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Spell check enabled but not working
Running Firefox 110.0.1 (64-bit) on Windows 11 Pro.
Spell check does not work. No red underlining of spelling mistakes. It is enabled and about:config confirms it. This happened to me a couple of times under Windows 10 and much older versions of Firefox. This is a recurring theme without a one-stop resolution.
Anyone? Thanks
Wšykne wótegrona (4)
OK, I worked it out.
Firstly, Chrome does this out of the box for English US, UK, AUS (at least).
Why does it have to be so difficult in Firefox?
The check box for "Check spelling as you type" should come with a warning to say you may need a "Dictionary" and to go here: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-GB/firefox/language-tools/ to download it. Instead the option sets you up for failure. Considering that most users on this planet will simply not be able to use Spell Check as their language is not English (US)???
This Dictionaries and Languages pages is actually confusing because it makes you believe you can download any of the recommended items, wheras the first one is a "Language" and only the latter two are "Dictionaries". I believe this is the source of confusion for most people.
Why do non US users have to go through all this manual hunting for a solution? Licensing issue? Why don't you ask the Dictionary creators if you can incorporate into the core app? Would they really mind? I think the devs have this one figured all wrong.
Wót NadJ2020
Only a few locales come with a dictionary due to licensing reasons. This has been the case ever since inline spell checker existed in Firefox as of Firefox 2.0
On top of the https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/language-tools/ page there is a description of what the dictionaries and language packs are used for so there should be minimal confusion ideally. But then again not everybody reads before installing or using things.
Also when you want to look up how to spell a word you look in a dictionary so the same is the case with spell checker.
I am guilty of not RTFM but....please don't tell me there's no room for improvement in the way Firefox implements this option. One would think "Check spelling as you type" is all you need. Users don't expect to go anywhere else to get the thing working especially as they're not being asked to from within the app.
It's just poor implementation.
Wót NadJ2020
It is possible that you confused dictionary with language pack and that you actually do not have a dictionary installed.
Do you have a dictionary installed and selected?
You can see which dictionary is selected if you right-click in a text area and open the Languages sub menu. At least one dictionary should be installed and have a check mark to indicate that it is selected.
- open the "Add Dictionaries" link to install a dictionary if you do not have one.
The spelling checker is enabled if [X] "Check Spelling" in the right-click context menu has a checkmark.
Note that in current releases you can enable multiple dictionaries.