[Solved] Those red lines again

[fullmark]

I have been in and out of the forum and tried all the advice and nothing works. My spreadsheets have every name underlined in red and even when I tell it to ignore all it does it then but when I reopen they are there again. I have deleted and now downloaded the latest version and there they are again. I am absolutely over it!! And being technologically unsound I rely on the very generous and knowledgeable people who know what they are doing. Usually with great success.....

[RoryOF]

The reason it has such names underlined in red is that the dictionary does not know that these are valid spellings. You need to add them to your dictionary. Note that correct words, such as "Aged", "Outlaw" etc are recognised. If your tables were being made in Writer, I think you could set these words to "do not check spelling" and it will thereafter ignore them (as in my test just now).

Spreadsheets are not designed for detailed text manipulation.

[fullmark]

But this has never happened to me before and I have done dozens of these spreadsheets with all these foreign (to English!) names and the spreadsheet has not even noticed. I would not worry for myself but I am contributing to a database and would hate that the person in charge has to try and manipulate my data over and above what they are already doing. I cannot add them all to the dictionary or I shall go mad and you would hear me in Ireland. Do I sound desperate - I might just be!!

[RoryOF]

Then you must ask yourself "what changes have I made to my computer?". I do not, and cannot, know.

[Bill]

But this has never happened to me before and I have done dozens of these spreadsheets with all these foreign (to English!) names and the spreadsheet has not even noticed.

AFAIK, that's impossible unless SpellCheck was turned off, the language was set to [None] or you had a user-defined dictionary that included the names. If SpellCheck is turned on, the language is set correctly and there is no user-defined dictionary, then SpellCheck won't know the names and will underline them.

[fullmark]

I wouldn't even know where to turn off spellcheck and my language is always set to Australian English and nothing else and I reiterate - until this week, it has never happened to me before. Of course, if the word is misspelt - like this thinks it is obviously - then it will be underlined and I will correct it but this is not what is happening - if it can't be fixed so be it but it would be nice to know that there is some little thing I can click on to make it look pretty again! As you can see by these dates, I have been doing it a while without a red line causing me grief. Ah well.

[robleyd]

Go to Tools | Options | Language Settings | Writing Aids; under Options, uncheck Check spelling as you type and see what happens.

[Bill]

eg1.JPG

I wouldn't even know where to turn off spellcheck and my language is always set to Australian English and nothing else and I reiterate - until this week, it has never happened to me before. Of course, if the word is misspelt - like this thinks it is obviously - then it will be underlined and I will correct it but this is not what is happening - if it can't be fixed so be it but it would be nice to know that there is some little thing I can click on to make it look pretty again! As you can see by these dates, I have been doing it a while without a red line causing me grief. Ah well.

Look at your screen shot. The underlined name appears in a box labeled "Not in dictionary" on the Spelling dialog. SpellCheck thinks the name is misspelled simply because the name is not in the dictionary. SpellCheck has no other way to determine if a word is actually spelled correctly. It can't be "fixed" to recognize that words not in the dictionary are actually spelled correctly. If the names weren't being underlined in the past, then something was wrong with your configuration.

[fullmark]

Thank you Rory and Bill for your assistance but the gold star will go to David! It worked! I am so thrilled - and if It made any sense to me I would demand an explanation but heavens, thank you all and I will leave you in peace until the next disaster. Many thanks.

Margaret F

[Bill]

My spreadsheets have every name underlined in red...

Looking at the first screen shot, that's not true. The English names aren't underlined. It's only the non-English names which are underlined. The English names are in your English dictionary. The non-English names are not.

[Bill]

Thank you Rory and Bill for your assistance but the gold star will go to David! It worked! I am so thrilled - and if It made any sense to me I would demand an explanation but heavens, thank you all and I will leave you in peace until the next disaster. Many thanks.

Margaret F

It worked because what you did was turn off AutoSpellCheck which means that no misspelled words will be underlined.

[John_Ha]

But this has never happened to me before and I have done dozens of these spreadsheets with all these foreign (to English!) names and the spreadsheet has not even noticed.

That is because you had never previously selected the Underline mis-spelled words icon so you never saw the red lines.

As a new poster you will find much useful information in the User Guides. May I suggest you bookmark the page.

When a pop-up window opens, click the Help button for extensive help on that function - it is often more comprehensive than the manual.

[jrkrideau]

On the toolbar there should be two buttons (ABC with a blue checkmark below the lettersand ABC with the squiggly red line below it). The button with the squiggly red line toggles between checking spelling while you type and not checking while typing.

Click on it and the red lines in the main body of the spreadsheet will disappear.

At a guess, you may have accidentally hid that button while doing something else.

[fullmark]

well, there you go John_ha and jrkrideau who knew? Thanks again.