Is there something for Linux that comes near to the MS Word grammar checker?
Wish list:
- Emacs support
- Ignores Latex markup
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Do you mean "grammer" or "syntex"? ;-) – splattne May 15 '09 at 11:25
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Should it detect wrong grammar or are you looking for a spell checker (="Rechtschreibung" vs. "Grammatik") – splattne May 15 '09 at 11:32
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1A grammar checker is not about orthography, it's about the proper use of the subjunctive and dangling participles and so on. – joeforker May 15 '09 at 13:35
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You could use Ispell, a spell-checking program available for many Unix implementations. For shell prompt usage, enter:
ispell filename
Here is a description how to use it in Emacs.
For grammar checks, you could use diction:
diction mytextfile | more
It finds wordy or badly written sentences.
splattne
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Tried using `diction` myself, but the results were disappointing. I gave it a short run of text (an abstract for a proposal), and the three things it complained about were: 1. Use of the word "phase". 2. Use of the word "dependable". 3. Use of the word "system". As this was for a Phase II effort dealing with systems of systems (and our company name is Dependable Computing), needless to say this was less than helpful. Maybe this is not representative. Still, thanks for pointing it out. – Ben Hocking Mar 01 '14 at 00:23
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Did you try GNU Aspell ?
GNU Aspell is a Free and Open Source spell checker designed to eventually replace Ispell. It can either be used as a library or as an independent spell checker. Its main feature is that it does a superior job of suggesting possible replacements for a misspelled word than just about any other spell checker out there for the English language. Unlike Ispell, Aspell can also easily check documents in UTF-8 without having to use a special dictionary. Aspell will also do its best to respect the current locale setting.
gimel
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