Sunday, July 7th 2024

Windows 11 Notepad Gets Spellcheck Feature

Everyone's favorite plaintext editor, the Windows Notepad, now has Spellcheck. The latest update to Notepad in Windows 11 adds spellchecks, along with spelling suggestions. The company had released Spellcheck and Autocorrect to Insiders in March 2024, and has now rolled the feature out to the regular userbase. The feature is enabled by default. The app now also has an autocorrect feature that, well, automatically corrects common typos the way a fully fledged word processor would. Both Spellcheck and Autocorrect are now enabled by default, and can be turned off in the gearwheel screen. Starting with Windows 11, Microsoft turned many of the popular Windows Accessories to UWP apps. These used to be Win32 apps in previous Windows versions. The company continuously updates these apps through the Windows Store platform, and we've noticed that Notepad got several new features it never had over the past three decades, including tabs, session restore, and now Spellcheck.
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46 Comments on Windows 11 Notepad Gets Spellcheck Feature

#26
64K
If MS wants everyone to speak 'Murican then we will just have to speak 'Murican. :p
Posted on Reply
#27
matar
Microsoft windows 10 users sorry your os is too old to support spell check.
Posted on Reply
#28
Vayra86
matarMicrosoft windows 10 users sorry your os is too old to support spell check.
Nothing of value was lost to us ;)
Posted on Reply
#29
R-T-B
Caring1Lol, if words are spelt correctly in English, this will probably tell you it's wrong as it will be based on the mutilated English used by Americans.
It'll be based on your windows configured language selection and dictionary. Lets not borrow trouble where it doesn't even exist.

EDIT: I take it all back, see below.
windwhirlYep. Even if you have it set to UK English
You are looking at keyboard layout sir. That's seperate from OS language IIRC.
Posted on Reply
#30
windwhirl
R-T-BIt'll be based on your windows configured language selection and dictionary. Lets not borrow trouble where it doesn't even exist.


You are looking at keyboard layout sir. That's seperate from OS language IIRC.
Nope, I set my OS language to UK English and restarted just to make sure
Posted on Reply
#31
R-T-B
windwhirlNope, I set my OS language to UK English and restarted just to make sure
That's shockingly bad, heh. Have to confess I just assumed they'd use that facility. MS really has some questionable design choices as of late.
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#32
windwhirl
R-T-BThat's shockingly bad, heh. Have to confess I just assumed they'd use that facility. MS really has some questionable design choices as of late.
From what I see, it seems that Notepad either detects the language automatically, disregarding system settings, or just checks against whatever number of dictionaries it can call upon. "This is a prueba" not being detected as wrong makes me lean towards Notepad just running words against all available dictionaries, and as long as the word is in one of them, it won't highlight it.

English and Spanish for this test:



On the other hand, it doesn't highlight either metre or meter, so I guess the word "realise/realize" was a one off error?

Posted on Reply
#33
ARF
matarMicrosoft windows 10 users sorry your os is too old to support spell check.
Word in Windows 10 actually works just fine. English UK returns different results to English US.

matarwindows 10 too old
Same can be said about the failure that is Windows 11. Microsoft desperately needs a modern OS, namely Windows 12..
Posted on Reply
#34
Shihab
Next they'll turn into into a word processor, killing off the only use of the damned thing.
Imagine editing a script, config file, or whatever, and have the damned thing autocorrect your variables.
Spellcheck is a nice addition, but defaulting autocorrect to enabled is just plain stupid. This is not a smartphone IM app.

Y'all still on Windows should pray that MS remembers they have VSCode. Else the next notepad "update" will have intellisense strapped on (because they won't just settle for petty syntax highlights a la notepad++, gnome-text-editor), and your 100kb readme will take two hours to launch.
ARFMicrosoft desperately needs a modern OS, namely Windows 12.
What makes a "modern OS," exactly?
Posted on Reply
#35
Scrizz
windwhirlFrom what I see, it seems that Notepad either detects the language automatically, disregarding system settings, or just checks against whatever number of dictionaries it can call upon. "This is a prueba" not being detected as wrong makes me lean towards Notepad just running words against all available dictionaries, and as long as the word is in one of them, it won't highlight it.

English and Spanish for this test:



On the other hand, it doesn't highlight either metre or meter, so I guess the word "realise/realize" was a one off error?

It's still an Insider's build, so give them feedback...
Posted on Reply
#36
lexluthermiester
ZoneDymoerror: spellcheck is online only, pls check internet connection
Yup.

Folks,
Block Notepad from online access with the firewall of your choice.
Posted on Reply
#37
Eiji
You can uninstall the Notepad app and use Notepad.exe in C:\Windows.

This is what I'm doing on IoT LTSC 2024.
Posted on Reply
#38
Crackong
Notepad is supposed to be

"AS is"
"Unedited"
"yup I noticed there is a mistake here in the code"

type of stuff.

Adding spellcheck into notepad destroy the whole purpose of it.
Posted on Reply
#39
Frick
Fishfaced Nincompoop
AGlezBI knew it! They exist! :peace:

Joke aside, that makes you the exception to the rule and you're not alone, but if we count Notepad users as a percentage of the total Windows userbase and plot it in a pie chart you'd be a single line and the percentage would round to 0% up to 4 or 5 decimals.
In some specific areas I'm definitely in the top 000.1%.
EijiYou can uninstall the Notepad app and use Notepad.exe in C:\Windows.

This is what I'm doing on IoT LTSC 2024.
I'll have to check, but I think my desktop shortcut leads to notepad.exe and it's the same as the app.
Posted on Reply
#40
ARF
ShihabWhat makes a "modern OS," exactly?
DirectX 13. DirectStorage 2.0, automatic scaling as on smartphones with Android, 4K-friendly, detection of poor quality DisplayPort and HDMI cables, interface that is user friendly, and requires less clicks, aka is faster, not slower, i.e. requiring more clicks as in windows 11.
Posted on Reply
#41
Shihab
ARFDirectX 13. DirectStorage 2.0
There is an implicit assumption here that DX12 is not "modern," which I'd love to hear the rationale for.
(And I'd hardly call a yet-to-exist specification modern).

The rest is a nice wish list. Some are questions of implementation quality rather than existence (e.g. autoscaling), others are highly subjective. e.g. user friendliness. And I question equating it with modernity in the first place. See critique of flat design back when it was the symbol of modernity.
ARFrequires less clicks, aka is faster, not slower, i.e. requiring more clicks as in windows 11.
Me thinks you're looking the wrong way there, mate. Reject modernity, embrace tradition!
Posted on Reply
#43
Vayra86
64KI stay perpetually disgusted with MS for many things over the decades but I'm curious why you think MS could ever become irrelevant? They are so deeply ingrained in the business world that there is no rooting them out. It's been tried before in 1998 and failed and they didn't have the stranglehold that they have today.
Well the major risk I see for them is that they will lose their unique selling point.

Windows as an offline OS that can do a lot locally is going to be a perk in an online world. They're throwing that away for a lot of people and its not only a shame, it will not help them differentiate from any mobile OS sooner rather than later. And we all know, they're not going to survive as just 'a mobile OS'. They're far behind on that front, their app store is still barely a factor of importance for example, and if they move towards gatekeeping all the things you do on Windows while Apple et all are just now getting forced to open up... Its not a big step either to hook a phone to a dock and a screen and work on it. You're using cloud anyway, right. Where's Windows Phone? :)

I don't know I don't see the space where Windows still needs to exist at that point. It'll be more of a 'yet another cloud service' that offers a rich Office experience and whatnot. So maybe they can carve out a bit of productivity-oriented space there in the consumer market. And then what's next? The next generation of users, or the one after that, grows up without Windows. Its already happening, except now Windows still has a chance to stand out as something special. Heck, you could probably do all of the productivity stuff just as well in any browser based app like Google Docs or something other that can often be had for free. Windows is the only ticket MS really has to keep a strong brand presence. And what will that generation opt for when they run their business next? Its far away I admit, but their cloud business alone won't save them, I think.
Posted on Reply
#45
Minus Infinity
LOL Notepad is still a thing. I must upgrade to Win 11 immediately!
Posted on Reply
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