Beware of 'Find and Replace'!

montholon

Beware of the 'find and replace' facility in Word! I've just been doing some editing of my new novel and couldn't understand why on earth I'd made reference to 'spectacular Lucies' by the German forces. Then I remembered that I'd changed the name of one of my characters from Victor to Luc.

heather

Haha.
I've done similar before and now always use 'replace next' rather than 'replace all'. It takes longer but you can check as you go along.

snailmale

It's a good job there isn't a 'find and replace' facility on Talkback. There are one or two members who would never be seen again.

mike olley

There should be a checkbox 'match whole words only' to avoid this scenario.

Lizy

I've made similar errors in my time - even worse, TBH.

If I remember correctly, the use of a space before and after both 'find' and 'replace' avoids most of them.

Noodlehendon

That is clever, Lizy, I'll remember that. Good tip.

Phots Moll

The space before and after causing problems if the word you're changing comes at the start or end of a sentence, or before a comma.

Mike is right about 'whole word only' being the best wa, but remember to go through and check for variations too. If it's a name, are they ever referred to by a shortened form? If another type of word has it been used as a plural or with ed, ing or something else on the end?

montholon

Thanks, everyone. I'll bear all your suggestions in mind.