Automatically Generated Inflection Database (AGID)
Version 2016.01.19
Copyright 2000-2016 by Kevin Atkinson <kevina@gnu.org>
The file "infl.txt" is an automatically created database of the
inflected forms of words from a rather large word list.
The latest version can be found at http://wordlist.aspell.net
Entries are in the following form.
<word><sp><pos>[?]:<sp><inflected forms>
<word> := [[A-Za-z']]+
<sp> := <literal space>
<pos> := [[VNA]]
<inflected forms> := <inflected form><sp>|<sp>...<sp>|<sp><inflected form>
<inflected form> := <individual entry>,<sp>...,<sp><individual entry>
<individual entry> := <word><word tags>[<sp><variant level>][<sp>{<explanation>}]
<word tags> := [~][<][!][?]
<explanation> := [<explanation text>][:<distinguishing number>]
<explanation text> := [[A-Za-z'_/]]+
where stuff between [ ] is optional, stuff between [[ ]] indicate a
range of possible characters for that entry. If a [[ ]] is followed by
a + it means the entry can consist of one or more characters in
that range. { } are literal.
A typical entry will look like
WORD V: WORDed, WORed 2, WORD {EXPL} | WORDing, WORing 2 | WORDs
<pos> is V for verb, N for noun, or A or adjective or adverb.
If <pos> is followed by a ? that means that the part-of-speech was not
in the part-of-speech database however the inflected forms of the word
where found in the word list.
The inflected forms are in the following order for verbs (except for
a few special verbs):
<past tense> [<past participle>] <-ing form> <-s form>
and for adjective or adverbs:
<-er form> <-est form>
Each form is separated by a ' | '.
Special cases:
be:
<past 1st & 3d singular> <2d singular, plural, past subjunctive>
<past participle> <present participle> <present 1st singular>
<2d singular> <3d singular> <plural present>
wit:
<past & past participle> <present participle> <present participle>
<present 1st & 3d singular> <2d singular> <plural present>
An absence of a variant level implies a variant level of 0. Two words
with the same whole number variant level are considered almost equal
with a slight preference given to the entry with a lower number. A
whole number variant level of 1 indicates a less preferred form of the
word. A whole number variant level of 2 indicates any number of
things. It could mean that it is from an archaic use of the word, or
a variant that is hardly ever used or for an extremely obscure meaning
of the word, or finally it could mean that the word looked like it
could possibly be a inflected form of the base word but I could not
find any evidence for them. If two words have the same variant level
and explanation it means that both inflections were found and the
script was not sure which one to use.
Sometimes the inflected form to use depends on the meaning of the
word. If this is the case the two entries will have different
explanations. If the distinction can be made in a few words it is
given with underscores (_) replacing spaces. Otherwise the two
entries will have different distinguishing numbers.
A < after a word means that there is a good change that this is an
inflected form of the word, a ~ after a word means that there is a
slight chance. A ! after a word indicates that the word is likely an
inflections of a similar word (generally one ending in e) and not the
current word. A ? after a word means that the word was not in the
word list but if it was it would be considered an inflected form of
the base word.
This version is now almost as accurate as Alan Beale's 2of12id file
distributed with the "Unofficial Alternate 12 Dicts Package" for the
base words which have an entry in 2of12id.txt with a few notable
exceptions. The most obvious one is the "person" entry. Alan Beale
considers, based on what his sources have told him, that "persons" is
the proper plural for "person" and "people" is considered a variant.
I however disagree and decided to consider "people" the primary form
and "persons" as the slightly less preferred variant based on my own
experience and http://www.quinion.com/words/usagenotes/un-person.htm
which says:
The normal plural of person was persons ... However, there is
evidence from Chaucer onwards that some writers chose to use people
as a plural for person, not only in the generalised sense of 'an
uncountable or indistinct mass of individuals' but also in specific
countable cases. ... Though persons survives, it does so largely in
formal or legal contexts ...From the evidence, it seems that the
trend towards using people instead of persons is accelerating and
that it may not be so long before persons vanishes from the language
except in certain set phrases.
I considered making "persons" a variant (level 1), but I decided
against it as "persons" is for the most part perfectly acceptable and
probably considered the proper plural to use by some.
I also considered the -people ending the primary form for all words
ending in -person such as salesperson and the -persons entry the
slightly less preferred variant in spite of what 2of12id.txt said.
In some cases a variant of level 2 is listed in AGID where it is not
listed at all in 2of12id. In general this means that the script came
up with the possibility and, in spite it not being listed in 2of12id,
it seams logical to me.
The final case occurs when a word has two or more -s inflections used
as both noun and verb forms, and these forms would have different
variant levels in 2of12id. For example:
ditto N: dittos, dittoes 1
ditto V: dittoed | dittoing | dittos, dittoes 0.1
For purely technical reasons and because I do not feel that it matters
too much I have made the variant levels for the -s forms the same. For
example the ditto entries became:
ditto N: dittos, dittoes 0.1
ditto V: dittoed | dittoing | dittos, dittoes 0.1
The choice of the variant levels I used is somewhat arbitrary but I in
general went with the lower level.
Fell free to send me corrections to correct any of these questionable
words. I am mostly interested in the preferred form of the word when
the script was not able to decide or words marked with < or ~ that are
valid inflected forms of the words.
Also included in this version are the files "variant_0.lst",
"variant_1.lst", "variant_2.lst", and "variant.tab". The files
"variant_#.lst" include all of the inflected forms at the given level
found in infl.txt which are not generally considered to be some other
common word. The file variant.tab contains a cross reference of all
alternate forms of inflected form of words. The file variant-wroot.tab
is like variant.tab except that it also included the root form of the
word.
Words are in mixed case but all accents have been striped thus words
like café are instead cafe.
The file "variant" contains a list of alternate inflections.
The file "irregular" contains extra information where a noun or verb
has irregular inflected forms.
The file "dontuse" contains a list of words not to consider an
inflected form of a word if more than one inflected form of a word is
found.
The files "prefixes" and "suffixes" contains a list of common prefixes
and suffixes respectfully. These files are used by the script to
produce inflected forms for words that end in a word in the
"irregular" file. If the beginning appears in the word list or the
prefixes file and the ending appears in the irregular file I also
consider <prefix>+<irregular inflections>. If the prefix is 3 letters
or more OR appears in the prefixes file and the suffix is 4 letters or
more OR appears in the suffixes file I consider it the most likely
choice, otherwise I consider it as a possible candidate but not the
most likely choice.
The file "make-infl" is the actual Perl script used to create the
data base.
The file "find-var" is the Perl script used to create the variant
lists and cross reference file.
The file "make-all" was used to create the word list used by the script.
CHANGES:
From Ver 2014.08.11 to 2016.01.19
Avoid hard coding the input files in the make-infl script.
No changes to the data files.
From Rev 4 to Ver 2014.08.11
Misc. changes to sync up with what is being used by SCOWL.
From Revision 3a to 4 (January 2, 2003)
Added variant-wroot.tab
Update find-var script to also produce variant-wroot.tab.
From Revision 3 to 3a (April 04, 2001)
Fixed a bug in the find-var script which caused some common
words which are variants for one usage of a word but not
variants for any other common usage to improperly appear in
the variant list.
From Revision 2 to 3 (January 28, 2001)
Changed the format of infl.txt to something which is slightly harder
to read but a lot less ambiguous and easier to parse.
Update various files, including the actual script, so that the
output that is almost as accurate of Alan Beale 2of12id.txt
Eliminated Moby Words and ABLE from the word list used by the script
to give more accurate results.
From Revision 1 to 2 (August 18, 2000)
Classified variants as either almost equal, also used, or
secondary.
The / is now used to indicate equal variants. "/?" is now used to
mean what "/" used to be.
Lots of additional rules added which greatly improved the results.
COPYRIGHT AND SOURCE:
The final product is under the following copyright, as well as any
copyrights mentioned below.
Copyright 2000-2014 by Kevin Atkinson
Permission to use, copy, modify, distribute and sell this database,
the associated scripts, the output created from the scripts and its
documentation for any purpose is hereby granted without fee,
provided that the above copyright notice appears in all copies and
that both that copyright notice and this permission notice appear in
supporting documentation. Kevin Atkinson makes no representations
about the suitability of this array for any purpose. It is provided
"as is" without express or implied warranty.
The part-of-speech database is taken from Alan Beale 2of12id
and the WordNet database which is under the following copyright:
This software and database is being provided to you, the LICENSEE, by
Princeton University under the following license. By obtaining, using
and/or copying this software and database, you agree that you have
read, understood, and will comply with these terms and conditions.:
Permission to use, copy, modify and distribute this software and
database and its documentation for any purpose and without fee or
royalty is hereby granted, provided that you agree to comply with
the following copyright notice and statements, including the disclaimer,
and that the same appear on ALL copies of the software, database and
documentation, including modifications that you make for internal
use or for distribution.
WordNet 1.6 Copyright 1997 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
THIS SOFTWARE AND DATABASE IS PROVIDED "AS IS" AND PRINCETON
UNIVERSITY MAKES NO REPRESENTATIONS OR WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR
IMPLIED. BY WAY OF EXAMPLE, BUT NOT LIMITATION, PRINCETON
UNIVERSITY MAKES NO REPRESENTATIONS OR WARRANTIES OF MERCHANT-
ABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PARTICULAR PURPOSE OR THAT THE USE
OF THE LICENSED SOFTWARE, DATABASE OR DOCUMENTATION WILL NOT
INFRINGE ANY THIRD PARTY PATENTS, COPYRIGHTS, TRADEMARKS OR
OTHER RIGHTS.
The name of Princeton University or Princeton may not be used in
advertising or publicity pertaining to distribution of the software
and/or database. Title to copyright in this software, database and
any associated documentation shall at all times remain with
Princeton University and LICENSEE agrees to preserve same.
Alan Beale 2of12id.txt is indirectly derived from the Moby part-of-speech
database and the WordNet database. The Moby part-of-speech is in the
public domain:
The Moby lexicon project is complete and has
been place into the public domain. Use, sell,
rework, excerpt and use in any way on any platform.
Placing this material on internal or public servers is
also encouraged. The compiler is not aware of any
export restrictions so freely distribute world-wide.
You can verify the public domain status by contacting
Grady Ward
3449 Martha Ct.
Arcata, CA 95521-4884
grady@netcom.com
grady@northcoast.com
The word list used is a combination of several word list:
1) The ENABLE2K word lists which is in the public domain:
The ENABLE master word list, WORD.LST, is herewith formally
released into the Public Domain. Anyone is free to use it or
distribute it in any manner they see fit. No fee or registration
is required for its use nor are "contributions" solicited (if you
feel you absolutely must contribute something for your own peace
of mind, the authors of the ENABLE list ask that you make a
donation on their behalf to your favorite charity). This word
list is our gift to the Scrabble community, as an alternate to
"official" word lists. Game designers may feel free to
incorporate the WORD.LST into their games. Please mention the
source and credit us as originators of the list. Note that if
you, as a game designer, use the WORD.LST in your product, you
may still copyright and protect your product, but you may *not*
legally copyright or in any way restrict redistribution of the
WORD.LST portion of your product. This *may* under law restrict
your rights to restrict your users' rights, but that is only
fair.
2) All of the word lists except ABLE.LST in the ENABLE2K Supplemnt
which consists of:
2DICTS.LST ALSO.LST LETTERS.LST OSPDADD.LST UCACR.LST
LCACR.LST NOPOS.LST PLURALS.LST UPPER.LST
All of these word lists are also in the public domain.
3) The list of signature words from the YAWL package which is in the
public domain.
4) The UK Advanced Cryptics Dictionary which in under the following
copyright:
Copyright (c) J Ross Beresford 1993-1999. All Rights Reserved.
The following restriction is placed on the use of this
publication: if The UK Advanced Cryptics Dictionary is used
in a software package or redistributed in any form, the
copyright notice must be prominently displayed and the text
of this document must be included verbatim.
There are no other restrictions: I would like to see the
list distributed as widely as possible.
5) Some extra words found in the Part-Of-Speech database that was not
found in any of the above word lists.
6) Words found in the Jargon File Word List package, available at
http://aspell.sourceforge.net/wl/, which is in the Public Domain.
7) Words in 2of12id.txt not in any of the word lists above. 2of12id is
indirectly derived from all the above sources and most of the word
lists from the Moby Words package:
10196pla.ces 113809of.fic 21986na.mes 256772co.mpo 354984si.ngl
3897male.nam 4160offi.cia 4946fema.len 6213acro.nym 74550com.mon
The Moby Word package, like the Part-Of-Speech database is in the
public domain.
8) And finally some extra words that I added myself. These words can be
found in the file "extra-words"
The "dontuse", "irregular", and "variant" file was created by me
(Kevin Atkinson) from numerous sources.