On Wed, 7 May 2008, Andriy Rysin wrote:
One thing I'd like to note on this matter as a dictionary maintainer
is that even though I see a great sense in having different spelling
engines which can compete in quality for particular languages I see no
value in having multiple dictionary formats.
Long time ago it was only ispell, then ispell and aspell, then ispell,
aspell and myspell/hunspell (even though the first one fades away).
The problem as I see in aspelll currently is of two parts:
1. Architecture-dependent dictionaries, I see really no reason in
making dictionary arch-dependent, and to keep users updated on the
dictionaries I have to create one for each architecture or let them
compile it (which for end users is not quite nice). So until recent
time I had to generate a lot of files for each new version just to
make sure users don't have deal with compilation.
They are Architecture-dependent for performance reasons, in particular
startup time. I am willing to accept modifications on Aspell to support
Architecture-independent dictionaries but I just don't have the time to do
so myself. I honestly don't see why compiling the dictionary is such a big
deal, it is very easy to do, and even possible to automate as part of
an automatic install process. Nevertheless, I can understand how some see
this as a problem.
2. No win platform support, it seems that this problem was part of why
big projects (OOo and FF) went the other way for hunspell. So now all
primary users of the dictionary I support are going for hunspell
dictionary thus (even though for now both are generated from the same
source) my attention goes more the non-aspell way :)
Aspell can compile on windows just fine, several people have done so. I
just don't have time to maintain a Windows port, but am trying to find
some one do so.
Oh, and not officially supporting windows is only a small part of the
reason OOo and FF went with hunspell. I think I have a good reason why,
and it involves some possible missteps on my part. One of these days I
will write it up.
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