Re: [Aspell-user] Arabic wordlist for aspell is available.

[Lars Aronsson]

Ethan Bradford wrote:

> Is there an Ispell for Arabic?  Do you know how to get to the 
> source files?

I have no idea if Ispell works for Arabic.  I suppose the same 
dictionary can be used both for aspell and ispell, that's how it 
works for Swedish.  The advantage of aspell (for English) is that 
it provides better suggestions than ispell for mistyped words.
I don't know whether this advantage applies to Swedish, and I was 
asking whether it does for Arabic.

The advantage of ispell, as described by SuSE Linux' RPM packet 
manager is: "Compared to UNIX spell, it is faster and much easier 
to use. Ispell can also handle languages other than English."

This is like moving from the 1970s into the 1980s.  Wow, more 
languages than English!  Who needs that?!  Do non-English speakers 
know how to use computers?

As a comparison, aspell is described like this: "GNU Aspell is a 
spell checker designed to eventually replace Ispell. It can be 
used as a library or as an independent spell checker. Its main 
feature is that it does a much better job of coming up with 
possible suggestions than just about any other spell checker 
available for the English language, including Ispell and Microsoft 
Word."

There is a Swedish dictionary for ispell, which is also used in 
aspell.  I haven't heard that anybody has adjusted aspell's sound 
matching system for Swedish, or produced any test suite based on 
statistics from common misspellings, to evaluate whether aspell 
for Swedish is any better than ispell for Swedish.


-- 
  Lars Aronsson (address@hidden)
  Aronsson Datateknik - http://aronsson.se