[384] in SIPB bug reports
xwebster & crashes
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU)
Tue Mar 21 10:44:34 1989
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 89 10:44:47 EST
From: Jonathan I. Kamens <jik@Athena.MIT.EDU>
To: sueu@ATHENA.MIT.EDU
Cc: bug-sipb@ATHENA.MIT.EDU
In-Reply-To: <sueu@ATHENA.MIT.EDU>'s message of Mon, 20 Mar 89 21:48:07 EST <8903210248.AA16035@M4-035-4.MIT.EDU>
From: <sueu@ATHENA.MIT.EDU>
Date: Mon, 20 Mar 89 21:48:07 EST
Webster will crash on the words:
scatalogical
saskatchewan 12 letters long
ssssssssssss
NOT on:
aaaaaaaaaaaa
We know that there are quite a few words that will earn you a "The
webster server appeare to be broken" error message. However, there
isn't much we can do about it.
The problem is in the algorithm that webster uses to try to figure out
a misspelled word. If you give it a word that is not in its
dictionary, that it reasons that if the word is misspelled, one of the
following things is probably wrong with it:
1. It's missing a letter.
2. It's got an extra letter.
3. One of the letters is wrong.
4. Two of the letters are switched.
It then proceeds to take the word and modify it over and over again,
each time correcting one "error" of the above type. If it goes
through all of those errors (think about how long that would take) and
doesn't find anything, it tells you there's no definition.
The problem is that when you give it a long word, the frobbing with
the word to try to get it to lookup in the dictionary takes so long
that the call from the client to the webster server times out.
Like I said, there's not much we can do about it.
In any case, thank you for reporting the problem.
--> Jonathan Kamens
Project Athena Watchmaker
SIPB (Student Information Processing Board) Member
Volunteer OLC Consultant
jik@ATHENA.MIT.EDU
