To or Too, that is the question, lol

[hiredgun]

This only applies to gesture style keyboards, and "swyping," but what is the reason that NO keyboard I have seen so far can tell when to use "to" and "too" correctly? It can't just be because of the grammar rules, because you can easily program those into any app I imagine, like when to capitalize the "I" for example, which works 99% of the time. Is it because the keyboard would actually have to UNDERSTAND the context of the sentence AND the English language to give you the correct suggestion first? Nine times out of ten it gives you "to" when you really want "too" and while some people just use it anyways, it really bugs me to even text incorrectly! I've even resorted to using "2" because it saves me one keystroke of swyping "too" getting "to" and having to press "too" in the prediction box. Any chance they will come up with the technology to get this right one day, or anyone using a keyboard that will "swype" this right now?

 

[John Bean]

I understand your frustration. Many people don't care about grammar anymore but I'm not one of them and misused "confusables" like to/too or your/you're really grate on me when I read them.

In fairness to the phone in your example it's quite hard to make a machine rule for the use of to/too. Consider these two correct uses:

1. I often get too many spam emails.
2. I can get to many places.

Can you think of any simple way to identify the correct to/too?

 

[hiredgun]

I understand your frustration. Many people don't care about grammar anymore but I'm not one of them and misused "confusables" like to/too or your/you're really grate on me when I read them.

In fairness to the phone in your example it's quite hard to make a machine rule for the use of to/too. Consider these two correct uses:

1. I often get too many spam emails.
2. I can get to many places.

Can you think of any simple way to identify the correct to/too?

It's nice to know that I'm not alone on this John, I just can't stand "I miss you to" either, lol. And you might be on to something there, if we could remember how WE learned to say them correctly maybe someone could teach the machine TOO, lol.

 

[John Bean]

We need real AI that can learn the language much as we do rather than just following rules.

The thing about human language - and especially English - is that the "rules" are full of exceptions that must be learned; I'm reminded of an odd discussion I had some years ago on a camera "gear" forum where a non-English member who referred to his camera equipment as "my gears" took umbrage when I gently pointed out that in English it's always "gear" (not "gears") in this context, no matter that there may be a lot of it.

His English was actually pretty good and all I was trying to do was help him polish off a few rough edges that were making him the butt of jokes by some less kind members, but instead he argued vehemently that if a clock could be full of gears then his camera bag could also be full of his "gears", so I was wrong. I pointed out that this could indeed be true, but only if he removed his camera gear and filled his bag with cogs.

Eventually he became quite abusive and accused me of being a racist. I'm sure the exchange caused much amusement to the forum lurkers before a moderator removed most of the it and banned him. He's still around, although not on the same site. And he still talks about "my gears"

 

[Stuntman]

Swype has a convention where if you want to type a double letter, you do a tiny circle on the key you want. If you want to type "to", you trace from the T to the O. If you want to type "too", you trace from the T to the O and then do a little circle over the O.

SwiftKey Flow tends to do a good job at figuring out the context and does a fairly good job at figuring out whether or not you mean "too" or "to". It does need some context, so if you start a sentence with "too" or "to", SwiftKey will not have enough information to figure out which word you want. You could be typing, "Too many cooks spoil the broth" or "To be or not to be". There is no reasonable way for a keyboard to figure out what you mean to type if you haven't typed anything else yet.

 

[hiredgun]

Swype has a convention where if you want to type a double letter, you do a tiny circle on the key you want. If you want to type "to", you trace from the T to the O. If you want to type "too", you trace from the T to the O and then do a little circle over the O.

SwiftKey Flow tends to do a good job at figuring out the context and does a fairly good job at figuring out whether or not you mean "too" or "to". It does need some context, so if you start a sentence with "too" or "to", SwiftKey will not have enough information to figure out which word you want. You could be typing, "Too many cooks spoil the broth" or "To be or not to be". There is no reasonable way for a keyboard to figure out what you mean to type if you haven't typed anything else yet.

I actually have both paid versions, so I'll have to go back and try them for a while and let you know. I don't remember them nailing it, but maybe I was focused on some other bug, lol.

 

[Shocky]

Not sure, I disable auto correction and suggestions as both annoy me.

I understand your frustration. Many people don't care about grammar anymore but I'm not one of them and misused "confusables" like to/too or your/you're really grate on me when I read them.

In fairness to the phone in your example it's quite hard to make a machine rule for the use of to/too. Consider these two correct uses:

1. I often get too many spam emails.
2. I can get to many places.

Can you think of any simple way to identify the correct to/too?

Don't care outside of a work environment, most of us have busy life's and more important things to think about than the grammar and spelling of total strangers online.

Users share their free time on various forums looking of help or just looking to discuss something they enjoy, they're not coming here for grammar or English lessons.

 

[John Bean]

Don't care outside of a work environment, most of us have busy life's and more important things to think about than the grammar and spelling of total strangers online.

Good for you (and no irony implied). The thing is that some people (including me) suffer from OCD (obsessive compulsive disorder) and are often disturbed by things that are of no consequence to the majority of non-sufferers. I'm sure most people don't care one way or the other about grammar and spelling, but please don't be judgemental about those who seem to take it seriously - there may be reasons for the behaviour that you don't fully understand.

Oh, and that would be 'busy lives"...

Sorry, my resident OCD pedant made me do it

 

[mikedt]

Think it's one of those English language semantics that can be difficult for machine AI and people often get them wrong as well, a few more would be, "your" vs "you're", or "were", "where" or "we're"

 

[hiredgun]

I agree with you both, and Mike too, lol. There are people that don't mind "butchering" the English language in texts or on forums, and that's great for them, and then there are people like John and myself that hate to type "I'll miss you to." Mike is probably right that the semantics are just too hard for a AI machine to grasp. There are several keyboards with text expansion features, after reading all the posts here I am thinking that could be a solution for a few "canned" replies!

P.S. Was just texting with my family in the States, and I wrote "way too long." I don't even think there is a rule for that usage, as native English speakers we just KNOW it's "too" long because someone told us in grammar school ages ago (for some of us, lol). Probably no way you can "teach" a machine that. Maybe just a good predictive keyboard will "remember" the correct usage if you give it enough context like Stuntman said!

 

[John Bean]

An AI would have no more trouble with language than a human - but no AI exists (yet).

Anything that executes stored programs without understanding is just a dumb machine no matter how "clever" its algorithm may be. In contrast an AI would be a very smart machine indeed, understanding what it was doing and learning from experience, much as we do.

 

[zuben el genub]

Homonyms will give anyone fits. Some can be told apart by usage - affect vs effect if you are using voice, but some will depend on pronunciation, like Route. Some say rout, like a lopsided sports score, and some say root, like Route 66. If it's spelled correctly, it goes.

Like Mary, marry, and merry. Used to be NYC, New England, and some southern states said them differently.

 

[hiredgun]

Homonyms will give anyone fits. Some can be told apart by usage - affect vs effect if you are using voice, but some will depend on pronunciation, like Route. Some say rout, like a lopsided sports score, and some say root, like Route 66. If it's spelled correctly, it goes.

Like Mary, marry, and merry. Used to be NYC, New England, and some southern states said them differently.

Very true, I even now often find myself pausing to decide which "affect/effect" I want to use!

 

[Hadron]

Homonyms will give anyone fits. Some can be told apart by usage - affect vs effect if you are using voice, but some will depend on pronunciation, like Route.

I pronounce "affect" and "effect" differently, so to me that's one of the second type (though it's not a huge difference like rout vs root).

P.S. Was just texting with my family in the States, and I wrote "way too long." I don't even think there is a rule for that usage, as native English speakers we just KNOW it's "too" long because someone told us in grammar school ages ago (for some of us, lol).

There is a simple rule for that one: it's "too" denoting excess, as in "too much, too young". Quantity is always "too", direction is "to".

 

[hiredgun]

I pronounce "affect" and "effect" differently, so to me that's one of the second type (though it's not a huge difference like rout vs root).



There is a simple rule for that one: it's "too" denoting excess, as in "too much, too soon". Quantity is always "too", direction is "to".

I take my hat off to you for pointing that out sir!

 

[Hadron]

Shame I mistyped the song reference and didn't fix it until too late....

 

[John Bean]

There is a simple rule for that one: it's "too" denoting excess, as in "too much, too young". Quantity is always "too", direction is "to".

Indeed, but in text form how can a machine determine whether quantity or direction is the intended meaning in a text fragment? We know because we understand the context from experience of what went before, but the machine can't. For example, these could be replies to an earlier text message:

Too many places.
To many places.

Without understanding the conversation it is impossible to determine which is the intended meaning.

 

[exninja]

Swype has a convention where if you want to type a double letter, you do a tiny circle on the key you want. If you want to type "to", you trace from the T to the O. If you want to type "too", you trace from the T to the O and then do a little circle over the O.

SwiftKey Flow tends to do a good job at figuring out the context and does a fairly good job at figuring out whether or not you mean "too" or "to". It does need some context, so if you start a sentence with "too" or "to", SwiftKey will not have enough information to figure out which word you want. You could be typing, "Too many cooks spoil the broth" or "To be or not to be". There is no reasonable way for a keyboard to figure out what you mean to type if you haven't typed anything else yet.

This. I noticed that my first Android phone, a Samsung Galaxy Prevail, did this and it usually got it right when I wanted a double letter. My two phones since haven't cared one bit how many little circles I make, it always defaults with "to." Also, I don't see a short way of swyping "we're." Seems that one is doomed to always default to "were."

 

[Stuntman]

Homonyms will give anyone fits. Some can be told apart by usage - affect vs effect if you are using voice, but some will depend on pronunciation, like Route. Some say rout, like a lopsided sports score, and some say root, like Route 66. If it's spelled correctly, it goes.

I pronounce the word route, ROUT when I use it as a verb and ROOT when I use it as a noun. For example, "Traffic was ROU-ted to ROOT 66."

With regard to word usage, I think there is no excuse for using "irregardless".

Here's a video that I'm sure many can relate to: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Gv0H-vPoDc

This. I noticed that my first Android phone, a Samsung Galaxy Prevail, did this and it usually got it right when I wanted a double letter. My two phones since haven't cared one bit how many little circles I make, it always defaults with "to." Also, I don't see a short way of swyping "we're." Seems that one is doomed to always default to "were."

It depends on the keyboard. Different phones have different stock keyboards. They all implement gesture typing slightly differently.

I believe Swype has some advanced gestures for things like punctuation. I generally don't bother with learning them. I just use the capitalisation gesture. That I find is the most useful and most common thing that I do that Swype does very well.

 

[zuben el genub]

With all the variations, that's what AI will take very long to understand, if ever. The only way would be by context - if you can substitute also, use too - and even then get it wrong.

 

[hiredgun]

I remember messaging on my PC with someone from the U.K. that constantly used "to" when it should have been "too." Since I was on the PC I assumed that they were too, and it really annoyed me at first, but then I thought that it was the "English" English usage of the word like "tyre" for tire or capitalise for capitalize until one day they mentioned that they were messaging on their iPhone, and then I understood why they kept messing up the to/too, lol.

 

[Digital Controller]

I use Swiftkey on my phone and it does a pretty good job distinguishing between to/too.

Granted sometimes I might also mess up which one I need to use, my SO likes to grammar nazi me so she will usually correct me when I use the wrong one...

To which I reply with..."I'm an Engineer darn it, not an English major!"

EDIT: I have moved this thread into the Android Applications forum since it is dealing specifically with keyboard applications.

 

[hiredgun]

I use Swiftkey on my phone and it does a pretty good job distinguishing between to/too.

Granted sometimes I might also mess up which one I need to use, my SO likes to grammar nazi me so she will usually correct me when I use the wrong one...

To which I reply with..."I'm an Engineer darn it, not an English major!"

EDIT: I have moved this thread into the Android Applications forum since it is dealing specifically with keyboard applications.

You are probably right, I have the paid version of Swiftkey and I don't know why I am jacking around with all these other keyboards, lol. Nothing beats Swiftkey for prediction for sure, and if you say it handles the to/too well I'll take your word for it. I just like trying new things, and I guess I'm always searching for the "perfect" keyboard and it's actually a pretty cheap hobby to have too, lol.

 

[UncleMike]

My two phones since haven't cared one bit how many little circles I make, it always defaults with "to."

I'm pretty sure that "looping" to indicate a double letter is a Swype Keyboard exclusive.

Here's a video that I'm sure many can relate to: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Gv0H-vPoDc

I love it!

I understand your frustration. Many people don't care about grammar anymore but I'm not one of them and misused "confusables" like to/too or your/you're really grate on me when I read them.

"Confusables" - I like it.

 

[Clementine_3]

I'm pretty sure that "looping" to indicate a double letter is a Swype Keyboard exclusive.

"Confusables" - I like it.

I like "confusables" too!

If you pause (not quite a long press) on the letter using the Google keyboard it will usually figure out what you are shooting for. It does work most of the time for things like too, off etc. It's not perfect but it tries.