GNU Aspell

Infobox Software
name = GNU Aspell
logo =


caption =
developer = GNU Aspell developers
latest_release_version = 0.60.6
latest_release_date = April 16, 2008
operating_system = Cross-platform
genre = Spell checker
license = LGPL
website = [http://aspell.net/ aspell.net]

GNU Aspell, usually called just Aspell, is a free software spell checker designed to replace Ispell. It is the standard spell checker for the GNU software system. It also compiles for other Unix-like operating systems and Windows. The main program is licensed under the GNU Lesser General Public License (GNU LGPL), the documentation under GNU Free Documentation License (GNU FDL). Dictionaries for it are available for about 70 languages. The main maintainer is Kevin Atkinson.

Comparison to Ispell

In comparison to Ispell, Aspell can also easily check documents in UTF-8 without having to use a special dictionary. Aspell will also do its best to respect the current locale setting. Other advantages over Ispell include support for using multiple dictionaries at once and intelligently handling personal dictionaries when more than one Aspell process is open at once. However, Ispell follows the Unix convention of being a command applied to a file (eg ispell text-file-with-spelling-errors), Aspell requires other command line options and the '--help' option is written by an expert rather than someone who wants to use it. Here are two uses:
*Interactively runs through the text_file checking the spelling: aspell check text_file
*Allows you to type in a word (followed by newline and Ctrl-D) to find words that sound the same aspell soundslike

Windows port

The Windows port of GNU Aspell is extremely out of date. The developer has no time and very little interest in maintaining a Windows port, and is currently looking for maintainers. [cite web | url = http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/aspell-announce/2008-04/msg00003.html | title = Need Someone to Maintain Aspell Windows Port | accessdate = 2008-07-06]

Integration in other applications

Among others, Opera [cite web | url = http://www.opera.com/support/tutorials/opera/spellcheck/ | title = Spell-checking With Opera | accessdate = 2006-02-06] , Pidgin, Digsby, AbiWord, Coccinella, LyX, gedit and Notepad++ use Aspell as spell-checking facility.

ee also

* Enchant
* Hunspell
* MySpell
* Pspell

Notes and references

External links

* [http://aspell.net/ Aspell Homepage]
* [http://aspell.net/suggest/ Aspell Spell Helper]
* [http://aspell.net/test/ Test Results of Aspell Compared to Other Spell Checkers]
* [http://aspell.net/man-html/index.html The GNU Aspell documentation] under the GNU Free Documentation Licence
* [ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/aspell/ GNU Aspell download page] (FTP link)
* [http://lists.freedesktop.org/pipermail/utf-8/2004-February/000005.html Aspell and UTF-8/Unicode]
* [http://savannah.gnu.org/projects/aspell/ GNU Aspell summary page] at Savannah
* [http://cocoaspell.leuski.net/ Mac OS X interface for Aspell]