Elizabeth Bevilacqua ([info]princessleia2) wrote,
@ 2008-03-20 14:37:00
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typo*

So, I’m sitting in IRC and someone says:

<person> I am typing bdaly
<person> badly*

See, they use this “typo*” syntax to correct their typo. What is that? Where did that syntax come from? No one I asked seems to know, there are theories ranging from it being some old DOS thing (hmm?) to it just being some arbitrary typo correction syntax that someone started and it caught on.

FWIW, I don’t see this a whole lot, most channels I’m in you’d see “s/bdaly/badly” used for typo correction …because we’re nerds, and I know where that comes from!


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[info]pdx6
2008-03-20 07:40 pm UTC (link)
I don't know where the star syntax comes from. I usually say "er..." followed by the corrected statement, or a regular expression.

I personally find the star corrections confusing, because I parse them as either wildcards or to expect a footnote.

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[info]curson
2008-03-20 08:55 pm UTC (link)
Shouldn't "*typo" be more correct...
I use s/typo/correct/ but just because I'm vim addicted ;)

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[info]kattphud
2008-03-20 10:29 pm UTC (link)
Who knows where it came from, but it works. It's like a colloquialism on the Internet; most people seem to know what it means, even though it really doesn't make much sense.

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[info]shades3d
2008-03-21 12:53 am UTC (link)
I actually don't use the *, I use '.

typo
'correction

etc

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[info]ehowton
2008-03-21 03:18 am UTC (link)
I type 80wpm but never at 100% accuracy. So if I typo something, unless its makes it a completely different word altogether (heh - like 'awk' vs. 'afk') I usually don't bother. Besides, with so many young people online, they probably thought I was trying to be l33t.

"The thing is, Bob, it's not that I'm lazy, it's that I just don't care."

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typo syntax
(Anonymous)
2008-03-21 03:52 pm UTC (link)
i use the * just because its less strokes than s/mispell/correctspell. I take the "*" to just to draw attention to corrected word

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[info]escapenguin
2008-03-22 01:20 am UTC (link)
Ah, this is an AOLism.

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