Pale Musings

Spelling is very important at Microsoft

While I am not saying that spelling is unimportant, indeed we should all try a little harder to improve our spelling and grammar, the update made available to me today in Vista just blows my mind.

Update for Windows Vista (KB995020)

It’s not so much that Microsoft feels it necessary to push out an update with five…yes that is only 5… words to the English and German dictionaries, it is the fact that it is flagged as important and that it may require a reboot!  The last time I looked, checking spelling has the option to add a word that has been flagged as incorrect to your local dictionary.  One button click is required to do this.  Uno.  Eins.  That’s it!  Yet, if I accept this update, according to the informational dialog, I may need to reboot!?  C’mon Microsoft!

I decided to read the knowledge base article for KB955020.  It shows me that the five words that will be added to the dictionaries are:

• Friendster (Is that a real word?)
• Nazr
• Obama (Oh c’mon, that’s a proper name!  Surely we can add that manually?)
• Racicot

KB995020 Article

Scrolling down in the article to the resolution section I see under Restart requirement that indeed I will have to reboot my computer.  Looking further down the page to the Workaround section shows me the Add to Dictionary method which I have already deduced.  The update itself just seems a bit unnecessary, don’t you agree?

In closing, beware of KB95502 from Microsoft Update as it may require you to reboot….all in the name of proper spelling.

July 14, 2008 - Posted by palehorse | Humor, Internet, Operating Systems, Windows