DICTION(1)                           BSD                            DICTION(1)



NAME
     diction, explain - print wordy sentences; thesaurus for diction

SYNOPSIS
     diction [ -ml ] [ -mm ] [ -n ] [ -f pfile ] file ...
     explain

DESCRIPTION
     diction finds all sentences in a document that contain phrases from a
     database of bad or wordy diction.  Each phrase is bracketed with [ ].
     Because diction runs deroff(1) before looking at the text, formatting
     header files should be included as part of the input.  The default macro
     package is -ms.

     explain is an interactive thesaurus for the phrases found by diction.

OPTIONS
     The following options apply to diction only:

     -mm       Specify mm as the macro package to be used instead of ms.

     -ml       Make deroff(1) skip lists. Use this option if the document
               contains many lists of non-sentences.

     -f pfile  Specify pfile as a pattern file to be used in addition to the
               default file.

     -n        Suppress the default file.

BUGS
     Using nonstandard formatting macros may cause incorrect sentence breaks.
     In particular, diction doesn't understand -me.

SEE ALSO
     deroff(1), ms(7), mm(7)