbs. Aim for 11 or less. 8 words or phrases can be simpler. 12 uses of passive voice. Aim for 9 or less.
Neat! From their JS: readinglvl = getReadingLevel(paragraphs, sentences, words, chars); [..] function getReadingLevel (p, s, w, c) { var r = Math.round((4.75 * (c / w)) + (0.5 * (w / s)) - 21.43); return r; } So it's a slightly modified http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automated_Readability_Index (uses 4.75 instead of 4.71 .
That's right. We're using ARI, mainly because it's a much simpler algorithm since it doesn't require identifying syllables. As you can see in the code, my programming skills are pretty weak, so ARI was an easy choice. This was my first non-trivial programming effort (I'm a marketer/product manager, not an engineer).
so app
such writing
better than mcirosoft word
I wrote a book chapter recently -- as a last minute favor for a friend, and gratis. I did my best to make the words sing -- the subject's a yawner for most people, and I had to entertain myself while writing the thing. In addition to sly references to whatever caught my fancy that day, I quite deliberately used contractions all through. More music in 'em I reckoned and they scanned better. Some genius editor sent a markup back all de-contracted and I had to spend a day adding them back in. Cursing.
It is really, really hard to write well precisely because so much depends on context. It's true in professional writing too -- you have to keep your audience in mind. True that adjectives are less persuasive, usually, than facts stated slyly, but see how those sibilants sounds aloud? Maybe it's my taste and not yours, but maybe that's the point of a hemmingwayapp -- you could always joyceify it or send it throughout iambify.com and set it to my wild irish rose.
I'm sure Stanislaw Lem's great piece the Electronic Bard has been posted in the past but for those who don't know it and want the last word on wordsmithing machina, check it -- goo.gl/zZD0pX . Warning -- don't read this while drinking anything or you will risk snorting soda pop out your nose.
Any answers by English experts?
You know what's fun? Pasting in text from Ernest Hemingway and seeing what he did wrong. But seriously, this is a nice, simple way to point out some general rules of thumb for improving writing, although I would love for it to be less proscriptive. Not every long sentence is a bad sentence, not every passive-voice sentence is a bad sentence, and not every adverb is a bad adverb. Oh, and by the way, the copy editor in…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
You might not be able to force people to write well, but you can help them not write badly. That's the point of apps like this one - mediocre is better than bad. Once someone has improved their writing to the point where this app is no longer useful they can easily switch to something else. Writing is a skill that few people have really learnt to do well. For them, following some "random rules" will improve what they…
Forcing somebody to write short sentences wouldn't improve his writing.