PERSONAL SPELLING CHECKER

BY BRYAN SCHAPPEL and BARRY KOLBE

This speedy, powerful machine
language program supports up to 10
personal dictionaries.  It's easy to
use and works with most DOS files. A
48K system and about 31,800 free
bytes give you about 6,360 words per
dictionary (counting about five
bytes per word) -- as many as 63,600
words altogether.

GETTING STARTED
Format a blank disk with DOS 2 or
2.5, then use DOS menu option "H" to
WRITE DOS FILES to the disk.  This
will be your Personal Spell Checking
disk.

   Next, copy PSC.EXE to this disk.
Rename PSC.EXE to AUTORUN.SYS.
Finally, copy DICTION.1 to this
disk. This is a dictionary file.

   Turn your computer off and place
your Personal Spell Checker disk
into drive 1. Remove all cartridges
(hold down [OPTION] on an XL/XE) and
turn your Atari ON.

   At the prompt, insert a
DOS-formatted disk that will contain
your dictionaries (the monthly disk
contains DICTION.1, a sample
dictionary for you to use).  You can
use the program to create additional
dictionaries.  Legal dictionary
filenames are DICTION.0 through
DICTION.9.

     NOTE:  The program may only use
one dictionary at a time. (For
example, after proofing your text
file with the first dictionary, you
must stop, load the next dictionary
file, and check the text again.)

   If there are no dictionary files
on your disk, the program chooses
its built-in default dictionary.

The top half of the screen displays
information to help you use the
program, such as the amount of
available memory, your current
dictionary and disk directories
("catalogs").  The bottom half is
your work area.  This is where the
main menu will appear.

  Choose a menu item by typing
the number or the first letter
of that item:

1) Proof Document
2) Delete Word
3) View Dictionary
4) Add File to Dictionary
5) Catalog
6) Exit PSC

Proof: Type in a filename.  ("D:"
isn't needed if you're using drive
1.)  The top of the screen shows the
filenames of the current dictionary
and file being proofed, the amount
of free memory, the number of words
in the dictionary and the number of
words proofed so far.  Below this is
the context line, which shows the
part of the sentence containing the
word being checked. An unknown word
is highlighted and displayed
separately below.  If it's spelled
correctly, just press [RETURN] at
the "Correct?" prompt.  Otherwise,
type in the correct spelling.  To
add the word to the dictionary,
press [RETURN] or [Y].  Press [N] to
skip it.

Delete Words: Enter the word to be
deleted from your dictionary.  Then
press [Y] after the prompt "Delete
word? [Y/N]" to remove it.

View Dictionary: This is for
examining the current dictionary.
Pressing any letter key displays the
words beginning with that letter.
For more words, press [RETURN].
Words can be up to 29 characters.

Add File: This lets you build a
dictionary fast -- but do this only
if you're sure that all the words in
the document are spelled correctly.

Catalog: This gives a directory of
drives 1-4, or 8 for a RAMdisk.

Exit: At this point you can save the
current dictionary by putting your
dictionary disk in drive 1 at the
prompt and pressing [RETURN].  You
can now restart or return to DOS.
If you restart, the current
dictionary remains in memory, but
you can load one different
dictionary if you want.

The first two bytes of a dictionary
contain the number of words in the
dictionary.  Next are 27 pointers to
the beginning of each set of words,
A-Z.  This speeds up the search for
a particular word.  The 27th pointer
points to one byte after the end of
the dictionary.  Third is a table
containing the number of words under
each letter.

Finally there is the default
dictionary of 26 words.  These are
AT, BUT, CAN, DO, END, FOR, GET,

HOW, IN, JOG, KNOW, LET, ME, NO, ON,
PUT, QUIT, RED, SO, THE, UP, VAN,
WHO, XEBEC, YES, and ZIP.  The first
letter is not actually present in
the word, and the last letter is in
inverse video.  Each single-letter
word -- that is, "I," "A" and
whatever other single letters you
choose to call "words" -- is stored
as a single inverse letter.

If you choose a command by mistake,
press [RETURN] at the first prompt
to go to the main menu.

When proofing a document, PSC
creates a file called DOC.TMP and
writes your corrected document to
it.  Your document disk must have at
least enough room for one copy of
the original document, or the
proofreading process will abort.

Since you can specify any drive as
the source disk, the DOC.TMP file
will also be written to that drive
-- so if you have a RAMdisk, this
program flies.

When the file has been proofed
successfully, the source file is
given the extender ".BKP" (even if
it already had an extender), and
DOC.TMP is given the original
filename.

This program is not case-sensitive,
so you can enter words in either
uppercase or lowercase -- even
inverse video -- and the program
will convert them to normal
uppercase.  The only time this
conversion is not performed is when
you enter a corrected spelling for a
word during a proof.

   EXTRA BONUS: We've also included
SPELL.M65, SPELL.DAT and SPELL.SUB,
the MAC/65 source code files for
the Spelling Checker.  Due to the
size of these files, they have been
stored in MAC/65 "SAVEd" form.
   You do NOT need these files to
use the PSC program.

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