I have visited many blogs, forums and web pages. Also following many RSS feeds as well as Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn groups. It is overwhelming and too much at times.
I found a few nice tools make my content more digestible. This does not mean the blog entries are more useful or interesting ;-):
- Wordle (as published on this blog)
- Gobbledygook: check messages for jargon! – http://www.webinknow.com/2007/08/the-gobbledygoo.html
- Bull factor: Fight the bull – why business people speak like idiots?
- Fog or smog formulas – in linguistics, the formulas enable to measure the readability of English writing. I try to write in a style for less then 18 year old readers and use e.g. the gunning fog index.
- Readability Test Tool — test all or part of a webpage by web address or referer – provides age of reader as a result.
- Fog Index Calculator — a simple web page to cut-and-paste text and then calculate Fog Index.
- Online Fog Index calculator — suggestions how to improve readability, different measurements.
This blog entry will change over time. I intent to add useful tools or links to other pages over time.
The results for this entry are:
Wordle:
Gunning Fog index : 8.99
Coleman Liau index : 7.60
Flesch Kincaid Grade level : 6.93
ARI (Automated Readability Index) : 4.98
SMOG : 9.65
This page has an average U.S. grade level of about 7. It should be easily understood by 12 to 13 year olds.
Jürgen Homann 