It doesn’t take a genius to know that spelling is an extremely important aspect on how we convey information – It allows us to present ourselves in a credible and professional light, it respects the reader’s time, and allows us to properly communicate.

This is especially true in the web development industry.

It can become frustrating for a web developer to work on projects if they are neither a native English speaker nor someone who is not accustomed to American English. Regretfully, there is no actual standard in what dialect a web developer must use when working on a new project.

In this blog, we will go over the main things every developer needs to put into consideration when working on a project, and more importantly, with a team.

Code Consistency

If you are a regular to our blogs, you might have heard this one before:

• Keep your code as simple as possible.
• Always keep your code organised.
• Make sure that your code is clean to easily spot errors and bugs.

The list goes on. However, if you’re new to our blogs or require a refresher, I do recommend reading the following articles by my fellow colleagues:

• Tips for Writing Clean and Readable Code by Jacques Le Roux
• The Beauty Of Writing Clean Code: Why Refactoring And Optimising Is Essential by Roger Ndaba.

Long story short, the above-mentioned advice is extremely important. If you choose to ignore said advice, you are making it difficult for yourself and for your fellow coders.

The number one thing that you must always remember is what type of spelling you are going to use in your code. If you are going to use American spelling (i.e. Color or Organization), it is highly advisable that you use it continuously. The same can be said for if you wish to use British spelling or spelling that belongs to similar dialects such as South African English, Australian English, New Zealand English, and other English dialects not mentioned.

Once again, it’s up to you to decide what path you want to take. Just make sure the variables you define and are implementing are the same across the entire site. Otherwise, it would lead to a catastrophe if unchecked.

Content Management

Managing content for a project can sometimes be a bit tedious for some. Some developers would rather prefer to just copy-paste the entire paragraph and call it a day.

Of course, I’m not stating you should read every paragraph and title thoroughly for an hour or so, but I would suggest skimming through the content before you publish and deploy it for the whole world to see. Clients can also make mistakes, especially if they keep providing you a goodly amount of content, which can range from images, videos, and sometimes an entire document that is worth 286 pages.

It can be annoying, and at times, confusing for those that subconsciously use one dialect instead of the other. This does of course, inhibit passing proper judgement on what the actual spelling and grammar should be. The most important thing you always need to keep in mind is what the client wants. If they made it clear that the site’s content needs to be in British English instead of American English, then you must ensure that everything aligns with the client’s vision.

If you believe that you don’t have enough confidence on passing judgement for what could be an issue, you could make use of services such as Grammarly and Typely to assist you in your endeavours.

However, it should still be noted that using such software does not always guarantee accuracy and could lead to issues in expressing the correct information if you are not careful. Different languages have different rules, so it is always wise to be wary of such details.

Documentation and Comments

In the previous sections, we talked about ensuring that your code is consistent and that you must ensure that the website’s content does not have any spelling or grammar errors. In this section we will be briefly talking about managing your spelling and grammar.

Everything that I have stated in the previous two sections can also be applied to the creation of documentation and comments, since both are summaries of what is happening on your project.

Furthermore, it should be fully noted that it is vital that you make your descriptions easy to read and can be easily understood.

If you were to make a comment that only consists of a large paragraph or explain what the page’s functionality consists of by only typing it out without highlighting anything, it can make it difficult for a client or developer to understand what is important or miss something while they skim through the pages.

So, in short, you need to do the following in order to avoid any pitfalls that would lead to miscommunication:

• Always make your descriptions digestible by separating main ideas into paragraphs.
• Always use bullet points to list functions, tabs or even sections in your documentation.
• Always create sub-bullets for your main bullets if the information is relevant for your document.
• Always ensure that function and button names are highlighted or bolded to ensure that the reader can easily see what functions and buttons are being mentioned when skimming through content.

I hope that this blog helps you improve in managing your web development journey, even if it does sometimes feel troublesome or maddening, it’s always the small things that make a huge difference.