Your pet peeve, technical or otherwise.

[Analog Kid]

Then there's:

o "hone in on" (should be "home in on", like a pigeon or a guided missile; you hone a knife on a whetstone)
o "reign in"; what, does your horse come with "reigns"? (rein/reign/rain)
o "based off of" (why not the much clearer and direct "based on"?) or "based out of" instead of "based in"

And yes, as you say it isn't all that complicated. Not rocket surgery.

[Ranayna]

o "high current will shorten it's life": misuse of apostrophe*
o "He acts like he's got nothing to loose."

It's always been a mystery for me how it is even possible that native English speakers make these mistakes. It's so easy to learn how to use these correctly even if English isn't your first language.

Well, you'd think, wouldn't you?
Maybe ask our own @coppercone2 here, who for some reason insists on using the lazy "your" for "you're", and "then" instead of "than" ("it's more complicated then that"). Native English-speaker, I'm pretty sure ...

I have often heard that these homonym errors are more common with native speakers than ESL people.

Though i make some similar mistakes quite often. I (and many germans) have trouble with "lose" and "loose" for example. They just sound the same to me, and it just looks weird with a single O. 
This goes so far that i did't even see that in Analog Kid's post at first. I thought he meant "he's" and wondered what's wrong with that.

[PlainName]

I have often heard that these homonym errors are more common with native speakers than ESL people.

If so, might be because a native speaker doesn't think about it so makes mistakes easily, whereas a non-native speaker has to think more and thus everything is above the radar. A native speaker is also probably more likely to type phonetically (hence the use of -of rather than the correct -have and similar), but a non-native may well type decent English and speak little, so they don't have that easy confusion.

But I think it's a bit off to be picky about forum posts. I, for instance, have a good grasp of English and even act as a copy editor, but I post some terrible mistakes because my fingers say I've typed what I meant to say and my eyes say "Fair enough, we'll do something else then". You really need to review every post to catch stuff, and even then you can read what you wanted to type rather than what you actually typed. We are not sitting an exam, here!

[Analog Kid]

I (and many germans) have trouble with "lose" and "loose" for example. They just sound the same to me, and it just looks weird with a single O. 

Different pronunciations:

Lose = "looze" (like "booze")
Loose = "luce" (like "juice")

[Analog Kid]

But I think it's a bit off to be picky about forum posts. I, for instance, have a good grasp of English and even act as a copy editor, but I post some terrible mistakes because my fingers say I've typed what I meant to say and my eyes say "Fair enough, we'll do something else then". You really need to review every post to catch stuff, and even then you can read what you wanted to type rather than what you actually typed. We are not sitting an exam, here!

True all that.

What I find really irritating is seeing these common spelling/grammar mistakes popping up more and more in places where the writer really ought to know better, like in newspaper and journal articles.

[shapirus]

o "reign in"; what, does your horse come with "reigns"? (rein/reign/rain)

This reminds me of a curious word play: Slayer's beautiful album "Reign in Blood" has a track named "Raining Blood".

[PlainName]

where the writer really ought to know better, like in newspaper and journal articles

Oh yes! Mail Online is notorious for that. They must pluck teenagers off the street to do the writing (probably for a tube of glue a day).

[shapirus]

where the writer really ought to know better, like in newspaper and journal articles

Oh yes! Mail Online is notorious for that. They must pluck teenagers off the street to do the writing (probably for a tube of glue a day).

Do they still sniff glue these days? I thought all the interesting stuff has long been removed from it.

[MathWizard]

Lately it's the huge google.com sign-in box, that appears on so many websites, and won't go away unless you click on it.

[PlainName]

Do they still sniff glue these days?

Sorry, showing my age. I think it's laughing gas now, or perhaps even that is passé 

[RJSV]

   In my experience, the smartphone goes back and changes my words, so I have to watch it like a cop.   That gets complicated as the small screen requires that I SCROLL back and forth (horizontally),  sneaking back to check that AutoComplete didn't totally SHIT on one of my key words, in the discussion.

   Today, "I let the puppy lay on my big coat."

Changed by sutocomete:
(also note how AutoComplete got mangled, ...numerous but irking).

   "Today, I let the puppy lay on my COST".

Wrong wrong wrong,  wrong wrong...(Say Dr. John)
- - -  Rick Jack

[RJSV]

   Oh yeah,...my point:
   Point is, that sometimes looks like the comment poster was correct, but word got changed, out of the poster's control.
  Thus we see 'lose' and 'loose' get mixed up.

[RJSV]

  Concerned, that I've started to notice IDENTICAL errors, in government agencies, and in television or Internet media things, like menus and lists.
   It's as if they contract with, uh, somebody same as consumers use...

[Analog Kid]

   Oh yeah,...my point:
   Point is, that sometimes looks like the comment poster was correct, but word got changed, out of the poster's control.
  Thus we see 'lose' and 'loose' get mixed up.

So what? The solution to this problem is paying attention.
Look, Rick, everyone on the planet now knows about autocorrect and autocomplete and all the ridiculousness they cause, so what you're bitching about is a triviality.

[nctnico]

Has anyone mentioned the way people pack test equipment like fish & chips wrapped in a newspaper? If yes, sorry for the repeat, but I witnessed a new low. A 100k+ instrument packed in a single walled box with next to no padding and shipped across 4 countries in Europe. I can't go into the details but I'm so f-ing annoyed even though the instrument isn't mine... 

[RJSV]

   No, that's incorrect.  One key word mangled and the whole meaning gets trashed, wasting other readers time, and killing the point being attempted.
   Do you always see 'COST, and stay open minded that it might have meant 'COAT'...ironically a point where, I just corrected even this message 3 x. !

[Analog Kid]

   No, that's incorrect.  One key word mangled and the whole meaning gets trashed, wasting other readers time, and killing the point being attempted.
   Do you always see 'COST, and stay open minded that it might have meant 'COAT'...ironically a point where, I just corrected even this message 3 x. !

Well, your first problem is that you're composing your posts on your goddamn phone. What do you expect?
I use a computer--you know, those things with keyboards? No autocorrect, no autocomplete here.
And no (or very few) "fat finger" mistakes either.

[RJSV]

Thanks, Analog Kid,  that's actually the first time I've heard that there was a big difference, in quality of interface.  Something to think about.
I've been trudging to the public library, for times when needing the full screen.

   Plus I haven't mentioned have major broken glass,  almost ruined the touch screen response, so have been coping with that distraction, simultaneously.

But anyway, I was attempting to defend some of the peeves as not being a persons fault, sometimes, as the autocorrect changes things way after they were typed...almost like a human's compulsive redo of the spelling.

[MathWizard]

o "reign in"; what, does your horse come with "reigns"? (rein/reign/rain)

This reminds me of a curious word play: Slayer's beautiful album "Reign in Blood" has a track named "Raining Blood".

I liked how on the GTA Vice City , Rock radio station, it would play the Anthrax song Madhouse, then lead into Raining Blood. I don't know much of either bands, but I love both those songs. And causing chaos in GTA games.

[Ranayna]

   Oh yeah,...my point:
   Point is, that sometimes looks like the comment poster was correct, but word got changed, out of the poster's control.
  Thus we see 'lose' and 'loose' get mixed up.

So what? The solution to this problem is paying attention.
Look, Rick, everyone on the planet now knows about autocorrect and autocomplete and all the ridiculousness they cause, so what you're bitching about is a triviality.

I have a couple of examples of autocorrect causing significant misunderstandings.
The company in Germany i work at has all computers set to english. That includes the spellchecking and autocorrect settings that are set to english by default.
Supposedly, Microsoft products are able to handle using another language if it is installed, but in practice this often does not work.

Since we are in Germany, a lot of german is used in emails.
But if autocorrect mistakenly thinks you are writing in english, while you really are using german, some serious mangling happens.
For example, the german word "noch", translating to "still", is replaced by "nich". Nich, in colloquial german, is a shortening of "nicht", commonly translated to "not".
So this replacement drastically changes the meaning of a sentence: "Das muss ich noch erledigen" ("I still need to do that") is changed to "Das muss ich nich erledigen" ("I do not need to do that").

And i don't even have any idea what "nich" would even mean in english

[Xena E]

Yes, you have to be careful. A fair proportion of the English language is based on German/Saxon: some similar words though have different meanings...

I don't  know of a word nich but there is niche, which means a "small place".

Some mistakes and "treachery of words" within text compilers and spell checkers do seem suspiciously orchestrated to catch people out.

X

[shapirus]

I don't  know of a word nich but there is niche, which means a "small place".

Which, curiously, has a French origin, and not a German one

[mendip_discovery]

Has anyone mentioned the way people pack test equipment like fish & chips wrapped in a newspaper? If yes, sorry for the repeat, but I witnessed a new low. A 100k+ instrument packed in a single walled box with next to no padding and shipped across 4 countries in Europe. I can't go into the details but I'm so f-ing annoyed even though the instrument isn't mine... 

We get it all the time, a height gauge arrived the other day and it was only wrapped in thin plastic wrap.

I even had to have words with the people at work. They thought they were saving on postage by putting it in one box. Once I asked them to find the prices to replace that kit they changed their minds. When you have >500k of kit in one box it starts to sink in that we need to make sure its packed in a way so it won't get damaged.


For those complaining about words, people are happy with the term OK yet that is just down to a misspelling. I would just keep using the correct ones, at least its not management speak "lets socialise that idea".

[Xena E]

I don't  know of a word nich but there is niche, which means a "small place".

Which, curiously, has a French origin, and not a German one

The classic confusable between English and German of course is the german meaning for the word Gift...

[RJSV]

(Dave should charge Pet Peeve posters a subscription fee, lol):

   Advertisements that print all upper case,  for email contacts.  Unless I'm wrong, pretty sure the 'dot com' portion must be lower case ?
Something like 'Freddy'sCakes.com' must be correct case, whether upper lower.
      ??