Basically there are not many good proofreaders available in the publishing industry - and the demand is high. That was the main reason for starting this course. Wikipedia is an important source for information. However, the concern here is about correct use of language too. Today we see a lot many errors in Gujarati newspapers, publishing, media and almost everywhere. That is a high concern for us. If Wiki is going to be an important tool for the next generation, we Have to make sure that it conveys correct language to the society. I would like to know, whether any auto-correction of spelling etc. are available while editing an article in Wiki ? Thank you. Roopal On Tue, Sep 17, 2013 at 4:38 PM, Kartik Mistry <kartik.mistry(a)gmail.com>wrote;wrote: _______________________________________________ Wikipedia-gu mailing list Wikipedia-gu(a)lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-gu _______________________________________________

Dear Bakulbhai, Most of us prefer to work straight on the wiki as wikiformatting could be done simultaneously. But, eitherway, it is OK so far as we have the spellchecker somewhere. That's simply great, we are lucky to have come across a person like you and Thank Rajeshbhai for looping in :-) Suggested a different thread because, all interested parties have already responded. Also, this being a mailing list, many people have opted for a digest instead of individual emails. So, if we continued discussion here, their feedback might not be in time (e.g. Vihangbhai's reply today), while if it came as personal email, it could be replied by interested person. But, both options have their own pros and cons, so will leave it entirely on you all. Regards, Dhaval On Sat, Sep 21, 2013 at 10:46 PM, Bakul Shah &lt;bakul(a)bitblocks.com&gt; wrote: > This is perhaps not the right mailing list to continue this discussion > but I am already on 3 or 4 gujarati related lists.... So for now I will > continue here. > > On Sep 20, 2013, at 9:36 AM, "Dhaval S. Vyas" &lt;dsvyas(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: > > Once we have such functionality, and it is available under CC > licence/public domain, it could be embedded in wiki (if not easily, without > much trouble). There are several ways we could take it on board. > > > *Licensing:* > > The spellchecking dictionary needs the kind of enhancements I talked > about earlier. One starting point is the word list in *dict-gu_IN.oxt*OpenOffice extension. > > Before doing any real work on it, we need to get the licensing issues > clarified. *dict-gu_IN.oxt *has a README file that says the original > word list was prepared by Utkarsh Project volunteers and the list has GPL. > GPL is actually for software so it is strange to see a dictionary using > GPL. See also: > > > http://stackoverflow.com/questions/4329467/is-it-okay-to-include-gpled-file… > > I don't want to get into a discussion of pros and cons of GPL but I am > unwilling to work on anything GPL due to its more restrictive licensing. > The best option in my view is to ask the Utkarsh volunteers to make it > public domain or licence it under a dual license (GPL as well as BSD). I > checked out http://www.utkarsh.org but it is not clear how to do this. > Rajesh, can you help sort this out? > > The other alternative is to do what Rajesh suggested, which is to feed > lots of text to a program and derive a list. If we do this, we will make > this completely public domain. > > > Can we all, who has interest in developing such functionality and > passion for the language as well as expertise, form a taskforce and take it > off list? I will be delighted to work on it in whatever capacity I can. > > I will leave any organizational issues to Rajesh and other more capable. > Rajesh, rather than use individual email addresses, pick an existing > mailing list to discuss this further. > > On 20 Sep 2013 15:48, "Bakul Shah" &lt;bakul(a)bitblocks.com&gt; wrote: > >> Rajesh, >> >> Proof readers will have to use a word processor or browser as other >> tools are not very good at displaying Indic languages. >> >> Googledoc is no good at spell checking. >> >> OpenOffice (or LibreOffice) has a number of dictionaries including for >> Gujarati. I suspect it doesn't work well & we have work to do. I have no >> desire or time to work on openOffice -- it is massive -- but there may be a >> way.... >> >> [The rest is a bit too technical. Feel free to skip] >> >> There are a number of open source standalong spell checking programs >> such as ispell, aspell, hunspell etc. Most were derived from or influenced >> by the original unix spell program written by S.C.Johnson. For the curious, >> here's a paper by Doug McIlroy about it: >> http://unix-spell.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/McIlroy_spell_1982.pdf >> >> ispell was pre-unicode and only worked with western languages but it >> made some major advances that seemed to be carried over to aspell. I dug >> into apell some and it seems to support Gujarati. >> >> Anyway, aspell can be used from other programs (has an API), can handle >> multiple languages etc. Its documentation is not sufficient (IMHO) to >> understand affix rules. ispell documentation has more details. I used to >> know ispell fairly well but that was 20+ years ago! >> >> The *dict-gu.oxt *extension (used in OpenOffice) contains a file >> called *gu_IN.dic* that contains a world list and* gu_IN.aff* that >> should have *affix* rules for Gujarati but it is very small (compared >> to English) and seems to needs a bunch more work. I see that this extension >> is maintained by Kartik Mistry (did I see an email from him in this >> thread?) so may be he and I can figure out how to add more affix rules? >> >> The basic idea with some example: given a rule like >> >> BOTH/R >> >> This can expand into BOTH and BOTHER, as -ER is a common english >> extension (cart, carter and so on). Another example: may have >> >> ACIDIFY/NR >> >> This can expand into ACIDIFY ACIDIFICATION ACIDIFIER (Y-ER maps to >> IER). These rules make the spellchecking dictionary quite compact as well >> as indicate how a word should be taken apart for efficient matching. >> >> aspell is capable of deriving such rules for English but I suspect it >> will need help in Indian languages. This is where the *.aff* file >> comes in. So for example in Gujarati we would like to render the following >> words in single rule >> >> * ગધેડો ગધેડી ગધેડું ગધેડા ગધેડાનું ગધેડાની ગધેડાનો ગધેડાના* >> * >> * >> etc. For this we can write something like >> >> * ગધેડ/XYZABC* >> >> where each letter denotes a particular suffix. And yet, there is no >> such word as *ગધેડ *-- And I am not sure these programs can handle >> this. And we have compund words such as *ઘોડાગાડી* -- which will >> require more complex rules. In fact Indic languages should have a much >> larger set of affix rules than English! We should also check out what is >> being done for Hindi. >> >> Next, we need rules for `similar' letters (or letters near each other >> on a keyboard) so that if there is not an exact match, we first try such >> similar or neighbor letters. >> >> Anyway, once we fix up the dictionary, very likely the same dictionary >> can be used with word processors such as openOffice etc. An easier idea may >> be to do a web based frontend. >> >> These programs do a lot of work: create dictionaries, read various file >> formats, update screen, etc. etc. that make them complicated and hard to >> modify. ideally I would want a single function for checking: >> check(Speller, String) >> >> That returns a quad: (correctly spelled prefix, misspelled word, list >> of suggestions, remaining string). A separate program can generate the >> dictionaries. The Speller object will read whatever dictionaries it needs. >> But I don't have time to implement this. >> >> Bakul >> >> On Sep 19, 2013, at 7:43 PM, Rajesh Mashruwala &lt;mashru(a)gmail.com&gt; >> wrote: >> >> Has anyone tried Microsoft office Gujarati spell checker? It is >> available with office 2010. >> >> Sent from the old new iPad! >> >> On Sep 18, 2013, at 11:43 AM, Bakul Shah &lt;bakul(a)bitblocks.com&gt; wrote: >> >> Googling "hindi spell checker algorithm" found a number of papers. The >> basic idea is to compare how "similar" a word being checked is to a word >> known to be correct, where similarity is computed using some algorithm. You >> don't store all the ways people can misspell a word. plus logic is used to >> derive related words from a root word, which depend on plurality, gender, >> tense, etc. These rules are more complex in Indic languages than western. >> And i think we may need to look at "clusters" instead of individual >> unicode points. But all this must have been worked years ago. May be not >> for Gujarati but for Hindi, Marathi, Bengali. You should check with the >> usual suspects (google, Microsoft, SIL, language researchers etc.). >> >> For OCR you may need something slightly different than spellcheckers >> that deal with human errors. Here a more common problem will be mistaking >> similar looking letters and joining or splitting of words due to too little >> of too much white space. >> >> Ultimately there should be support for language variations too (surati, >> kathiawadi, amdavadi etc)! >> >> On Sep 18, 2013, at 4:12 AM, Rajesh Mashruwala &lt;mashru(a)gmail.com&gt; >> wrote: >> >> Dhavalbhai, >> >> As we get text that is generated using OCR, I see need for a good >> Gujarati dictionary. I tried to use GL dictionary. It was not effective >> because it has corpus of words. It can not recognize any variation on the >> word. In that model, we need possibly over ten times the corpus GL >> dictionary has to be useful. Otherwise, it finds error with too many >> correct words. >> >> The same dictionary could be used for Gujarati proof readers. >> >> One way is to generate larger corpus by scrapping words from Gujarati >> Internet pages (those in Unicode), a better way is to think about building >> better dictionary logic. I may be able to interest exceptionally good >> volunteer developers if we can think of smarter way of creating a >> dictionary. For example, we could codify grammar rules to form derivative >> words. >> >> Should we pursue this course? >> >> >> >> Sent from the old new iPad! >> >> On Sep 18, 2013, at 2:48 AM, "Dhaval S. Vyas" &lt;dsvyas(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: >> >> Dear Roopalben, >> >> I second your concern regarding the correct language. I often say that >> Newspapers are the only LITERATURE most of us end up reading and have >> access to. The language and (more becoming common Hindi) words used in them >> shapes the language of society in present day and hence it is great that >> you are introducing this course. >> >> Unfortunately, on wiki we don't have spelling correction tool or >> dictionary lookup facility. But, Vishal Monpara has been developing one. >> Gujarati Lexicon has recently developed pop-up dictionary as well, which >> could be adapted for this purpose. >> >> On gu.wikipedia, there is a lot of content translated from either >> English or Hindi, and most of these lack the original Gujarati language. >> When read, these translations look so artificial. For the course, it could >> be good idea to show such examples and get the course attendees correct it, >> may be offline if they are not computer savvy or hesitant to use wikipedia. >> >> Please let me and community here know if you have any suggestions on >> how we can help with the task you are carrying out. >> >> Kind Regards, >> Dhaval >> On 18 Sep 2013 06:39, "Roopal Mehta" &lt;roopal.mehta(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: >> >>> Basically there are not many good proofreaders available in the >>> publishing industry - and the demand is high. That was the main reason for >>> starting this course. >>> >>> Wikipedia is an important source for information. However, the concern >>> here is about correct use of language too. Today we see a lot many errors >>> in Gujarati newspapers, publishing, media and almost everywhere. That is a >>> high concern for us. >>> >>> If Wiki is going to be an important tool for the next generation, we >>> Have to make sure that it conveys correct language to the society. >>> >>> I would like to know, whether any auto-correction of spelling etc. are >>> available while editing an article in Wiki ? >>> >>> Thank you. >>> >>> >>> Roopal >>> >>> >>> On Tue, Sep 17, 2013 at 4:38 PM, Kartik Mistry < >>> kartik.mistry(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: >>> >>>> On Tue, Sep 17, 2013 at 3:42 PM, Roopal Mehta &lt;roopal.mehta(a)gmail.com&gt; >>>> wrote: >>>> > At Gujarati Sahitya Parishad, we are running proof reading course >>>> and we are including a session of modern methods of proof reading, which >>>> includes editing on (Guj) Wiki articles. >>>> > >>>> > Please send suggestions if you have. This is the first batch of >>>> students from various fields. >>>> >>>> Few suggestions (some may be offtopic, sorry for that!) >>>> 1. Please follow Wikipedia's guideline for article. >>>> 2. Make sure person is logged in before making changes. >>>> 3. Please do not change anything other than spelling/grammar etc. >>>> 4. If you're that already, donating pictures of 'સાહિત્યકાર' in >>>> various articles from GSP, is good idea. Isn't it? :) >>>> >>>> Thanks for good work! >>>> >>>> -- >>>> Kartik Mistry | IRC: kart_ >>>> {0x1f1f, kartikm}.wordpress.com >>>> >>>> _______________________________________________ >>>> Wikipedia-gu mailing list >>>> Wikipedia-gu(a)lists.wikimedia.org >>>> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-gu >>>> >>> >>> >>> _______________________________________________ >>> Wikipedia-gu mailing list >>> Wikipedia-gu(a)lists.wikimedia.org >>> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-gu >>> >>> _______________________________________________ >> Wikipedia-gu mailing list >> Wikipedia-gu(a)lists.wikimedia.org >> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-gu >> >> >> > _______________________________________________ Wikipedia-gu mailing list Wikipedia-gu(a)lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-gu