Editing
Check numbers in a nonfiction manuscript
Treat figures as claims that have to agree with their context. A number check includes units, dates, comparisons and the calculations behind the sentence.
Build the list from the manuscript
A correctly spelled word can still be the wrong word. A specialist term may resemble an ordinary one, and a person’s name may have two familiar spellings. Automated checking is least reassuring when the error looks normal.
Collect names and terms as you read. Include people, organisations, locations, product names, abbreviations and vocabulary particular to the subject. Record the preferred form, the source used to verify it, and any allowed variation. A list assembled from memory will miss the words most likely to cause trouble.
Check against an appropriate authority. A person’s own professional page may settle how they present their name; an organisation’s current materials may establish its capitalisation. Historical usage can require a source from the period. Do not modernise an old name automatically when the date matters to the passage.
Distinguish a spelling decision from a factual one. Confirming that a river name is spelled correctly does not show that the river passes through the town described. Mark factual questions separately so that a neat terminology list does not create false confidence.
Search for variants deliberately
Search the preferred form, then likely alternatives: a missing accent, a changed initial, an old organisation name, or a hyphenated version of a technical compound. Check possessives and plurals too. Whole-word searching can prevent one name from matching the middle of another, but may also miss forms you need to review.
Read each result in context. Two people can have similar names, and a quotation may legitimately use an older term. Replacing every occurrence of an apparent variant can create errors that are harder to notice than the original inconsistency.
For an abbreviation, confirm that the expanded form agrees with the letters and is introduced where the reader needs it. A chapter designed to stand alone may need the explanation again. Do not assume that defining it once in a long book is always sufficient.
Keep the final decisions with the manuscript when it goes to an editor or designer. A concise entry such as “organisation name: retain lower-case initial as used by the organisation” prevents somebody from correcting an intentional form. Mark genuinely unresolved questions rather than giving them a guessed answer. The list becomes useful because its certainty is visible.
