Transient text substitutions

QIn macOS Sierra, I have set up substitutions in the Text tab of System Preferences’ Keyboard pane, which correct most of my common errors, such as typing ‘hte’ instead of ‘the’. Some of them only work for a day or so before they become disabled, and I have to enter them again. What am I doing wrong?

by Dianne Lam

AThese aren’t stored in a Preferences file, but in your user dictionary, which is a closed database. You can save them all to a file by selecting all and dragging them to a folder in Finder. You could quickly add them back by dragging and dropping that file into the shortcuts list, but that is unlikely to make them ‘stick’.

One potential issue that could be causing those settings to change is use of a third-party app that also performs text substitution or similar functions. If you’re certain that you have no such conflicting software installed and running in the background, the best thing to try is to remove all text substitutions and then leave the Keyboard pane. Open it again, and add the substitutions you want. That should flush out the problem.

Text replacements you set up in the Keyboard pane don’t seem to be stored in an accessible preferences file.