Spell checker

Posted by Zeno on Wed 07 Mar 2007 12:54 AM — 14 posts, 41,192 views.

Zeno USA Wed 07 Mar 2007 12:54 AM #0

I can't remember, is the spell checker included with the trial version of MUSHclient?

I'm having some issues with it on this computer, but can't remember if the trial includes the spell checker.

(The problem is that the Options and Dictionaries button do not do anything)

Nick Gammon Australia Forum Administrator Wed 07 Mar 2007 01:02 AM #1

They are not intended to do anything with the new spellchecker. Once the old one is decommissioned they will be removed. To change the dictionaries, edit the file spellchecker.lua, and look for these lines:


-- dictionaries - add new entries along similar lines to add more dictionary files
local files = {

-- lower-case word

  "english-words.10",
  "english-words.20",
  "english-words.35",
  "english-words.40",

-- upper case words

  "english-upper.10",
  "english-upper.35",
  "english-upper.40",

-- contractions (eg. aren't, doesn't)

  "english-contractions.10",
  "english-contractions.35",
  
-- user dictionary, we read and write this one
  userdict,
  }

You can add or remove files from that list.

There are a couple of options, too, at the start of that file.

Zeno USA Wed 07 Mar 2007 01:28 AM #2

Is Ctrl+J to spellcheck still? That doesn't seem to work.

Nick Gammon Australia Forum Administrator Wed 07 Mar 2007 01:59 AM #3

If the spellchecker is enabled, it should work. Possibly for an unregistered copy you used up the limit of "free" spellchecks it does.

Zeno USA Wed 07 Mar 2007 02:22 AM #4

Ah okay. The computer seems to have issues, so I think this old one is the issue.

Although I got this error in the middle of testing the new spellcheck:

Error number: 0
Event:        Run-time error
Description:  C:\Program Files\MUSHclient\spellchecker.lua:244: C:\Program Files\MUSHclient\spellchecker.lua:151: bad argument #1 to '?' (progress dialog userdata expected)
stack traceback:
	[C]: ?
	C:\Program Files\MUSHclient\spellchecker.lua:151: in function <C:\Program Files\MUSHclient\spellchecker.lua:136>
	[C]: in function 'gsub'
	C:\Program Files\MUSHclient\spellchecker.lua:235: in function <C:\Program Files\MUSHclient\spellchecker.lua:234>
	[C]: in function 'xpcall'
	C:\Program Files\MUSHclient\spellchecker.lua:234: in function <C:\Program Files\MUSHclient\spellchecker.lua:229>
stack traceback:
	[C]: in function 'error'
	C:\Program Files\MUSHclient\spellchecker.lua:244: in function <C:\Program Files\MUSHclient\spellchecker.lua:229>
Called by:    Function/Sub: spellcheck called by Command-line spell-check
Reason:

Nick Gammon Australia Forum Administrator Wed 07 Mar 2007 03:11 AM #5

I suggest removing the spellchecker.lua file and re-installing MUSHclient. I can't see why those line numbers would give those messages, and suspect you have an earlier version.

Keith Weaver Mon 12 Mar 2007 05:07 AM #6

I can't use the spellchecker. I have no idea how it is supposed to work anyway. What one would need to do to check text, when, where. I've never seen it function so I have no idea what it does.

When I try use it. I do this" File Menu -> Global Preferences -> General and check the "Enable" box for the Spell checker.

Then if I hit the Options or Dictionaries button I get

The DLL SSCE5232.dll was not found. Be sure it is in your path.

Not being a computer oriented person this is pretty much gibberish to me.

Nick Gammon Australia Forum Administrator Mon 12 Mar 2007 05:49 AM #7

You haven't mentioned which version of MUSHclient you have. It is always helpful to do so, as there have been many versions released over the years. Some may have known bugs, others might have subtle problems with the installer.

The DLL you mentioned should have been installed *if* you checked the "spell checker" box during the installation process.

Some of the more recent versions of MUSHclient use a new spellchecker that does not rely upon that DLL (Dynamic Link Library), however you need to download and install the dictionary files (this is a once-off process). See this forum post:

http://www.gammon.com.au/forum/?id=7403

Keith Weaver Fri 16 Mar 2007 04:41 AM #8

I'm using version 3.42. Attempting to download the new version resulted in a long chain of error messages so I gave up.

Nick Gammon Australia Forum Administrator Fri 16 Mar 2007 05:49 AM #9

Version 3.42? Released in May, 2003? 4 years ago?

Problems in that version may well have been fixed over the last four years. You haven't said what the "long chain of error messages" is, can you be more specific? Is it a downloading problem? An installing problem? What were the messages?

Zeno USA Sun 18 Mar 2007 03:03 AM #10

While on the topic, where was the dictionary acquired from? Is it English-American, or no?

I found it strange that there was no entry for 'violator' or 'license' and it gave no suggestions for either as well.

Nick Gammon Australia Forum Administrator Sun 18 Mar 2007 05:59 AM #11

As mentioned on this page:

http://www.gammon.com.au/forum/?id=7403

I got the words from this site:

http://wordlist.sourceforge.net/

In particular, it was this file:

http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/wordlist/scowl-6.tar.gz (2.23 Mb)

They have broken their dictionary lists down into "frequency" files, where the more common, the earlier file number. For example:



american-words.10

american-words.20



british-words.10

british-words.20

To save space and time loading (as well as memory usage) I selected a subset to be included on the downloads page.

It turns out that "violator" is in english-words.50, but I stopped at english-words.40 in the spellchecker file list.

Also "license" is in american-words.20, which also is not in the list.

It won't suggest them if they aren't in the list. Once you load the file, a similar sounding word would suggest "license" - but it needs to be there for the suggestion to be made.

Some of those files are quite small (eg. american-words.20 is only 3 Kb) so maybe they should be in the default list.

I hadn't exhaustively analyzed which files would be required, and in any case it is easy for you to change. If you want to suggest better defaults, without making the spell checker load time be too great, by all means do so.

Keith Weaver Tue 20 Mar 2007 12:03 AM #12

When I try to install the new version I get

Error Opening File for writing: ".\worlds\plugins\constraints.vbs"

Hitting "Igonre" at that point brings up

Error Opening File for writing: ".\worlds\plugins\constraints.js"

Hitting "Ignore" again yields:
Error Opening File for writing: ".\worlds\plugins\constraints.pl"

Then

Error Opening File for writing: ".\worlds\plugins\constraints.pys"

Then

Error Opening File for writing: ".\worlds\plugins\constraints.lua"

Then

Error Opening File for writing: ".\worlds\plugins\plugin_list.xml"

Then

Error Opening File for writing: ".\worlds\plugins\plugin_summary.xml"

And so on for 22 error messages.

The program then says it is installed but seems no different than it was before, and still shows it as being version 3.42.

Obviously I’m not doing something correctly.

Nick Gammon Australia Forum Administrator Tue 20 Mar 2007 12:15 AM #13

It is getting confused about where to put stuff, maybe you moved directories around?

I suggest going into the Windows Control Panel, and uninstall MUSHclient. That will clear out the Registry entries. Then, re-install it using the new version.