Linux grammar checkers? (was OT - predicate nominative (was Re: [PLUG] Next Perl Monger's) Meeting)

[glen e. p. ropella]

=><=><= "o2" == Ovid  <publiustemp-plug at yahoo.com> writes:

o2> Yes, I'm sure.  "Is", in this case, is a linking verb and as such, the
o2> pronoun in the predicate takes the nominative case.  Reference: 
o2> http://grammar.uoregon.edu/case/nomcase.html

Yes, I understand.  However the word "that" implies something other
than the subject.  When one says "That is green", for example, 
they're not normally referring to themselves.  "That" indicates
"other" where "this" indicates "self".  The predicate nominative is
based on the subject being identical with the predicate.  The subject
and object both refer to the same thing.  But, when you use "that",
the subject and object don't refer to the same thing.  When you
say "That is me", you've stepped outside yourself... you're referring
to yourself in the third person, not the first.  So, the first person
form of the pronoun would NOT be appropriate.

So, I think the correct forms are "That is me" and "This is I".  Note,
of course, that I don't really care what's correct or
not... especially as dictated by an elitist community who somehow
suppose themselves the regulators of a living language. [grin] (That's
why I'm ok with putting punctuation on the outside of "s, splitting my
infinitives, using words like "productize", and ending a sentence in a
preposition.)

=><=><= "gepr" == glen e p ropella <gepr at tempusdictum.com> writes:

gepr> To justify this post [grin]... Are there any linux tools that help
gepr> with grammar?  In particular, I do alot of writing in GNU Emacs... so,
gepr> it would be very cool if there were a tool I could summon from emacs.
gepr> But, I'd be happy with something for abiword or openoffice.

Nobody knows of any?  Or is this a case of RTFM (or RTFGoogle) in the
form of silence. [grin]  I've found:

   http://queequeg.sourceforge.net/index-e.html
   http://www.gnu.org/software/diction/diction.html
   http://www.link.cs.cmu.edu/link/

It's a bit strange, really.  There seems to be a host of tools for
other languages... Perhaps English is too common to be interesting?
Or perhaps English grammar is less algorithmic?

-- 
glen e. p. ropella              =><=                           Hail Eris!
H: 503.630.4505                              http://www.ropella.net/~gepr
M: 971.219.3846                               http://www.tempusdictum.com