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From: finn@theory.tn.cornell.edu (Lee Samuel Finn)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next
Subject: Re: /usr/dict/{web2,web2a}
Summary: Webster second edition
Message-ID: <1991May8.220518.10422@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu>
Date: 8 May 91 22:05:18 GMT
References: <1991May8.144744.10089@watserv1.waterloo.edu> <1991May8.163059.10684@nntp-server.caltech.edu>
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In article <1991May8.163059.10684@nntp-server.caltech.edu> ptok@void.caltech.edu writes:
>In article <1991May8.144744.10089@watserv1.waterloo.edu>  
>wgilbert@fatou.UWaterloo.ca (William Gilbert) writes:
>> The same files, web2 and web2a, are on our Unix mainframe so I expect they 
>> are part of the BSD.  I assume they are used by the Unix "spell" as
>> supplemental dictionary files, though there is no mention of them in the
>> man pages for "spell".
>
>From the Man Page for TeX:
>
>     TeX  was designed by Donald E. Knuth, who implemented it
>     using his WEB system for Pascal programs.  It was ported to
>     Unix at Stanford by Howard Trickey, and at Cornell by Pavel
>     Curtis.  This version is a combination of their efforts.
>
>My guess is that you only need web to complie TeX and Knuth-related stuff.
>
>web2a = WEB -> assembly ????


No. The files /usr/dict/web{2,2a} have nothing at all to do with TeX;
they are lists of all the bold-face entries in Webster's second
dictionary. I'm not sure about /usr/dict/web2a. Neither of these are
the dictionaries used by spell(1) --- that dictionary is in
/usr/dict/words --- and neither of these are the Webster App
dictionary, which is in /NextLibrary/References/Webster-Dictionary.