From: Andrew Dunbar (hippietrail@yahoo.com)
Date: Tue Oct 22 2002 - 05:05:19 EDT
--- Gabriel Gerhardsson <mr.g@home.se> wrote:
> On Tue, 2002-10-22 at 04:05, Andrew Dunbar wrote:
> > --- Gabriel Gerhardsson <mr.g@home.se> wrote:
>
> On
> > Mon, 2002-10-21 at 02:21, Andrew Dunbar wrote:
> > > > --- phearbear <phearbear@home.se> wrote:
> > > > I was just thinking about this too. Or
> > > > something like it. How about showing a
> > > > disabled/ghosted version of the icon when a
> > > > dictionary exists but is not currently
> > > > installed?
> > >
> > > Right now the list of available dictionaries is
> > > downloaded from www.abisource.com when needed,
> > > so that information isn't available to us before
> > > we do that.
> >
> > That can't be right. The information for ispell
> > used to be in ispell_checker.cpp and Dom recently
> > moved it out into a separate XML file. This is
> > all the information we need. I think it's much
> > more useful to show an icon if a dictionary
> > *exists* rather than being available on some
> > internet server. This is usually going to be the
> > same for both anyway and we then don't have to
> > make the broken assumption that everybody
> > using AbiWord has a full-time internet connection.
>
> I clearly see your point, and I thought the same way
> a while there. But what made me suggest what I did
> was this:
> The listed dictionaries in
> ispell_dictionary_list.xml does not guarantee that
> we have a dictionary-file for all those entries.
It should. Dictionary names are arbitrary by definit-
ion with ispell. The only way we know what the file-
name is, is by finding one in the wild. We definite-
ly shouldn't be adding entries to this list when no
such files exist. If there are some there now they
should be commented out IMHO.
> * Now and then we may add entries in advance, before
> a dictionary is made available.
This is an edge case and we can either not add them in
advance or we can put up with them being out of synch
and put a note somewhere for users to see.
> * Many dictionaries is only available for little-
endian.
Really? I was working on a fix for this and had it
half done so that either endian system could load
either endian hash file. It was suggested that this
was of little use so I put it on the back burner.
Maybe I should dig it out and finish it off...
In any case we can extend the xml file to know which
dictionary exists in which endian. At compile time or
run time we decide which endian we are and show or not
show the icons with this full information.
> > > When that list have been downloaded (during a
> > > dictionary download) it's cached in the abi
> > > $HOME directory, so then we're free to use it
(of
> > > course, it may not be totally accurate, not
> > > being the latest version and all). A simple
> > > workaround would be a menu-option somewhere
> > > "Download updated dictionary-list".
> >
> > I'd recommend putting the focus on "supported"
> > rather than "downloadable". Otherwise an icon
> > alone isn't enough and is completely pointless for
> > non-internet-connected AbiWord users.
>
> My thought was that the "downloadable" dictionaries
> equals the "supported". How do you define this?
For ispell, if there is a hash file known to work with
AbiWord and which has been entered in the xml file.
We can always note that being supported doesn't always
mean downloadable. For instance Yiddish is supported
but our friend hasn't yet released the dictionary to
be usable by everybody else.
> I don't want to shut non-internet-users out. I was
> just thinking out loud of how we currently can get
> the list of currently available dictionaries.
> Granted, it's currently pretty much internet-only
> material. So another solution, better suited for
> non-internet-users, would be to ship the latest
> version of the abispell-list with AbiWord
> releases.
Well as I say, the xml file Dom created should *be*
the list.
I don't have an objection to giving connected users
more accurate information. That's a good idea. But
we should start out with the information that's
available all the time online or offline and it should
have the same meaning.
> That way my solution above would work, and in case
> someone wants an updated list, he can order AbiWord
> to download it (or it may be done implicit during a
> dictionary download).
> So, my main point is that the list that we currently
> ship in ispell_dictionary_list.xml can contain more
> than the available dictionaries,
We should fix this and make a note in the cases where
it makes sense to leave it broken such as Yiddish.
> while abispell-list contains exactly the currently
> available dictionaries.
Why not add an attribute to the xml file instead of
maintaining two separate files for very closely
related
things.
> That said, in this area I of course bow before your
> will whatever you decide. I'm not a linguist nor a
> HCI expert :) I just wanted you to understand my
> view.
Hey no need to boost my ego like that (: I just feel
that AbiWord is not primarily an internet app and most
AbiWord users at least outside the USA won't have
full-
time internet connections so we should pursue a mostly
non-internet solution. Making it a bit better when we
do have internet access is a nice enhancement though.
Also think of cases where I use AbiWord at home and
can come here to the internet to download spelling
dictionaries when I find out via the new icon that one
exists. Or what about when AbiWord plus all the
dictionaries come on a CD but only English is
installed
by default. The user will know to find the other one
on her CD. It also makes sense for Linux distros to
have one language in the base RPM and the others
available somewhere else.
Also, we should support pspell builds just as well as
ispell builds if this is possible. At least try to
make the code at the highest level possible instead of
designing the whole thing around ispell. This is
probably what you've done but I haven't inspected the
code.
Andrew Dunbar.
> Take care
> /Gabriel
>
=====
http://linguaphile.sourceforge.net/cgi-bin/translator.pl http://www.abisource.com
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