.TH ISPELL 1carl CARL
.SH NAME
ispell - spelling error fixer
.SH SYNOPSIS
\fBispell\fR text_file
.sp
.nf
.RS 1i
interactive options: 
look:			l <key>, 
grep:			g <key>,
sed:			s <script>,
new file:		n <filename>,
help:			h,
print words:		p,
shell:			! <command>,
print current file name: %,
.RE
.fi
all args to 
.I look, grep,
and
.I sed
are double-quoted.
.SH SHORT DESCRIPTION
.I text_file 
is first fed to 
.I spell(1), 
and a list of
words not in the dictionary is printed.  Then a '*'
prompt appears.  Type 'h' at that point for help on
interactive commands which are available to help correct spelling errors.
.SH LONG DESCRIPTION
.B ispell
is a program that lets you conveniently run various existing system
programs to interactively correct spelling errors.  The programs 
.B ispell
knows about are 
.I spell, look, grep 
and 
.I sed.  
An interactive command to
.B ispell 
consists of a letter (which is expanded into the full name of
the system command to run) followed by statements to be passed 
as arguments to the system program.
.PP
When invoked, 
.B ispell 
first runs 
.I spell 
to generate a list of words not
found in the dictionary.  It displays them, then shows a '*' prompt.
Either 'h' or '?' displays a help message.  Here are examples of all
the commands:
.SH look:			l <key> 
The command
.sp
*l fort
.sp
will search the UNIX dictionary
all words beginning with "fort" to be printed on the screen.
.SH grep:			g <key>
The command
.sp
*g aver
.sp
will print out all lines in the file containing this string.
.SH sed:			s <script>
The command
.sp
*s s/explain/explane/g
.sp
will change all of the former spellings in the file to the latter.
.SH new file:		n <filename>
The command
.sp
*n nextfile
.sp
will cause nextfile to be sent through spell. It then becomes the object
of \fBispell's\fR interactive commands.
.SH help:			h, ?
prints a short help message.
.SH print words:		p
redisplays all words found by spell (does not reflect changes).
.SH shell:			! <command>
The prefix '!', as in most other unix programs, escapes the following
command to a subshell.  Note there must be a space between the ! and
the command.
.SH print current file name: 	%
This reveals the name of the current file being corrected.
.PP
The command line sent to
.I grep
and
.I sed
is automatically double-quoted to keep shell meta-characters 
such as '*' and friends from screwing things up.  
.PP
.SH AUTHOR
Gareth Loy
.SH SEE ALSO
spell(1), look(1), sed(1), grep(1)
.SH BUGS
No syntax checking is done on the command being passed to
.I sed, 
and
.I grep.
If it is not well formed, strange things can happen to your 
file.
It is worthwhile to run \fBispell\fR on a copy of your original text file
for safety.