Linux spell command
On Unix-like operating systems, the spell command is a spell-checking program which scans a text file for misspelled words, and prints each misspelled word on its own line.
This page covers the GNU/Linux version of spell.
Description
spell is a very minimalistic spell-checking program, based on the original UNIX spell checker. It reads the contents of file FILE, word for word, checking them against its dictionary. If a word does not correspond with any of spell's dictionary words, the word is printed.
If an input FILE is not specified, or is specified as a dash ("-"), spell performs a spell check of standard input.
Spell and ispell
spell is essentially a wrapper for the more complex ispell utility. However, unlike ispell (or the very similar GNU program, aspell), spell does not make any spelling suggestions. It only reports which words were misspelled.
Syntax
spell [OPTIONS] FILE ...
Options
| -I, --ispell-version | Print the version number of ispell, and exit. |
| -V, --version | Print the version number of spell, and exit. |
| -b, --british | Instead of an American English dictionary, use the British English dictionary, if it's available. |
| -d FILE, --dictionary=FILE | Use FILE as a personal dictionary file. |
| -h, --help | Display a help summary, and exit. |
| -i, --ispell=PROGRAM | Use PROGRAM as the ispell executable. |
| -D DICTIONARY, --ispell-dictionary=DICTIONARY |
Use dictionary file DICTIONARY as the ispell dictionary. |
| -l, --all-chains | (Ignored, but included for compatibility reasons.) |
| -n, --number | Print line numbers. (For each misspelled word, also print the number of the line it was in.) |
| -o, --print-file-name | Print file names. (For each misspelled word, also print the name of the file it was in.) |
| -s FILE, --stop-list=FILE | (Ignored, but included for compatibility reasons.) |
| -v, --verbose | When a word is not found in its literal form in the dictionary, it is printed. |
| -x, --print-stems | (Ignored, but included for compatibility reasons.) |
Examples
spell -on words.txt words2.txt
Checks the spelling of files words.txt and words2.txt, printing the file name (-o) and the line number (-n) of each misspelled word. Output resembles the following:
words.txt:1: Thisz words.txt:2: fyle words.txt:5: haz words.txt:13: miztakes words.txt:16: innit words2.txt:1: Mannny words2.txt:1: wordsis words2.txt:4: aree words2.txt:6: miszpelleds words2.txt:19: inthis words2.txt:21: fyyle words2.txt:42: allso
Related commands
deroff — Remove nroff/troff, tbl, and eqn constructs from files.
eqn — Language processor for describing equations.
sort — Sort the lines in a text file.
tbl — Preprocessor which formats tables for nroff or troff.
troff — Typeset or format documents for terminal display or line-printer.