FYI: My typing skills frequently interacted with MTS system spelling checkers, but I don't believe it could ever do this. The spelling checkers only provided replacements that were in their grammar (much more than a dictionary) of commands and keywords, and were context sensitive. Although there was some sillyness in the various grammars, I don't think DUNDERHEAD was in there.

Richard S. Conto

Date: 26 Aug 1997 23:33:17 -0700 
From: Dave Katz 
Subject: Re: Spelling-checker risks (Bird, RISKS-19.34) 

The piece about "Semper Fi" being corrected to "Semi-pro fiddles" reminded 
me of my favorite spell check faux pas. 

One of the then-unique characteristics of MTS (the Michigan Terminal System, 
a now-extinct o/s for IBM mainframes in the proud academic tradition) was 
that it provided a spelling corrector using a Soundex variant--if you 
accidentally typed "sigon", it would respond with, "Do you mean 'Signon'?" 

After James Duderstadt was named President of the University of Michigan, it 
was discovered that if you typed "Duderstadt", the system would respond, "Do 
you mean 'dunderhead'?" I believe it got a new dictionary entry shortly 
thereafter. 

Although there was no fallout in this particular case, it does underscore 
the political risks of unchaperoned spell checkers. 

[Incidentally, several readers responded that it must have been the 
spelled-out "Semper fideles" that was corrected to "Semi-pro fiddles". 
I had assumed that was obvious from context, but apparently should have 
made it more explicit by editing the contribution and spelling it out! PGN]