Proofreading is not just editing; it is the process of reviewing the final draft of a piece of writing to ensure consistency and accuracy in grammar, spelling, punctuation, and formatting.
Proofreading is the process/technique of analyzing the final draft of a written piece to make sure:
- Spelling
- Punctuation
- consistency and accuracy in grammar
- sentence structure
- formatting
Proofreading originally refers to newspapers, where the editors check errors in the text, and all this is done on a computer.
How do we define proofreading? Proofreading is a process to detect errors and then rectify them in a final draft.
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Proofreading concentrates on removing such errors as punctuation, spelling mistakes, and sentence structure, etc. Proofreader’s work should be free of writing mistakes. Proofreaders’ main work is to find errors unnoticed by the spellchecker or the system and rectify those mistakes.
Proofread copy should have the following features:
- It must be free from all types of errors.
- Content should be well structured.
- Its writing should be perfect.
- Should be ready to be published
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You have to watch for the common grammatical mistakes, for example:-
It’s not “too” (too) late to order A Cookie!
The punctuation also makes all the difference, And sometimes your eyes play tricks too and skip the basic mistakes. Many online tools (browser extensions) like Grammarly and “Online Text Correction” quickly identify and remove grammatical errors. In some cases, you can use Microsoft word’s built-in spelling and grammar checking feature to locate and remove the spelling and grammatical mistakes accordingly.
The bottom line is, you still need to take a deep dive after you finished writing to create errors in the free final draft.