Are there any computer tools to help me write documents?

Below are some useful tools to take the drudgery out of writing documents.

Lacheck

The lacheck utility is used to check for inconsistencies in LaTeX documents. It is located at
/home/damtp/users/mcneile/tools/lacheck-1.26/lacheck
Example output looks like: 
"research_report.tex", line 66: possible unwanted space at "{"
"research_report.tex", line 74: possible unwanted space at "{"
"research_report.tex", line 90: missing `\@' before `.' in "QCD."
"research_report.tex", line 94: missing `\@' before `.' in "QCD."
"research_report.tex", line 167: missing `\@' before `.' in "PACS."
"research_report.tex", line 313: double space at " ~"

Diction

diction identifies wordy and commonly misused phrases. The location of the diction utility is
/ukqcd3/mcneile/free_code/bin/bin/diction
Example output looks like 
research_report.tex:109: In 2003 the UKQCD collaboration [will -> Shall is
sometimes used with first person pronouns and the future tense. It expresses
something you believe will happen, not something that you are determined to
do. A drowning man shouts: "I shall drown, no one will save me!"] have
access to a QCDOC computer that [will -> Shall is sometimes used with
first person pronouns and the future tense. It expresses something you believe
will happen, not something that you are determined to do. A drowning man
shouts: "I shall drown, no one will save me!"] be 100 times ``faster''
[than -> Examine sentences containing "than" to insure that they are not
missing words: I love my father more than my mother. I love my father more
than my mother loves my father. I love my father more than I love my mother.]
our current computer and [will -> Shall is sometimes used with first person
pronouns and the future tense. It expresses something you believe will
happen, not something that you are determined to do. A drowning man shouts:
"I shall drown, no one will save me!"] be the fastest computer for
lattice QCD calculations at the time it is switched on.
(Note the subtle sense of irony that diction has).

Tired of LaTeX?

Stewart Wright has installed a copy of lyx that is a GUI front end to Latex. You can use it from 
/ukqcd3/svwright/sun/bin/lyx
There is some information about lyx available.

Online dictionary

http://www.yourdictionary.com/

Grammar guides


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Last modified: Tue Oct 16 10:41:11 2001