Description

What is StyleWriter?

Designed by experts to pass on their expertise

Designed by journalists, editors and business writing tutors, StyleWriter gives you the skills of a good newspaper subeditor. Simply click the StyleWriter button in Microsoft Word's or WordPerfect's toolbar to launch a check for the common faults and bad habits found in writing. Trimming the excess words, simplifying and clarifying your style, checking for good English usage is easy with StyleWriter.

Encourages the clearest writing style

StyleWriter works by teaching you to write in plain English - the style underlying all great writing. Don't think plain English is simplistic or patronizing. Plain English is clear English. It's the style of all great writers. Mark Twain, Ernest Hemmingway and John Steinbeck are writers with a simple, clear and direct style. Time, Newsweek, Scientific America and the Washington Post - just about every successful publication - owe their popularity and readership to adopting a clear, readable style.

Look at your writing through the editor's eyes

Imagine you could afford to pay an editor to improve every document you write. Send off your business plan, technical report or sales letter and you'd get a shorter, clearer and more effective document back. But the cost would be hundreds of dollars a week.

With StyleWriter you can edit your own documents and save money. Sure, a professional editor would show you other ways to improve your document, but you could get most of the advice offered by running StyleWriter through your text.

Break your writing habits

Good writing transfers ideas and information from the writer to the reader clearly and concisely. StyleWriter encourages the clearest style so your reader concentrates and acts on your message rather than struggles to understand what you want to say.

StyleWriter helps you write in the clear English style by identifying words and phrases in your writing that get in the way of clarity and poor style. It doesn't encourage a standard style. There's plenty of room for individual style, rhetoric and imaginative writing. So let StyleWriter help you get rid of your poor writing habits, present in most writing, and let you express yourself in your own words.

Gain new writing skills

StyleWriter shows you how to run the editorial pen through everything you write to make it clear, concise and readable. Why waste time drafting average documents when you can use StyleWriter to write documents that get the results that you want?

• Sales letters bring in more business.

• Press releases get more media coverage.

• Readers act on your suggestions.

• People compliment you on your style and clarity.

• Contracts don't cause disputes because they are clear.

• Web pages get more visitors.

Good writing is easy reading that guarantees you keep your readers' attention. Writing well helps you write successfully. StyleWriter users claim the program has led to better results when they write. Use it on any document.

More powerful than your grammar checker

Ten times as powerful and a hundred times more useful than the standard grammar checker in your word processor. Let's face it, we all know how poor grammar checkers are at improving writing. They assume you cannot write a sentence and constantly flag correct English as bad grammar. In a test of sentences with 25 grammatical errors, respondents spotted between 20 and 25 of the errors when they read the sentences. When Microsoft Word's grammar checker went through the same examples, it only spotted 6 out of the 25 errors.

Do grammar checkers really work?

More accurate than your grammar checker

StyleWriter is not a grammar checker. Grammar checkers try to show you how to write a correct sentence by analyzing each word for its part of speech and then only accepting sentences if the parts of speech are in the right order. StyleWriter does not parse the sentence but looks for the poor style habits that you can change to improve the quality of writing.

You will improve your grammar if you write clearly and concisely, using shorter sentences and active verbs. StyleWriter constantly encourages you to adopt this clear style and forces you to read your work. Thus, many grammar mistakes in your writing will disappear as you rework your original text.

So good even professionals use StyleWriter
Designed by journalists, editors and business writing tutors, StyleWriter gives you the skills of a good newspaper subeditor. Simply click the StyleWriter button in Microsoft Word's or WordPerfect's toolbar to launch a check for the common faults and bad habits found in writing. Trimming the excess words, simplifying and clarifying your style, checking for good English usage is easy with StyleWriter.

StyleWriter's Features

The most powerful way to edit any document

Call StyleWriter up by clicking a button in your word processor's toolbar. StyleWriter displays all your editing problems at the same time. As you begin editing, StyleWriter offers intelligent alternatives and sound advice to help you edit your document into simple, concise, plain English. With a split screen of StyleWriter and your word processor, you can go through your document at your own pace. You can click on any style or usage problem with your mouse, or click back to your word processor to edit your text.

StyleWriter edits any document. Articles, press releases, resumes and cover letters, technical manuals, speeches, ads, sales letters, proposals, legal documents, corporate communications - you name it, StyleWriter can help edit it. Within seconds of launching, StyleWriter has analyzed your documents for thousands of style and English usage issues including:

Style Issues		English Usage
Complex words Overused words Jargon/Abstract words Wordy phrases Passive verbs Foreign words Qualifying words Confused hyphens Clichés Legal words Long Sentences Sentence Variety		Misused Words Confused Words Hyphenation Sexist Writing Common Grammar Slips Miscellaneous Preferred Spelling

Without StyleWriter Dear Mr Thompson: We have now completed the majority of our redrafting work conducted on an annual basis for your management brochure however a number of issues still remain to be addressed before it can be sent for printing. I have been asked to follow-up on a number of questions that need to be answered by yourself or your head of public affairs. I would be grateful if you could give this matter your urgent attention. Should you have any questions concerning the information required, please do not hesitate to contact me.		With StyleWriter Dear Mr Thompson: We have completed most of this year's redrafting work on your corporate management brochure. However, you need to address some issues before we print the brochure. I need to follow up these questions with you or your head of public affairs. Please look at these issues urgently and contact me if you need more information.
Words: 93 StyleWriter suggested improvements 17: 6 wordy phrases · 2 complex words · 3 business clichés · 5 passive verbs · 1 long sentence · 1 grammar error (by yourself) 1 hyphenation error (follow-up)		Words: 60 The StyleWriter recommended redraft is 60 words - 33 percent shorter.

Full-screen editing plus your word processor

StyleWriter's displays all of its editing advice at once. You can expand the screen to show a page of your document, with each problem or issue highlighted. The top of the screen shows you how to edit your document into concise, clear English. You can make most changes by just clicking the blue alternative shown. If you want to make more extensive changes - and you will - just click StyleWriter's Edit button and you're in your familiar word processor with all its advanced editing features.

Instant analysis and ratings of every document

StyleWriter gives you instant, relevant analysis and scores. Most other writing aids offer you simplistic readability formulas. These measure, often inaccurately, your sentence length and a syllable count to define long words. There's more to good writing than sentence length and word length.

Click here to learn more

StyleWriter has three key scores and ratings shown at the bottom of the program's screen.

1. The Style Index - an overall score of the clarity of your style.

2. The Average Sentence Length - an important readability measure.

3. The Passive Index - a measure of the most common writing problem.

Each score and rating becomes instantly updated as you edit your document.

When you edit with StyleWriter, you'll discover that StyleWriter shortens sentences and strengthens words. Readers can easily take in and remember your message and as they find your writing style easy and understandable.

Constant updating of advice, analysis and ratings

As you edit, StyleWriter updates the text, analysis and ratings for your document. Each time you shorten a sentence, cut a redundant phrase or simplify your word choice, StyleWriter updates the text, reanalyzes your documents and give you new scores and ratings. This real time change helps you see your writing style improve.

 Fine-tuning the analysis to your document

You can adapt StyleWriter's analysis and ratings to the type of document you're drafting. An advertisement needs to have a punchy, direct writing style; a manual needs to be clear and simple; a report can carry more complex ideas. So you can tell StyleWriter the type of document you're drafting and it will alter its analysis and ratings to reflect the different styles expected. For example, you'll get a higher Style Index and stricter ratings if you tell StyleWriter you're writing an advertisement rather than a report.

Choose from 12 writing tasks to fine-tune StyleWriter's analysis.

See an instant graph of sentence variety

StyleWriter gives you an instant graph of your sentence variety so you can see if you're mixing long and short sentences to add interest to your style. While short sentences make easy reading, good writing contains good sentence variety and a readable average sentence length between 15 to 20 words. The program will even pop-up a warning if your sentence average drops below 12 words - a sign you're taking the idea of short sentences too far.

Use sentence variety to add interest to your writing style.

See a breakdown of your writing problems

Identify your writing habits in every document. The left-hand side of StyleWriter's Category Summary Screen shows the style problems in document you're checking. You'll find this a great way to know if your style is passive and wordy, abstract or stale.

Use StyleWriter's summary of writing issues to identify your writing habits.

StyleWriter puts you in control

StyleWriter puts you in control of the problems it highlights in your writing. For example, if you find your main writing problems are passive and hidden verbs, you can ask the program to switch off all other categories and concentrate on these problems.

Choose which problems you want StyleWriter to highlight.

Add advice to StyleWriter

You can add advice to StyleWriter to increase the power and accuracy of the program. The more you use StyleWriter the more your writing and editing skills improve. Learning the main techniques of good editors makes you think like an editor and you'll soon spot other ways to improve your writing. For example, suppose you notice you are overusing the words 'provide', 'involve' and 'undertake', you simply add them to the program and ask the program to pop up some relevant advice. It's as easy as using search and replace on your word processor. But StyleWriter searches for everything you add and its 35,000 style and usage patterns check every time you run the program.

Add any editing advice to StyleWriter

Delete any advice that annoys you

Deleting advice from the program is easy. Anything that annoys you - perhaps because it has a different industry-specific meaning - you can easily remove.

Fine-tune StyleWriter's advice to suit your writing needs.

Make context-sensitive exceptions

You can make context-sensitive changes to StyleWriter's advice to fine-tune it to your own writing needs. For example, StyleWriter suggests replacing 'purchasing' with 'buying' to simplify your style. But what if your job title is 'Purchasing Manager'?. You can make 'purchasing manager' an exception. Then every time StyleWriter checks a document it highlights all occurrences of 'purchasing' unless the next word is 'manager'.

Fine-tuning StyleWriter's advice is easy.

Review the changes made to the program

StyleWriter records any changes you make to the program so you can review and even reverse them. Most users delete or make exceptions to between 10 and 50 of StyleWriter's 35,000 patterns. StyleWriter's Review Changed Patterns feature lets you view every change you've made.

Review your changes to StyleWriter's database.

Bring StyleWriter's power to your documents

StyleWriter looks for patterns in language and uses wild cards to find thousands of variants of problems in writing. This gives the program immense searching power. StyleWriter has 35,000 style and English usage checks designed to reflect patterns in the English language. For example:

Before StyleWriter

Mr Jones has reached his decision and will take his retirement option next year.

After StyleWriter

Mr James has decided to retire next year.

Editors recognize 'reached his decision' and 'take retirement' as hidden verb - expressions you can turn from nouns to verbs to improve style, add action and save words. Because StyleWriter uses wild cards within its pattern searches, it doesn't matter if you write 'reached his decision', 'reaching different decisions' or 'reached my decision'. StyleWriter finds each variant hidden verb and thousands of other possible hidden verbs with just a few coded patterns.

StyleWriter, by using wild cards to match with patterns editors spot in text, is the world's most powerful writing aid.

Bring the power of StyleWriter to your writing.

Use StyleWriter for different writing tasks

You can call up StyleWriter's extensive help screens for different writing tasks. Perhaps you have to write a sales letter for the first time. Simply click on StyleWriter's Writing Tips and you'll find expert advice. You can also call up this advice from your word processor's help menu so it's available when you first draft your document..

StyleWriter helps you tackle different writing tasks.

Use StyleWriter's help screens for more editing advice

If you want more advice, just click your mouse on the problem and up pops the relevant help screen with more editing advice.

For example, if you've used a grammar checker you'll notice it stops on passive verbs. But you probably don't understand why using passive verbs are a problem or what to do with them. StyleWriter, with its accurate and comprehensive search for passive verbs, explains why passive verbs are such a problem and shows you simple techniques to switch them to the shorter, more direct active style.

Look at this government example. Changing the passive verbs (shown in red) into active verbs (shown in blue) saves 18 per cent of the words.

Before StyleWriter

It was estimated by the research that half of the states would adopt the approach, and that savings of up to $900 million a year would be made. However, to make sure these savings are guaranteed estimates will need to be recalculated by the Department of Labor for accuracy. (49 words)

After StyleWriter

The research estimated half of the states would adopt this approach and could save up to $900 million a year. The Department of Labor will need to recalculate this estimate to guarantee these savings are accurate. (36 words)

Switching passive verbs to active verbs is easy with StyleWriter's expert editing advice.

Keep track of your improved writing skills

StyleWriter's Statistical Archive lets you record the word count, style index, average sentence length and passive index of every document. StyleWriter records your scores when it first checks the document (the original draft score) and when you finished editing (the redraft score). The Statistical Archive lets you measure the improvement you make to each document. By looking at the original draft score, you can see how your general writing standard improves.

StyleWriter keeps a record of the writing scores for every document checked.