Re: ispell.el doesn't find all of aspell's dictionaries

[Juri Linkov]

>     There is one problem with this code: the dictionary list in the menu
>     bar is only updated when ispell.el is loaded (probably due to a call 
>     to an auto-loaded function).  So before any ispell-* command is run,
>     the menu shows the static list of ispell dictionaries, and if new
>     dictionaries are added, the menu is not updated.  I'm not sure what
>     can/should be done about that.
>
> Some ideas:
>
> 1. Have a menu item, "Update Dictionary List", to check again.
>
> 2. If checking is fast, check whenever the user is about to
> specify a dictionary.

Rechecking the dictionary list is needed also after changing the
program name in `ispell-program-name' (also don't forget to call
`ispell-kill-ispell').

> In the mean time, it would be useful for people to start testing your
> patch, so that by the time your papers have arrived, it will be
> thoroughly ready to go.

I tested the patch and discovered several problems:

> +   (let ((dictionaries
> +      (split-string
> +       (with-temp-buffer
> +         (call-process ispell-program-name nil t nil "dicts")

`aspell dicts' returns plain dictionary names like
`en_GB-ize-w_accents', but misses readable aliases like `english'.
Is it possible for aspell to return all aliases as well?

Aspell aliases will also make many aspell dictionary names compatible
with ispell dictionary names, so it would be good if users will be able
to use the same dictionary names for aspell and ispell without the need
to care about differences.

> +     (list dict-name
> +       "[[:alpha:]]"
> +       "[^[:alpha:]]"

This code doesn't take into account the real charsets used in
dictionaries.  Maybe it should extract the `charset' field
from `dat' files?

> + (defun aspell-find-dictonaries ()
                       ===========
Typo.  Use a spell checker to check your code ;-)

-- 
Juri Linkov
http://www.jurta.org/emacs/