| Pages in topic: [1 2] > | What's "the best" word count software to use? Thread poster: Katja Vuorisalo
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Hi there,
I am looking for a word count software that I could use to counting quickly the number of words on a doc./xls.file. Is there a free software, safe to download somewhere?
| | | | Oliver Walter 
United Kingdom
Local time: 22:29
German to English
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| Andrzej Lejman
Poland
Local time: 23:29
Member (2004)
German to Polish
+ ...
| Trados TagEditor | Oct 31, 2006 |
I have made some tests to estimate the accuracy of such software. The final word count of the same file may differ very much depending on software you are using. Thus there is no one really reliable.
If you have Trados, the best way is to open the document in TagEditor and use the ANALYSE function. In this way text boxes, footnotes and headers in Word are included. In spite of that, the statistical function of Word does not count them.
I'm also using PractiCount - it includes invoici... See more I have made some tests to estimate the accuracy of such software. The final word count of the same file may differ very much depending on software you are using. Thus there is no one really reliable.
If you have Trados, the best way is to open the document in TagEditor and use the ANALYSE function. In this way text boxes, footnotes and headers in Word are included. In spite of that, the statistical function of Word does not count them.
I'm also using PractiCount - it includes invoicing as a "one stop" solution. But almost always I make a double-check with Trados.
Best regards
Andrzej ▲ Collapse
| | | | Marc P (X)
Local time: 23:29
German to English
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| Definition of "accuracy" | Oct 31, 2006 |
Andrzej Lejman wrote:
I have made some tests to estimate the accuracy of such software. The final word count of the same file may differ very much depending on software you are using. Thus there is no one really reliable.
How do you measure the accuracy of the count, given that there is no consensus on the definition of a "word" in English, for example?
Marc
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Andrzej Lejman
Poland
Local time: 23:29
Member (2004)
German to Polish
+ ...
it's not my intention to conduct a thorough examination of the problem and to solve fundamental problems.
I simply compare existing tools to find out their weaknesses and advantages. I chose the most appropriate to my needs and preferences.
That's all.
Regards
Andrzej
| | | | Marc P (X)
Local time: 23:29
German to English
+ ...
| What's "the best" word count software to use? | Oct 31, 2006 |
Apologies if you thought I was criticizing your post, Andrzej. I was just pointing out that because two products return a different count, it does not mean that one is more accurate than the other.
I am writing my own (very simple) count tool at the moment, btw. If anyone is interested in testing it (and/or learning to program), it is... See more Apologies if you thought I was criticizing your post, Andrzej. I was just pointing out that because two products return a different count, it does not mean that one is more accurate than the other.
I am writing my own (very simple) count tool at the moment, btw. If anyone is interested in testing it (and/or learning to program), it is available here: http://www.omegat.org/omegat/omegatk/tkount_1.1.zip
Marc ▲ Collapse
| | | | Marina Soldati
Argentina
Local time: 18:29
Member (2005)
English to Spanish
+ ...
Hi Marc,
I´m interested in testing your sofware but does it run in Windows XP? Which are the system requirements?
Thanks
Marina
| | | | Marc P (X)
Local time: 23:29
German to English
+ ...
| What's "the best" word count software to use? | Oct 31, 2006 |
Marina Soldati wrote:
I´m interested in testing your sofware but does it run in Windows XP? Which are the system requirements?
It requires tcl/tk, Abiword (including the Abiword CLI plug-in) and pdftotxt. tcl/tk and Abiword are available for Windows, and AFAIK so is the Abiword CLI plug-in.
pdftotext is only available for Linux (and Mac) as far as I know, but you might be able to use an alternative command-line pdf-to-text converter for Windows, particularly pdf2txt (which costs $38, but there is a free trial version).
If you're interested in learning and playing around with the tcl/tk programming language (which is very easy - even I have learnt it!), it might be fun. Otherwise, probably not...
Marc
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Andrzej Lejman
Poland
Local time: 23:29
Member (2004)
German to Polish
+ ...
MarcPrior wrote:
Apologies if you thought I was criticizing your post, Andrzej. I was just pointing out that because two products return a different count, it does not mean that one is more accurate than the other.
Marc
I see this as a normal discussion, nothing in personal. So your apologies were not needed at all
The answer is simple: when you are ready to invest some time and hand work, counting the words in a file by hand, you can easily check than, how accurate the software is.
That's what I ment.
In my opinion, counting Word files with TagEditor is often the best method, since the software literally "sucks out" all single elements of the file.
But everyone has a free choice.
Best regards
Andrzej
| | | | | TagEditor does not count everything | Oct 31, 2006 |
Andrzej Lejman wrote:
If you have Trados, the best way is to open the document in TagEditor and use the ANALYSE function. In this way text boxes, footnotes and headers in Word are included. In spite of that, the statistical function of Word does not count them.
Tageditor can't translate page page headers, page footers, footnotes and embedded objects in an OpenOffice document.
You can't be sure that it counts everything, as it does not translate everything
Regards,
| | | | Marc P (X)
Local time: 23:29
German to English
+ ...
| What's "the best" word count software to use? | Oct 31, 2006 |
The answer is simple: when you are ready to invest some time and hand work, counting the words in a file by hand, you can easily check than, how accurate the software is.
There are (at least) two reasons for discrepancies. One is that some tools do not count all of the text. Some tools don't count text in text boxes, headers, footers, etc. This is solved by counting manually as you suggest.
The other reason is that there is no consensus on what constitutes "a word". For example, is "don't" one word, or two? What about hyphenated words? Some tools would count 1,000,000 as three words, some as one, and some wouldn't count it at all.
Marc
| | | | Ryan Ginstrom (X)
Local time: 06:29
Japanese to English
| Count Anything is a free tool that gives word counts for MS Office files | Aug 5, 2008 |
katerina100 wrote:
Hi there,
I am looking for a word count software that I could use to counting quickly the number of words on a doc./xls.file. Is there a free software, safe to download somewhere?
Count Anything is a free program that can count words in MS Word/Excel/PowerPoint, as well as PDF, HTML, XML, RTF, and text files. It tries to stick very closely to the word counts produced by MS Word, although there are some minor discrepancies (for example, MS Word counts bullets in bullet lists as words; Count Anything doesn't).
Regards,
Ryan Ginstrom
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Jean-Marc Tapernoux (X)
Switzerland
Local time: 23:29
German to French
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| Flexible word counting program | Oct 5, 2011 |
What is a word, asked xxxMarc P. Using "Word Frequency Counter" or "Word Frequency Counter Advanced" (for Windows XP to 7) from www.hermetic.ch/wfc/wfc.htm YOU decide what you want to count as a word. You can set following parameters: words with numerals / underscores _ / apostrophes ' / @ signs / colons : / forward slashes (I need a special separator here  ... See more What is a word, asked xxxMarc P. Using "Word Frequency Counter" or "Word Frequency Counter Advanced" (for Windows XP to 7) from www.hermetic.ch/wfc/wfc.htm YOU decide what you want to count as a word. You can set following parameters: words with numerals / underscores _ / apostrophes ' / @ signs / colons : / forward slashes (I need a special separator here  ) / periods . / backslashes \
In the Advanced Version a word may also include ampersands &, commas, opening and closing parentheses, plus up to five user-specified characters (such as currency signs and asterisks).
For further details, see http://www.hermetic.ch/wfc/what_is_a_word.htm .
Word Frequency Counter costs $ 38.95 and Word Frequency Counter Advanced $ 63.95 for unlimited licenses. Time-limited licenses for 3 month or 1 year cost one fourth respectively half the price of an unlimited license. Trial versions are also available.
[Edited at 2011-10-05 13:54 GMT]
[Edited at 2011-10-06 08:05 GMT]
[Edited at 2011-10-06 08:12 GMT] ▲ Collapse
| | | | | Counting in front of you while typing? | Sep 6, 2012 |
Has enybody met word/character count software that counts in a floating small window in front of you as you type (for Microsoft Word)?
All word count that I've found require that you click somewhere, but I have this in Word already.
I need it to count WHILE I type...
(Google search didn't help me in this so far)
Enything?
Grateful,
Igor
| | | | | Be aware of AIT and AnyCount | Sep 4, 2013 |
If you need mostly PDFs and some Adobe formats into Word, AnyCount would work well. However, I just purchased the Enterprise version of AnyCount 8 and found out it doesn't work with JPEGs, which I receive frequently. Their product description is deceiving.
Furthermore, both Translation 3000 and AIT staff have TERRIBLE customer service. Not sure how they are still in business other than serious lack of competition.
Omar
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