The Microsoft Word Spelling and Grammar checker is an impressive tool that has saved me from embarrassment many times.

But, there are times when it gets in the way.

For example, I often write articles that include code samples. I do not want to check spelling in my code because it includes key words and variable names that are not part of the English language.

Microsoft Word includes a feature that allows me to continue using Spellcheck on the document, while suppressing it for sections of text that I identify.

In Fig. 1  is a section of a Word document I recently wrote for a technical article. I want Word to check most of the document, but not the code (the part that begins with ".create-or-alter" and ends with "tostring(location);}")

ws01-SampleDocSection
Fig. 1

To exclude this section from the Spellcheck, I first highlight, as shown in Fig. 2.

ws02-SelectSection
Fig. 2

With the text highlighted, I select the [Language] dropdown on the "Review" ribbon and click "Set Proofing Language", as shown in Fig. 3.

ws03-LanguageButton
Fig. 3

The "Language" dialog displays, as shown in Fig. 4.

ws04-LanguageDialog
Fig. 4

Click the "Do not check spelling or grammar" checkbox and click the [OK] button to close the dialog.

You can repeat this for multiple sections in your document.

The next time you run Spellchecker (Fig. 5), this section(s) will be ignored.

ws05-SpellingGrammarButton
Fig. 5

This is a simple process that can make checking your documents more efficient.