How to add a spell checker for a new language to Symphony

Da Li Liu, Lotus ISV Enablement Team Of Lotus Symphony  |  Nov 4, 2008 4:38 AM
Profile image for Da Li Liu Lotus Symphony is base on Lotus Expeditor platform , the spell checking services in Lotus Symphony is provided by TextAnalyzer framework in this platform.The TextAnalyzer framework defines two extension points: com.ibm.rcp.textanalyzer.Engines and com.ibm.rcp.textanalyzer.Dictionaries. These extension points for applications are used to contribute custom spell check engines and custom dictionaries. By default, the TextAnalyzer framework provides two spell check engines: POE (IBM® LanguageWare 2.7 engine), jFrost (IBM LanguageWare 5 engine) and 29 dictionaries which are the main dictionaries used for spell checking within various languages. Applications can use them directly. You can contribute a custom spell check engine or a custom dictionary into the framework as well. There is a sample for you about how to add a spell checker for a Lithuanian(Lithuania) language to Symphony. The attachment zip file structure looks like:

com.ibm.contributed.custom.engine.site.zip/

sources/ #All the sources codes for this sample plug-in.

com.ibm.contributed.custom.engine.site.zip #The UpdateSite for this sample plug-in

ContributeSpellingCheckInSymphony.odt #The guide for how to build out this plug-in.

28 Comments
  • Dave said on Nov 4, 2008 4:53 PM:

    Thank you for creating and sharing this to help others add custom dictionaries to Symphony.

    However, I spent about 3-4 hours this morning with this and several hours over the past week to create a Canadian English (en-CA) dictionary to use the jFrost engine that's in Symphony. I can create the dictionary file myself with LanguageWare, but I am having a heck of a time trying 5 or 6 different methods of getting it into Symphony but nothing has worked so far.

    This CustomSpellCheck thing uses it's own custom spell check engine. I need a sample just like this, but uses the jFrost engine in Symphony so that I can just copy the Canadian English dictionary file into which I have already created.

    Can you or somebody help me out with this?

    Thanks
  • Volker Weber said on Nov 4, 2008 5:11 PM:

    I can't even get the German dictionary to work. Symphony installs it, I can find it, but it does not recognize it.
  • Linda said on Nov 6, 2008 9:54 PM:

    Dave,

    Could you leave us your contact information? we would like to contact you directly to see your problem. Thanks.
  • Dave said on Nov 6, 2008 11:09 PM:

    Linda,

    Thank you for responding. I wouldn't mind discussing this over e-mail, however I am hesitant to post my e-mail address on this forum. I have the resources (word lists) for Canadian English (en-CA) and would love to bring it to Symphony to share with others.

    Can I contact you through the iptcs@cn.ibm.com address?

    Thanks
  • Supportadmin4 said on Nov 10, 2008 8:13 PM:

    Hello Dave & Volker,

    Thank you for your interest in Symphony and sending us the feedback. Could you please send your dictionary file and other information to iptcs@cn.ibm.com ? Our developer will make an investigation on it. Thank you so much.
  • DaLi Liu said on Nov 14, 2008 1:29 AM:

    Hello,Dava,

    By default the JFrost engine only support following Languages: "ar-XX,ca-CT,cs-CZ,da-DK,de-CH,de-DE,el-GR,en-AU,en-GB,en-US,es-ES,fi-FI,fr-CA,fr-FR,it-IT,nb-NO,nl-NL,nn-NO,pl-PL,pt-XX,pt-BR,pt-PT,ru-RU,sv-SE" and there are only three dictionaris:"en-AU,en-GB,en-US" be installed.

    Please use following way to add a new Language(en-CA) and a new dictionary(en-CA) to JFrost engine:

    1.Create a fragment plug-in host to "com.ibm.langware.v5"

    2.Add these extensions to the new fragment plug-in:

    <extension

    point="com.ibm.rcp.textanalyzer.Dictionaries">

    <dictionary

    description="English(Canda) Dictionary"

    dict_name="en-CA.dic"

    engine="jFrost"

    filePath="./dictionaries/en-CA.dic"

    language="en-CA"

    locale="en-CA"

    provider="Dava"

    version_info="7.0.0.0"/>

    </extension>

    <extension

    id="com.ibm.langware.v5.engine.JFrostEngine"

    name="jFrost"

    point="com.ibm.rcp.textanalyzer.Engines">

    <engine

    class="com.ibm.langware.v5.engine.JFrostEngine"

    interface="com.ibm.rcp.textanalyzer.spellchecker.SpellCheckerEngine"

    locales="en-CA"

    name="jFrost"

    platform="all"

    provider="IBM"

    thirdParty="false"/>

    </extension>
  • Dave said on Nov 15, 2008 9:45 AM:

    DaLi Liu,

    Thank you for taking your time to help. Unfortunately, I still can't get my en-CA dictionary to work and I have put in nearly 20 hours total trying to make this extension. I have finally decided to give up because I can't do this. If you want the en-CA dictionary, I can send it to you and you can have it to make a plugin so that others can benefit from it as well. That's all I wanted, to share with others.

    Dave
  • DaLi Liu said on Nov 16, 2008 9:43 PM:

    Dear Dave, I have got your dictionary and have a test successfuly.

    After you create a fragment plug-in following my steps, your en-CA dictionary will be added to Symphony. You can verify it by check whether a "ABC√" icon be add to the Canda language in the language prefernce page "File=>Prefernces...=>IBM Lotus Symphony=>Language setting=>language". By default the lauguage of document is en_US, you can change it to en_CA then your dictionary will be loaded every time.
  • Dave said on Nov 17, 2008 7:47 AM:

    DaLi Liu,

    I am so confused by the whole process (Eclipse, Expeditor, Symphony SDK, etc.) that I really don't know how to do this. If you've tested it and got it working, could you just send it to me as an 'updateSite' or Symphony plugin?

    I'm sorry but I just don't know how to do any of this properly.
  • DaLi Liu said on Nov 18, 2008 4:32 AM:

    Hello Dave,

    I have sent a updateSite to you, please have a try.

    And you can follow the Symphony development Guide to start develop Symphony plugin.
  • DaLi Liu said on Nov 23, 2008 10:02 PM:

    Hi Dave,

    It seems the way to add en_CA language to JFrost engine is error.

    It is my mistake,sorry for trouble you.

    BY default the JFrost engine only support following Languages: "ar-XX,ca-CT,cs-CZ,da-DK,de-CH,de-DE,el-GR,en-AU,en-GB,en-US,es-ES,fi-FI,fr-CA,fr-FR,it-IT,nb-NO,nl-NL,nn-NO,pl-PL,pt-XX,pt-BR,pt-PT,ru-RU,sv-SE".

    Although we can add the en-CA language to the JFrost engine following my error way,but there isn't a operater for this language in JFrost engine. So part of it is working and part of it is not working. You must write a new engine for these languages which are not in the V5/V27engine support list.
  • Dave said on Nov 23, 2008 11:23 PM:

    DaLi Liu,

    Thank you for all of your help with this, even though it wasn't successful in the end. I appreciate you trying to help me and taking your time as well. Unfortunately, I don't know how to create an engine so I will just have to drop this en-CA project of mine for now.

    Thank you.
  • Kirill said on Nov 26, 2008 3:52 PM:

    Hi all,

    I'm looking a way to check spelling in a language, other then english.

    From your post, i've got an impression, that engine v5 is supposed to support ru-RU among others, which probably means that the corresponding dictionary must be installed. That is not true in my case, i have only

    com.ibm.langware.v5.dic.en_AU

    com.ibm.langware.v5.dic.en_GB

    com.ibm.langware.v5.dic.en_US.

    So, what is the way to add an additional dictionary?
  • Supportadmin5 said on Jan 8, 2009 10:14 PM:

    Hi Kirill,

    Please download language pack and install it following the instructions in Technote #1293486:

    http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?rs=0&uid=swg21293486
  • Tau said on Mar 23, 2009 11:04 PM:

    Hello,

    Thank you for the excellent example.

    Is "Instant Corrections" handled by TextAnalyzer as well? I can't seem to make it work for a new language. Users can add entries to the list, but it doesn't auto-correct when typing.

    Any pointers will be most appreciated.
  • Add support for OOO dictionaries said on May 3, 2009 1:34 PM:

    Dictionaries supplied with LS are not very good. Dictionaries from OO.org are much better. It would be nice to have ability to import them
  • sergey said on Jun 17, 2009 2:21 AM:

    can't make symphony for mac check english or russian documents. it says the spellcheck is finished and that's it - without underlining the words..
  • Sandeep Kantimahanthi said on Aug 11, 2009 2:57 AM:

    Hi,

    I have recently seen a plug-in which actually updates the document information in RPM in real-time, without actually needed to open the RPM client / Notes client etc.Its just simply update the .odt file directly into the RPM..If anyone has done this work ..Kindly share with me.

    Thanks
  • Francois said on Sep 4, 2009 8:23 AM:

    Hello,

    I installed dictionnaries (fr, de, en) but they aren't working.

    What to do ?

    Thanks for help
  • Joseph said on Oct 5, 2009 6:50 AM:

    My spell check does not work (English) in my recently installed Symphony.

    It does not underline misspelled words while typing, nor does it recognize them as erroneous once I invoke the spell checker (by clicking the "abc" icon or by invoking it from the Tools menu).

    Help much appreciated.
  • Donatella from Belgium said on Jun 22, 2010 11:04 AM:

    Trying to install French dictionary ... but cannot do it !

    When reading all these comments, it seems that it is not that simple.

    Can you help;

    Quite urgent.

    Presentation should be on customer's desk by end of this week at the latest.

    Thanks for your quick reply.

    Donatella
  • Eldarel said on Nov 8, 2010 7:59 AM:

    In case you installed English client:

    How to download dictionaries:

    http://symphony.lotus.com/software/lotus/symphony/home.nsf/dictionary

    How to install additional dictionaries: (plugins)

    http://symphony.lotus.com/idcontents/installguide/en/install_3.0_GA.htm#5243
  • Fernando said on Nov 17, 2010 11:34 PM:

    How to add dictionaries in Ubuntu (LINUX) the ones you got there are for windows...

    ilopango1@gmail.com
  • Ricardo said on Dec 2, 2010 9:25 AM:

    Something is very wrong with dictionaries in Lotus Symphony... In Ubuntu 10.10 it doesn't work as expected. The words doesn't appear underlined...

    Maybe a forum dedicated to Lotus Symphony could be a good start to centralize the problems reported from users... I have had troubles to find where report or ask for advice regarding Symphony.

    Symphony is a great productivity tool anyway. :)
  • Rafael said on Mar 10, 2011 5:40 PM:

    I am new to Symphony it looks great.

    Just one problem:

    None of the dictionaries I have installed: English, Spanish and Italian work fully, it will capitalize at the beginning of a sentence, that is all they do.

    Please if you have any suggestion let me know.

    Thanks
  • Joseph Harris said on May 8, 2011 11:53 AM:

    Spell check does not do anything. It did not from the start, it does not with English Uk selected.

    There is a pause, it asks if it should go to start and then says the check is completed, while I am sitting looking at errors it should be spotting for my decision..

    What is the reason for this?
  • Peter Mesiarik said on Jun 22, 2011 6:59 AM:

    Hello,

    this is a great article. I have tried to make similar custom spell checker dictionary (Slovak) in Lotus Notes Client 8.5.2, but not successfully. Have you got any ideas how can I do it ? Or can you send me a little example for Lotus NOtes Client ? Thanks a lot.
  • Saúl Fabián said on Oct 14, 2011 12:29 AM:

    Hi.

    I see the spell checker dictionary Spanish (Mexico), but always Lotus set up the English Dictionary. I believe because the Lotus Notes 8.5.2 doesn't support Spanish Mexico Dictionary.

    And i tryied finding the dictionary but I didn't it.

    Can you help me. Is posible to install Spanish (Mexico) Dictionary?
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