Tardis

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Tardis
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Tardis
This is a list of some of the more common spelling mistakes made on this wiki. All users should read this list carefully, but American users in particular should take a hard look at it.
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At this wiki, we've taken a community stand to use British English in our main article space, and we therefore have a strict policy to support that consensus. However, a lot of our editors are American, which means that they won't think they're making mistakes at all. The help file, How can I get my computer to spell check in British English?, gives tips on how you can make it easier to spot the mistakes you probably don't even know you're making.

Most people understand the -our differences. The bot almost never finds anyone misspelling colour, neighbour, favour or humour.

However, there are some words that are so commonly misspelt they deserve to be highlighted in the following spelling cheat card. These, then, are the words our spelling bot constantly corrects, in rough order of number of occurrences.

Correct (UK) Incorrect (US)
materialise
dematerialise, rematerialise, materialisation
Oddly, you will find one or two primary sources, mainly TV Comic stories, where the letterer chooses to use the -ize form. Nevertheless, this is clearly not preferred British usage.
materialize
realise
realisation, realising, realised
realize
recognise
recognises, recognised
recognize
colonise
colonises, colonised, colonising
colonize
traveller
This is a bit controversial, because traveler is an acceptable alternate British spelling. However, traveller is by far the dominant British spelling, so the bot will correct for it.
traveler
ageing
de-ageing
aging
synthesise
synthesising
synthesize
centre
centring, centred, self-centred
center
labelled
labelling but the base label has only one l
labeled
randomise
therefore, randomiser
randomize
criticise
criticising, criticised
criticized
appal
appals (but appalling and appalled are correct)
appall
mobilise
mobilising, mobilised, immobilised, immobilising
mobilize
humorous
This one is "overcompensation" — humour, humoured, humouring are all correct, but the US and UK agree on how to spell humorous
humourous
organise
organisation, organising, organised
organized
hypnotise
hypnotised, hypnotising
hypnotized
cancelled
cancelling, cancellation
canceled, canceling, cancelation (though, actually, cancellation is correct on both sides of the Atlantic)
chanelled
chanelling
chaneled
instalment
This is a tricky one. Instalment derives from the UK-only way of spelling install, instal. The British tend to use install as the base for most other forms of the word, just like Americans do. So installing, installed etc. are seen as correct by at least some Britons. But instalment is, for whatever reasons, firmly seen as the absolutely correct British spelling.
installment
fulfil
fulfils (but fulfilling and fulfilled are correct)
fulfill
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