About Word Counter

Word Counter is a Macintosh OS X application that performs a word count and a character count, but it can do much more. It can be used independently or in conjunction with other applications such as TextEdit, Microsoft Word, Pages, TextWrangler, and others.

Text can be typed, pasted, or dragged into the window. Word Counter can automatically update the count based on a user-defined time interval. It can show the progress achieved towards a set goal for the total number of words and characters. It also can perform bulk counts on multiple files and folders simply by dropping them onto the window. Word Counter can count the number of times a particular word appears in a document. It can even create a sortable summary table of all words in the document, with the number of times each word appears and the length of each word.

Word Counter can handle various file types including plain text (txt, text), rich text (rtf, rtfd), Hypertext Markup Language (htm, html), Microsoft Word (doc), Microsoft Word XML (wordml), Apple's web archive (webarchive), and others. This program may be useful for writing a manuscript or an abstract with a strict limit on the number of words or characters allowed.

A screen shot of the main window

Installation

Unzip the archive and then copy the folder anywhere on your computer. The ideal location for Word Counter is in your Applications folder.

Basic Use

Using Word Counter is easy. Simply type, paste, or drag text into the main word counter window, then press the "Count Words" button. Word Counter will provide the word and character count for the text, and it will also count the number of instances of a specific word or phrase if specified (see below).

Instances Count

Word Counter can provide a total for the number of times a certain word or phrase appears. This count will be displayed alongside the total count for words and characters.

A screen shot of the instances window

To perform an instances count, open the Instances Count window from the main menu and type in the desired word or phrase. Then choose the "Count Words" option. If the text area in the instances window is blank, Word Counter will return a count of 0. You can also choose whether Word Counter should consider the number of instances in a case-sensitive or case-insentive manner. With a case-sensitive count, the word "with" would be counted only once in this sentence if the search was case-sensitive since the first instance has a capital "W". In a case-insensitive count it would be counted twice in the preceding sentence since the case would be ignored. Additionally, Word Counter will consider any subset of text when it counts instances. Therefore, the word "count" would have two instances (case-insensitive) in the preceding sentence since it appears in both "Counter" and "counts".

Word Frequencies

Word Counter also provides an interesting feature that summarizes the frequency of every word in a document.

A screen shot of the word frequency window

To use the frequency option, the document to be summarized must be open in either the main Word Counter window or in the TextEdit window (depending on the current data source for the counts). The Word Frequency window can be accessed from the main menu. Press the Count button to begin the analysis. Once the count is complete, Word Counter will display every word that appears in the document as well as how many times each word appears and how long each word is. Columns can be sorted by clicking on the column name/column header. This can be useful if you want to know how many words longer than 10 characters you are using, or to see if your choice of words may be repetitive.

Progress Tracker

Using the Progress Tracker feature you can set a goal for the total number of words or characters you wish to type. Word Counter will then display the progress towards that goal in the small, floating Progress Tracker window. By default, a yellow warning icon will appear if you are at or above 90% of the goal and a red warning icon will appear if you exceed your goal (above 100%).

Type in a goal for Words, Characters, or Instances to track your progress

An example of the progress being tracked: the red icon lets you know that the goal has been exceeded whereas the yellow icon lets you know that you are within 90% of the goal

To change the defaults for the percentages for which the yellow or red icons should appear, click in the area shown above

A screen shot of the window where you can set the percentages for the limits beyond which the yellow or red warning icons will appear

Using Word Counter with Other Applications

Word Counter can be used in conjunction with various applications including TextEdit, Microsoft Word, Pages, TextWrangler, and others. Simply click on the Word Counter icon on the main Word Counter window. A small floating window will appear. Word Counter will then count the text in the chosen application. Apple's TextEdit application is the default, but you can change it to a different application in the Preferences section. To have Word Counter return to counting the text in the main Word Counter window, simply close the floating counting window, or press the Count Words button on the main Word Counter window.

If you are interested in having another program added to Word Counter's list of supported applications, please contact David Hanauer. Note that only certain AppleScript-aware applications are eligible for this functionality.

The horizontal floating window for TextEdit documents

The vertical floating window for TextEdit documents

Preferences

Word Counter has several user modifiable preferences that can be changed through the Preferences window. Most options should be self-explanatory. The "minor words" feature is described below.

The preferences window

Minor Words

Word Counter can ignore minor words in the counts. These are ignored for both the word and character counts. This feature can be turned on or off in the preferences window. Furthermore, you can edit the list of minor words by clicking on the "Edit List" button in the preferences window. A screen shot of this window is below.

The window where the minor words list can be modified

Bulk Counts

Word Counter can perform bulk counts on multiple files sequentially. Results of the counts are displayed in a table as seen below.

The table that is displayed when multiple files are counted.

Dropping more than one file, or a single folder, onto the Word Counter window will cause Word Counter to display the multiple file count window. (Note: More than one folder can also be dropped onto the window at the same time). You can also display the multiple file count window by choosing it from the menu or pressing the associated keyboard shortcut. A progress bar at the top of the window provides feedback about how far along Word Counter is in working through the files. Each row in the table represents a single file. The file name, word count, and character count are displayed. Additionally, a running total of the counts for all of the files is shown at the bottom of the table. The total number of files in the table is displayed in the window's title bar area. To reset the running total and remove the files from the table, simply press the "Clear" button. Otherwise, dropping more files onto the multiple file count window will cause the counts to be displayed in the table instead of the main window. To learn more about any file in the table, simply double click on the file or choose the "More Info" option from the menu. This will cause a small information window (see below) to be displayed which has details about the file, including it's entire file path. If a file type that Word Counter does not handle is being handled by the multiple file count window, it is simply ignored silently so that the counts of the other appropriate files can proceed. If Word Counter is unable to open or process any files, a warning message will be displayed when the counting is complete.

The More Info window, which displays details about a selected file in the multiple file count table

Supported File Types

Word Counter can load numerous file types either into the main window or via bulk counts. These include plain text (txt), rich text (rtf, rtfd), Hypertext Markup Language (htm, html), Microsoft Word (doc), Microsoft Word XML (wordml), Apple's web archive (webarchive), active server pages (asp), cascading style sheets (css), java (java), javascript (js), java server pages (jsp), hypertext preprocessor (php), perl (pl), ruby (rb), and extensible markup language (xml). For html documents, only those words that would normally appear on the web page are counted; for the other files related to programming languages, all of the words in the document are counted.

System Requirements

Word Counter requires Macintosh OS X 10.4 or higher.

Is Word Counter available as a Service?

No, but there is a program called WordService which is available from Devon Technologies.

Is Word Counter available as a Dashboard Widget?

Yes! You can download the Word Counter Widget from the website, http://www.supermagnus.com.

Is Word Counter available as a Yahoo! Widget?

Yes! Again, visit the website for more information: http://www.supermagnus.com.

A note about how Word Counter works

Word Counter only works for the English language. It may (or may not) work for other languages, so I suggest you try it first before relying on it. It is too difficult for me to ensure that the program works for any language other than English.

Word Counter should generally be thought of as providing a very close estimate of the true word and character count, but counts may differ depending on what program is used. Word Counter bases its word and character counts mainly on how AppleScript defines a word and a character. Thus, the ampersand ("&") will count as a word. Likewise, "&&" will count as two words. However, phrases such as "Mr. Watson -- come here!" will only result in 4 words using Word Counter. Microsoft Word will consider that phrase to have 5 words since the dashes ("--") are separated on both side by white space. Other nuances are relevant if the option to count words above a certain length is chosen: "$15,000" is considered to be a 7 digit word. However, for words that are in quotes, the quotes do not count as part of the word length. In the end the differences between the word counting features of different programs will likely be small, but it is best to try out a few short examples to make sure that this program works in the way you intended.

Word Counter was written using a part of the Apple Xcode development environment known as AppleScript Studio. This means that the application itself is written using the AppleScript programming/scripting language.

How much does Word Counter cost?

Word Counter is free.

However, comments would be most appreciated. For those that wish to make a donation, you can do so on the supermagnus.com website. Or, why not consider purchasing one of my screensavers which I sell to help cover web-hosting and development costs.

Legal issues

Word Counter is provided "as is" and no guarantee is made as to its function or any problems that occur as a result of its use.

Warranty

There is no warranty for this program.

Known Issues

• When Word Counter is unable to count a file due to an error, it will display a 0 (zero) for both the word and the character count.
• As of version 2.0, Word Counter can handle much larger file sizes. These large files can sometimes take a long time to count (60 seconds or more sometimes).
• While testing Word Counter on large files, it appeared to run faster under OS X 10.4 compared to OS X 10.2, even on the same machine.
• Sometimes, if Word Counter seems stuck on a small file that should appear in the multiple file count window, simply clicking on the window seems to "nudge" Word Counter to finish its task. I have no idea why this occurs.
• As of version 1.6 or later, Word Counter will tend to be CPU-intensive. This is because of the newly added feature to be able to update the word counts on an ongoing basis. This CPU-usage will likely exist even if the auto-update feature is off.
• Word Counter has occasionally crashed when a word count is performed on the Word Counter window and no text has been typed into it.
• Some of the text formatting options for rich text might not work in Word Counter. If they are needed the best alternative would be to use TextEdit to type and use Word Counter to count the words in the TextEdit window.
• The "Undo" option does not work extremely well in Word Counter, especially under "Plain Text" mode.
• Special characters are usually counted as separate words in Word Counter
• Word Counter may not launch properly at first (the icon will bounce a few times but no window will appear). This problem can usually be solved by fixing permissions on your computer and then re-downloading the Word Counter application.
• Currently, Word Counter can perform a count of a subset of text if it is highlighted only in the main Word Counter Window. Word Counts on TextEdit documents include all of the words, regardless of whether a subset of the text is highlighted.
• If a word count is conducted on a large volume of text, the count may fail if some of the "non-standard" options are chosen, such as the option to count words above a certain length.
• When printing the table with the word frequencies, the column headers/names do not appear. This is, unfortunately, a current limitation with AppleScript Studio applications.

Additional Customization

Word counter has a few options where are modifiable but not through the Preferences window. These options will not likely be important to the average user:

1. 1. Default fonts: You can change the default fonts for both the rich text and plain text options. You can find these option in the "Word Counter Preferences" file in your ~/Library/Preferences/ folder in your Home folder. Each line has a preference name on the left side (which you should not modify), and a varable on the right side, separated by an asterisk ("*"). To change the name of the plain text font, for example, you need to find the line that starts out with "PlainTextFont*" and then change the name of the font to the right of the asterisk. The default is Monaco, but you should be able to change it to any font you want, as long as you have the font installed on your computer. If you type something incorrectly you will likely cause an error in Word Counter.
2. Modifying CPU usage: Word Count, by default, updates itself internally every 1 second, which can cause more CPU usage than some might wish to allow. If you have the program set to update the count automatically every 1 second then there is no way to avoid this. However, if you don't use the option to automatically update the word count, then the extra CPU usage can be decreased substantially. To do so, locate the "Word counter Prefereces" file, as described above. Look for the preference name called" "autoCountSecondsDefault*" Modify the number to the right to change the number of second between when Word Counter auto-updates itself. The one downside to doing this is that if you do turn on the auto-word count option, you may have to wait longer until it turns on.

Future Directions

I now consider Word Counter to be a "mature" application. It does its job very well and likely meets the needs of the average user. Thus, there will be fewer changes and additions over time. I have no intention for Word Counter to become a full-fledged text editor--there are already a lot of wonderful (and free) text editors available for OS X.

If you are interested in having another program added to Word Counter's list of supported applications, please contact David Hanauer. Note that only certain AppleScript-aware applications are eligible for this functionality. If you have suggestions for any other file types or features, contact David Hanauer.

Version History

Version 2.7 (February 25, 2008):

• Added the ability to set a goal for words and characters and to track progress towards that goal
• Can now exclude minor words (e.g. "a", "of", "or", "the") from the count
• Can now close the main window without quitting the program
• Can now set default font sizes for the application
• Can now set whether the application should use plain or rich text as a default
• Now works with the BBEdit application
• Improved preferences window
• Improved handling of invalid file types when files are dropped into the main window
• New Leopard (OS X 10.5) compatible application icon
• Minor interface enhancements

Version 2.6 (December 19, 2007):

• Word Counter is now OS X 10.5 (Leopard) compatible
• When used with Pages Word Counter can now count all text or a subset of selected text
• Now works with SubEthaEdit and Text-Edit Plus
• Minor interface enhancements

Version 2.5 (September 10, 2007):

• Launch time for the application should now be faster
• Added a new preference option to either include or exclude line feeds/carriage returns in the character count
• Works with more file types including asp, css, java, js, jsp, php, pl, rb, and xml
• Improved the accuracy of the word counts. Symbols such as _ ^ * ( = + | etc. no longer count as a word
• Fixed an issue so that selected (highlighted) text in the Word Counter window could be counted separate from the full text
• Fixed an error that could occur when loading a file over an existing one without saving changes to the original
• Fixed an issue where a non-breaking space would count as a word instead of a space
• Minor interface enhancements

Version 2.4 (May 01, 2007):

• Word Counter can now work with multiple applications including TextEdit, Microsoft Word, Pages, TextWrangler, and others.
• Minor interface changes

Version 2.3 (April 09, 2007):

• Added a feature that can now count the number of instances of a particular word in the text
• Added a feature to provide a summary of the frequency and length of all words in the text
• Added Find/Replace as an option for editing text
• Interface improvements
• Fixed an AppleScript error that was displayed when dragging text onto the Word Counter window more than once
• Fixed an issue where the vertical TextEdit Word Counter window sometimes displayed incorrectly as horizontal
• Improved help documentation

Version 2.2.1 (February 12, 2007):

• Fixed an error where the preferences might not be saved between launches
• Improved the manner in which Word Counter handles RTFD files

Version 2.2 (September 26, 2006):

• Added a vertical floating window to the already existing horizontal floating window that works in conjunction with TextEdit
• The main Word Counter window now remembers its size and position better between launches
• No longer experiences an error when a folder with a custom icon is dropped onto the Word Counter window
• Fixed an error that occurred when only an empty folder was dropped onto the Word Counter window
• Added an option to cancel the counting process in the Bulk Counts window
• Minor interface changes

Version 2.1.1 (April 04, 2006):

• Word Counter is now a Universal Binary (will work on PowerPC and Intel Macs)

Version 2.1 (January 16, 2006):

• Now can either print or export multiple file count table data
• Documentation now reflects that Word Counter can handle HTML files
• Will provide feedback about files that Word Counter can't open in the multiple file count window

Version 2.0 (October 24, 2005):

• Can now perform bulk counts on multiple files at once, with the results displayed in a table. Folders, files, or both can be dropped onto the Word Counter window as one way to activate this feature.
• Word Counter can now handle files larger than 32k in size.

Version 1.9 (September 26, 2005):

• Can now count words in the following file types: plain text (txt, text), rich text (rtf, rtfd), Microsoft Word (doc), Microsoft Word XML (wordml), and web archives (webarchive). [Note: The ability to open some file types requires OS X 10.4 Tiger or higher].

Version 1.8.1 (July 29, 2005):

• Word Counter is now OS X 10.4 (Tiger) compatible
• Fixed a small issue where the title of a file would not display in the window's title bar when opened via the menu

Version 1.8 (May 09, 2005):

• Vastly improved speed of all counts (previously intolerable waits have been reduced to a few seconds)
• Improved accuracy of word counts
• Now automatically switches back to TextEdit after pressing the word count icon in the floating TextEdit window
• Choosing TextEdit option now brings TextEdit forward automatically
• Window locations are now preserved between launches for all windows (except the help window)

Version 1.7 (February 01, 2005):

• Can now handle both plain text (txt) and rich text format (rtf) files
• Added multiple text formatting options (to use with rich text)
• Key-command to count words has been changed to command-N
• Now asks for confirmation when dragging a file or text into the window if there are unsaved changed in the window
• Improved icons
• Improved help
• A few other minor interface enhancements
• Fixed a problem where it was not possible to highlight text on the first line of the window.

Version 1.6 (January 04, 2005):

• Added the ability to perform word counts and character counts for the frontmost TextEdit document in a small floating window
• Added the ability to automatically update the word counts based on a user-defined interval
• Can now choose to count hyphenated words as a single word or as separate words
• Created a separate window for the preferences
• Added icons for the main window
• A few other minor interface enhancements

Version 1.5 (October 18, 2004):

• Can now open plain text files directly into the application
• Can now save the window contents as a plain text file
• Can now drag and drop text files onto the window's text box
• Minor interface enhancements
• Added "Undo Typing" menu option
• Added minimal help into the application
• Word and character counting preferences, window size, and window location are now saved between launches

Verison 1.4 (July 14, 2003):

• Drastically improved the speed at which characters without spaces are counted. Using a PowerBook 667 and the first chapter of Moby Dick as a reference, the time for this function was reduced from 142 seconds to 1 second.
• Made a minor interface enhancement

Version 1.3 (April 7, 2003):

• Counts can now be performed on a subset of text if it is highlighted
• Can "push" button to count words with a key command (Command-T)

Version 1.2 (March 30, 2003):

• Added option to count characters with or without including spaces
• Modified the window layout again

Version 1.1 (March 16, 2003):

• Added a character count
• Modified the window layout

Version 1.0 (March 8, 2003):

• Initial release

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank the numerous users who provided bug reports and interesting suggestions for enhancing this application.

Feedback

I would love to hear any feedback about problems, bugs, suggestions, complaints, etc. If you find it useful I would love to hear from you!!

Send e-mail to David Hanauer: david@supermagnus.com

This program can be found at http://www.supermagnus.com

 

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