Re: Finding common mistakes

[Scott Kostyshak]

On Tue, May 17, 2016 at 07:02:02AM -0600, Joel Kulesza wrote:
> On Tue, May 17, 2016 at 12:13 AM, Scott Kostyshak  wrote:
> 
> > We do have a grammar checker. Worked well for me on Ubuntu last time I
> > tried it:
> > https://wiki.lyx.org/Tools/LyX-GrammarChecker
> > It uses
> > https://www.languagetool.org/
> >
> > It would be great to see some improvements for it so that it works more
> > seamlessly with LyX.
> >
> >
> Gotcha, thanks for making me aware of this.  A search through the User's
> Guide and Additional Features guide for "grammar" didn't produce any
> results for me so I'd given up hope that this functionality was available.
> I'll take a look at what is built-in already.

If we ever make the integration more seamless we can feature it more
prominently so it is easier to find.

> > By the way, please bottom-post as asked for by our list netiquette:
> > https://www.lyx.org/MailingLists#toc7
> > It really does make it easier for others to quote and follow
> > conversations.
> >
> >
> Thanks for the reminder; sorry for the oversight.  When in the flow of
> conversation, it's just *so* much more natural to simply hit reply
> (particularly with GMail / "conversations").

Well, perhaps I'm the only one so dogmatic about it, but I think it does
make it easier for others. I just try to remind users where convenient.
Sorry for the inconvenience for you.

Scott


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Re: Finding common mistakes

[Joel Kulesza]

On Tue, May 17, 2016 at 12:13 AM, Scott Kostyshak  wrote:

> We do have a grammar checker. Worked well for me on Ubuntu last time I
> tried it:
> https://wiki.lyx.org/Tools/LyX-GrammarChecker
> It uses
> https://www.languagetool.org/
>
> It would be great to see some improvements for it so that it works more
> seamlessly with LyX.
>
>
Gotcha, thanks for making me aware of this.  A search through the User's
Guide and Additional Features guide for "grammar" didn't produce any
results for me so I'd given up hope that this functionality was available.
I'll take a look at what is built-in already.


> By the way, please bottom-post as asked for by our list netiquette:
> https://www.lyx.org/MailingLists#toc7
> It really does make it easier for others to quote and follow
> conversations.
>
>
Thanks for the reminder; sorry for the oversight.  When in the flow of
conversation, it's just *so* much more natural to simply hit reply
(particularly with GMail / "conversations").

Re: Finding common mistakes

[Scott Kostyshak]

On Mon, May 16, 2016 at 07:35:50PM -0600, Joel Kulesza wrote:
> On the command line it appears to have two output formats: the standard one
> which gives some location information and a more complete JSON format
>  that gives complete location and severity
> location (which could used to style markup in the LyX interface).
> 
> Can someone comment on how LyX uses spellchecker diagnostics to perform
> continuous markup?  A similar approach could be useful with proselint (to
> parse the JSON output and style the LyX squiggles, perhaps instead of red
> using blue ala MS Word).  Similarly, it would be instructive to know how
> the spellchecker operates on-demand for running proselint on-demand.
> 
> On Mon, May 16, 2016 at 7:18 PM, Richard Heck  wrote:

We do have a grammar checker. Worked well for me on Ubuntu last time I
tried it:
https://wiki.lyx.org/Tools/LyX-GrammarChecker
It uses
https://www.languagetool.org/

It would be great to see some improvements for it so that it works more
seamlessly with LyX.

By the way, please bottom-post as asked for by our list netiquette:
https://www.lyx.org/MailingLists#toc7
It really does make it easier for others to quote and follow
conversations.

Scott

> > On 05/16/2016 09:00 PM, Paul A. Rubin wrote:
> > > Joel,
> > >
> > > If you decide proselint is useful, it would be worth mentioning in the
> > > user list. Maybe someone could hack a converter script to facilitate
> > > running it against a LyX document.
> >
> > It looks to be text only, so you could export a LyX file to plaintext
> > and run it against that. But it's hard to know how it would deal with
> > footnotes, etc.
> >
> > Richard
> >
> >


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Re: Finding common mistakes

[Joel Kulesza]

On the command line it appears to have two output formats: the standard one
which gives some location information and a more complete JSON format
 that gives complete location and severity
location (which could used to style markup in the LyX interface).

Can someone comment on how LyX uses spellchecker diagnostics to perform
continuous markup?  A similar approach could be useful with proselint (to
parse the JSON output and style the LyX squiggles, perhaps instead of red
using blue ala MS Word).  Similarly, it would be instructive to know how
the spellchecker operates on-demand for running proselint on-demand.

On Mon, May 16, 2016 at 7:18 PM, Richard Heck  wrote:

> On 05/16/2016 09:00 PM, Paul A. Rubin wrote:
> > Joel,
> >
> > If you decide proselint is useful, it would be worth mentioning in the
> > user list. Maybe someone could hack a converter script to facilitate
> > running it against a LyX document.
>
> It looks to be text only, so you could export a LyX file to plaintext
> and run it against that. But it's hard to know how it would deal with
> footnotes, etc.
>
> Richard
>
>

Re: Finding common mistakes

[Richard Heck]

On 05/16/2016 09:00 PM, Paul A. Rubin wrote:
> Joel,
>
> If you decide proselint is useful, it would be worth mentioning in the
> user list. Maybe someone could hack a converter script to facilitate
> running it against a LyX document.

It looks to be text only, so you could export a LyX file to plaintext
and run it against that. But it's hard to know how it would deal with
footnotes, etc.

Richard

Re: Finding common mistakes

[Paul A. Rubin]

Joel,

If you decide proselint is useful, it would be worth mentioning in the user 
list. Maybe someone could hack a converter script to facilitate running it 
against a LyX document.

Paul
-- 
Sent from my Android device with K-9 Mail. Please excuse my brevity.

Re: Finding common mistakes

[Joel Kulesza]

Paul,

Thanks for posting that.  I was thinking just the other day that something
that applies basic grammar rules within LyX would be a valuable addition.
In the meantime, I'll check out proselint (perhaps more accurately, its
plugin for VIM).

Thanks,
Joel

On Mon, May 16, 2016 at 5:31 PM, Paul A. Rubin  wrote:

> Bob Alvarez  hotmail.com> writes:
>
> > Is there any software tool that finds common mistakes in writing beyond
> spelling errors? I mean things like repeated words, homonym substitutions
> such as their/there, lose/loose, which/that confusion, etc?
>
> I have not tried it myself, but perhaps proselint (http://proselint.com/)
> might be of interest?
>
> Paul
>
>

Re: Finding common mistakes

[Paul A . Rubin]

Bob Alvarez  hotmail.com> writes:

> Is there any software tool that finds common mistakes in writing beyond
spelling errors? I mean things like repeated words, homonym substitutions
such as their/there, lose/loose, which/that confusion, etc?

I have not tried it myself, but perhaps proselint (http://proselint.com/)
might be of interest?

Paul

Finding common mistakes

[Bob Alvarez]

Is there any software tool that finds common mistakes in writing beyond 
spelling errors? I mean things like repeated words, homonym substitutions such 
as their/there, lose/loose, which/that confusion, etc?


I also paste my text into Microsoft Word and use their grammar checker. It 
spots some of these problems but goes overboard with pointing out passive voice 
verbs.


There is a tool called Papyrus Autor which implements the rules of Andreas 
Eschbach but alas so far it is only for German. Here are some of the rules 
(this is from a post on writers stackexchange but I will not post a link 
because it might get this post rejected). These are very sophisticated but it 
would be great to have even simple stuff.


The 10 marking steps by Andreas Eschbach:


First print out your text (yes, you need it on paper). Pick a small text 
passage you can easily overview and go through all of the following 10 points 
with this passage. Then pick the next one. Use different colors for marking 
your text and for editing it.

  1.  Strike through the first paragraph of a scene from upper left to lower 
right.
Think: Do you really need it? Often the first paragraph is used to "warming up" 
while writing. Could you put the info into later sections?
  2.  Strike through all adjectives and adverbs
Think: Can you use a more precise noun/verb instead using the 
adjectives/adverbs?
  3.  Mark all dialog decorators (like he said, he replied, ...) with wavy 
lines.
Think: Can you delete them without puzzling the user? Can you replace them with 
actions (instead of: "Are you sure?" asked Peter => use: "Are you sure?" Peter 
scratched his head. He couldn't believe what he was hearing.)?
  4.  Mark filler words and imprecise words (some, quite, rather, several, few, 
...) by drawing a box around them.
Think: Normally you can just delete them or make them more precise (Only a few 
people ... => Only ten people ...)
  5.  Cross out concurrency indicators (during, while, ...)
Think: Often it could be better to write things that happen simultaneously in 
two different sentences: "She cried while he beat her." => "He beat her. She 
cried."
  6.  Mark passive sentences with a small "P" above them.
Think: Often the active form is better (more action): New Orleans was 
devastated by a hurricane. => The hurricane devastated New Orleans.
  7.  Mark long sentences with an "L" above the sentence.
Think: Make them shorter! No-one likes to read long sentences (except your 
English teacher in school maybe).
  8.  Mark long dialogs with an "LD".
Think: Can you shorten them or divide them into several parts?
  9.  Mark indirect perception with a jagged line, like "watched" and "asked" 
in these examples:
"He watched, how the woman crossed the street joining the spectators there. He 
asked himself, what was going on there."
Think: Do you really need it? Why? Does this sound better: "He watched the 
spectators on the other side. Another woman crossed the street to join them. 
What was going on there?"
  10. Search paragraphs where you wrote the same thing with different wording. 
Mark it with wavy lines at the sheet margin:
"She hit him a second time. Another time she stroke the club on his head."
Think: This looks like you were searching for the right expression while 
writing. Nothing wrong with that, but only keep one of them.