How terms are found in text

The Glossary button under the page title, the Glossary item in the selection menu, the Term Highlight Block, the Only on page mode of the Glossary table and the Highlighter extension all use the same rules to decide whether a term is present in a piece of text.

Here is a piece of page text checked against a small glossary:

Terms in the glossary

Release candidate (RC)PostmortemFeature flagCardSLA

Before we cut a release candidate, every failed payment needs a postmortem. New code ships behind feature flags¹, so cardholder² data stays safe. The RC goes out only if we are inside our SLA: check the sla³ dashboard first.

highlighted foundunderlined not found

1. 1The glossary has Feature flag, not the plural. Add feature flags as an alternative form.
2. 2Card is only part of the word cardholder. Terms are found as whole words.
3. 3SLA is an abbreviation, so it is found only in capital letters.

postmortem is found although the term is written Postmortem: letter case does not matter for ordinary words. RC is found as an alternative form of Release candidate.

The rules

1. The app compares text with the names and alternative forms of terms. Definitions and labels are not searched.
2. A term is found only as a whole word. The term Cat is not found inside Category.
3. Letter case does not matter for ordinary words. The term Postmortem is found in postmortem and in POSTMORTEM.
4. Abbreviations must match exactly. A word with two or more capital letters and no spaces is treated as an abbreviation: SLA, PoC, JavaScript. The term SLA is found in SLA and is not found in sla.
5. Word forms are not recognised. The term feature flag is not found in feature flags. Add the other forms as alternative forms.
6. All languages of a term are checked. If a term has an English and a German name, either one is found.

Examples

Term or alternative form	Text on the page	Found
Release candidate	We cut a release candidate today.	Yes
Cat	See the Category page.	No, it is part of another word
SLA	We are inside our SLA.	Yes
SLA	We are inside our sla.	No, an abbreviation needs the same letter case
feature flag	Ship it behind feature flags.	No, add feature flags as an alternative form

Which terms are checked

A page is checked against every term its space can use: its own terms, global terms and the terms of linked spaces. See Space, global and linked glossaries.

If a term is not found

• Check the spelling on the page against the name and the alternative forms of the term.
• If the page uses a plural or another word form, add it as an alternative form.
• If the term is an abbreviation, check the letter case.
• For highlighting in page text, check that Enable Terms Highlighter extension is on in the Space settings or the Global settings and that the extension is installed.