Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!hao!ames!sdcsvax!ncr-sd!geoff From: geoff@ncr-sd.SanDiego.NCR.COM (Geoffrey R. Walton) Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions Subject: Re: spell bug????? Message-ID: <1673@ncr-sd.SanDiego.NCR.COM> Date: Tue, 11-Aug-87 11:33:35 EDT Article-I.D.: ncr-sd.1673 Posted: Tue Aug 11 11:33:35 1987 Date-Received: Thu, 13-Aug-87 02:29:08 EDT References: <541@augusta.UUCP> <727@houxa.UUCP> Reply-To: geoff@ncr-sd.SanDiego.NCR.COM (Geoffrey R. Walton) Organization: Western United Intergalactic Pacifier and Cane Corp., Ltd. Lines: 41 Keywords: is this in every system? In article <727@houxa.UUCP> jph@houxa.UUCP (J.HARKINS) writes: >In article <541@augusta.UUCP>, bs@augusta.UUCP (Burch Seymour) writes: >> Three of the words which are passed through by spell are: >> vfppvdu, plbpvhb, and nbclowd >> Is this a known problem? Do these words pass on all unix systems? > >Works OK on my system. Did some joker define a local >dictionary and stick these in? A shell script could be >replacing the real spell executable, and running the >real one with a local dictionaty. Just a possibility. >------- I sensed a trend in the "yes, it does this" and "no, it doesn't" replies/follow-ups to the original posting. So I decided to try a little experiment. ncr-sd is a Pyramid 90x, running OSx 4.0, so we have both the SYSVR3 and BSD 4.3 versions of "spell" (plus WWB and a few local variants). The strings mentioned in the original posting _DO_ pass unnoticed when the Berkeley speller is used; however, the ATT version of the command catches them every time, as does WWB (not surprisingly). A workable, but kludged, solution -- for sites with only the BSD "spell" -- is to add these strings, and any other known nonsense words, to the local stoplist used by the spell-checker. The real solution, of course, is to fix the source (for those sites that have source). (Is anyone in Berkeley listening? ;^)) #include Geoff Walton Software Publications NCR E&M San Diego geoff@ncr-sd.SanDiego.NCR.COM or {wherever}!ucbvax!sdcsvax!ncr-sd!geoff Even the smallest problem becomes unsolvable if enough meetings are held to discuss it.