SPELL(1-BSD)        RISC/os Reference Manual         SPELL(1-BSD)



NAME
     spell, spellin, spellout - find spelling errors

SYNOPSIS
     spell [ -v ] [ -b ] [ -x ] [ -d hlist ] [ -s hstop ] [ -h
     spellhist ] [ file] ...

     spellin [ list ]

     spellout [ -d ] list

DESCRIPTION
     spell collects words from the named documents, and looks
     them up in a spelling list.  Words that neither occur among
     nor are derivable (by applying certain inflections, prefixes
     or suffixes) from words in the spelling list are printed on
     the standard output.  If no files are named, words are col-
     lected from the standard input.

     spell ignores most troff(1), tbl(1) and eqn(1) construc-
     tions.

     Under the -v option, all words not literally in the spelling
     list are printed, and plausible derivations from spelling
     list words are indicated.

     Under the -b option, British spelling is checked.  Besides
     preferring centre, colour, speciality, travelled, etc., this
     option insists upon -ise in words like standardise, Fowler
     and the OED to the contrary notwithstanding.

     Under the -x option, every plausible stem is printed with
     `=' for each word.

     The spelling list is based on many sources.  While it is
     more haphazard than an ordinary dictionary, it is also more
     effective with proper names and popular technical words.
     Coverage of the specialized vocabularies of biology, medi-
     cine and chemistry is light.

     The auxiliary files used for the spelling list, stop list,
     and history file may be specified by arguments following the
     -d, -s, and -h options.  The default files are indicated
     below.  Copies of all output may be accumulated in the his-
     tory file.  The stop list filters out misspellings (e.g.
     thier=thy-y+ier) that would otherwise pass.

     Two routines help maintain the hash lists used by spell.
     Both expect a set of words, one per line, from the standard
     input.  spellin combines the words from the standard input
     and the preexisting list file and places a new list on the
     standard output.  If no list file is specified, the new list



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SPELL(1-BSD)        RISC/os Reference Manual         SPELL(1-BSD)



     is created from scratch.  spellout looks up each word from
     the standard input and prints on the standard output those
     that are missing from (or present on, with option -d) the
     hashed list file.  For example, to verify that hookey is not
     on the default spelling list, add it to your own private
     list, and then use it with spell,

          echo  hookey  |  spellout  /usr/dict/hlista
          echo  hookey  |  spellin  /usr/dict/hlista  >  myhlist
          spell  -d  myhlist  huckfinn

FILES
     /usr/dict/hlist[ab]      hashed spelling lists, American &
                              British, default for -d
     /usr/dict/hstop          hashed stop list, default for -s
     /dev/null                history file, default for -h
     /tmp/spell.$$*           temporary files
     /bsd43/usr/lib/spell     actual spelling checker program

SEE ALSO
     deroff(1), sed(1), sort(1), tee(1).

BUGS
     The spelling list's coverage is uneven; new installations
     will probably wish to monitor the output for several months
     to gather local additions. spellout is limited to a maximum
     of 30 characters per word - words greater than 30 characters
     are broken and treated as two words.  British spelling was
     done by an American.


























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