3.3 Using Aspell with other Applications

3.3.1 With Emacs and XEmacs

The easiest way to use Aspell with Emacs or XEmacs is to add this line:

(setq-default ispell-program-name "aspell")

to the end of your .emacs file.

For some reason version 3.0 of ispell.el (the lisp program that (x)emacs uses) wants to reverse the suggestion list. To fix this add this line:

(setq-default ispell-extra-args '("--reverse"))

after the previous line in your .emacs file and it should solve the problem.

Ispell.el, version 3.1 (December 1, 1998) and better, has the list reversing problem fixed. You can find it at http://www.kdstevens.com/~stevens/ispell-page.html.

3.3.2 With LyX

Version 1.0 of LyX provides support for Aspell’s learning from user’s mistakes feature.

To use Aspell with LyX 1.0 either change the spell_command option in the .lyxrc file or use the run-with-aspell utility.

3.3.3 With VIM

To use Aspell in VIM you simply need to add the following line to your .vimrc file:

map ^T :w!<CR>:!aspell check %<CR>:e! %<CR>

I use Ctrl-T since that’s the way you spell check in pico. In order to add a control character to your .vimrc you must type Ctrl-v first. In this case Ctrl-v Ctrl-t.

A more useful way to use Aspell, IMHO, is in combination with Newsbody (http://www.image.dk/~byrial/newsbody/) which is how I use it since VIM is my editor for my mailer and my news reader.

map ^T\\1\\2<CR>:e! %<CR>
map \\1 :w!<CR>
map \\2 :!newsbody -qs -n % -p aspell check \\%f<CR>

3.3.4 With Pine

To use Aspell in Pine simply change the option speller to

aspell --mode=email check

To change the speller option go to the main menu. Type S for setup, C for config, then W for where is. Type in speller as the word to find. The speller option should be highlighted now. Hit enter, type in the above line, and hit enter again. Then type E for exit setup and Y to save the change.

If you have a strong desire to check other people’s comments change speller to

aspell check

instead which will avoid switching Aspell into email mode.