Re: [CODE4LIB] spelling server

2005-09-23 Thread Eric Lease Morgan

On Sep 13, 2005, at 9:36 AM, Eric Lease Morgan wrote:


What do y'all think of the idea of a spelling server -- a Web service
taking a word as input and returning a list of alternative spellings.


Well, as a stress reliever I created the Spell Web Service (version
0.1), and at the URL below you can read about this light-weight
protocol, try out three almost brain-dead clients, as see the source
code:

  1. Simple - returns plain o' XML output complete with DTD
  2. Smart - transforms plain o' XML output into HTML
  3. British Library - an SRU interface to the British Library
catalogue,
 and when zero hits are returned the client tries to improve the
 query through spell checking a la Google's Did You Mean? feature

Try:

  http://spell.ockham.org/about/

--
Eric Lease Morgan
University Libraries of Notre Dame

AIM: ericmorgan


Re: [CODE4LIB] spelling server

2005-09-13 Thread Eric Lease Morgan

On Sep 13, 2005, at 8:53 AM, Forman, Andrew B wrote:


I've been asked to create a smart search a.k.a be like google
without any
of the resources ;) for our upcoming new library home page

I did see something on #code4lib about an ockham server?
Would/should that be part of this?


If I were to write such a Web service, I very much suspect it would
be hosted on ockham.org.

What would suggest the shapes of the input and output look like?

--
Eric Lease Morgan
University Libraries of Notre Dame

(574) 631-8604
AIM: ericmorgan


Re: [CODE4LIB] spelling server

2005-09-13 Thread Eric Lease Morgan

On Sep 13, 2005, at 9:17 AM, Andrew Nagy wrote:


What do y'all think of the idea of a spelling server -- a Web service
taking a word as input and returning a list of alternative spellings.


Seems like an awful lot of extra overhead, whats the need for a sever
instead of having the aspell installed along with the application?  I
always use this for all of my search applications and works well
and is
really fast.  I guess I don't understand the need for a webservice?


Actually, I think you have a valid point.

We here at [EMAIL PROTECTED] Central initially thought about
implementing the spell checking functionality as a Web service. We
then thought it would be too much bandwidth. We thought the same
thing regarding the inclusion of WordNet. (There is a Web Service
implementation.) Consequently we implemented them as library/module
calls.

On the other hand, our library/module calls are not very... modular.
Implemented as Web Service we could select from many spell checking
services and/or use the output in ways not necessarily expected with
the hard coded versions.

Maybe they would be just fun hacks. Maybe they could provide
something more useful. I'm not sure.

--
Eric


Re: [CODE4LIB] spelling server

2005-09-13 Thread Eric Lease Morgan

For a good time, try:

  http://mylibrary.ockham.org/spell/?word=FOOBAR

where FOOBAR is a... word. Code here:

  http://mylibrary.ockham.org/spell/spell.txt

--
Eric Off To Visit My Boss Morgan