Disable automatic spellchecking in ckEditor by default

Modify the default configuration for ckEditor so that it does NOT automatically spellcheck user input. This prevents user input from being sent to 3rd party web service (spellchecker.net) without them explicitly requesting this.

We will leave the Spell-check BUTTON in place (by default) - so users can choose to use the service. I've included information below about how to enable auto-checking and how to remove the spell-check button for those sites that need a different behavior. (This will also be added to the context-sensitive help on the Site Preferences screen).

To enable auto spell check, in packages/ckeditor/config.js - change this value to true
config.scayt_autoStartup = false;

To remove the Spell Check button, in packages/ckeditor/config.js - remove this item in the config.toolbar_Full list:
'SpellChecker'

NOTE: If you are modifying config.js you should first have configured a Custom PHP Path under Global Settings > Directories, and place your modified version in the custom path.

---- original report from Andrew Perry ----------------------
As outlined in this post http://forum.civicrm.org/index.php?topic=15159.0 there are performance and privacy issues created by CKEditor's default use of the spellchecker.net plugin that sends a user's data to a third party service for spell checking.

Many modern browsers have a built in spell-checker so this "hidden feature" should be disabled by default to protect users' privacy compliance and minimise potential performance issues if the third party site is slow/unresponsive (I haven't looked at how the editor deals with timeouts of spellchecker.net).

This can be achieved through a simple change in the default config as set out in the above forum post from Pat.