C Is For Checking #2

I've been very busy recently, but I've been fitting in working on the dictionary in between site visits, troubleshooting, design work and expert witnessing. Having collated almost 12,000 terms to define, I'm working through them systematically, writing my own definitions.

Yesterday I found in passing that a few of my cross references to definitions offered in published standards were wrong. There weren't many, but to my mind the proper number of errors in a dictionary is zero. If it isn't definitive, it's not what I am looking to produce. That I found many errors in competing products in my preparation doesn't matter, I'm not looking to be as good as the competition. Whaat would be the point of that?

I bring my engineer's systematic methodology to my books, so I can guess where the problem lies, and I have kept copies of the raw unprocessed data at various stages fo development. I just need to find and revert to a point before the error occurred, and redo the automatic operations I carried out in Excel to produce the sorted document I am working on to get an error free version. Then I paste in the definitions I have already done, and I'm back in business.

I've also got a stack of engineering calculations to double-check. I know what needs doing there as well. Checking is of course all very tiresome, which is probably why I am writing this account of what I must do next it rather than doing it, but producing excellence is all about the checking. I'm not talking about careless boxticking. I mean checking in the spirit of caring about any important aspect of the product being as good as it can be. Then coming back and checking it again if there is time and making it better, and repeating until you run out of time, or you are just changing it, but it isn't actually getting better.

As far as the dictionary is concerned, I have a difficulty. Normally, once I have completed my first stage of checking, I get other experienced engineers expert in whatever the book or chapter is about to offer comment. I integrate these comments, and be sure to review where they might change my opinion more widely. Once I have this considered, the book is a little rough around the edges again, so it gets a couple of stages of checking (simple proofreading, and ensuring evenness of tone) before it goes to the publisher. They proofread it a couple of times, I confirm acceptability (or otherwise!) of their proofs, and away we go. This all adds up to seven to nine stages of checking. Writing the book takes maybe 25% of the hours.

But anyway, I have no difficulty finding an expert on any technical matter or area - I have 15,000 LinkedIn contacts. But who out there is an expert on words beginning with the letter A?

PS- I delibertley left errors in. If they annoy you, you might be teh person I need, though what I need are not proofreaders as such. I need to know that the definitions represent complete, current professional understanding of what terms mean to practitioners by sector.

See here