Maybe the easiest way an idea to be understood is to tell its ultimate goal, in a 'I have a dream ...' style.
In my case: I dream of instant English-phrase sidekick (suggester/hinter) tool.
The goal is everybody to have the ability to write, in real time, as correctly as possible.
Nowadays when a text is typed in search-engine fields some pale text/suggestions appear, that is what I am talking about.
Imagine this: A kid playing with words and wanting to construct a sentence by using two afore-chosen words but not knowing any grammar.
The situation is similar to forcing some unexperienced person to drive bicycle instead of tricycle first.
The point is, that even when one is extensively trained, it is never enough - the tricycle remains as a reminder-of-everlasting-ignorance forever.
Or as one of our renowned translators of Jack London has said: 'The difference between the better translator and the good one is in using a dictionary.' - contrary to the expected the former uses it whereas the latter is too 'versed'/(vanity sick) and needs it not, well-said.
Of course for a corporation or skillful programmers it is not a big deal to achieve such functionality.
The problem lies not so much in applied algorithms or used programming language but in the scarcity of data which feeds the suggester.
Currently only Google (I am not their fan) shared their ngram datasets, as far as I know made from
4% of all printed books or 5+ million books.
In my view these huge numbers weigh little because the practice shows one poor (yet) corpus far from needed, to talk here for comprehensiveness is a nonsense (look at 210 unfamiliar 4grams encountered in 'The Little Match Girl').
So my dream needs a NEARLY-UNABRIDGED corpus of English(British, American, Australian ...) 4grams (as minimum) preferably 9grams (enabling whole sentences to appear under your fingers).
I know I know that it looks/sounds like/as a long shot, but such greediness fits well here, after all I speak of billions of phrases, no room for profanity, floppy thinking, half-done encoding.
In my vocabulary 'greedy' and 'uncompromising' are synonyms and I use them interchangeably.
In next paragraphs I tried to visualize poorly one static suggestion for word 'getting' by giving all/PROPER three-words-collocations from left and right side:
to get the suggestions I ran Graphein in search for:
*_getting|
also for:
getting_*
and finally the first search yields 17,425 hits, while the second search yields 18,773 hits.
The results for '
*_getting|':
a_baby_is_getting
a_baby_without_getting
a_bad_time_getting
a_balance_between_getting
...
a_habit_of_getting
a_half_in_getting
a_hand_at_getting
a_hand_in_getting
a_handicap_in_getting
a_hard_job_getting
a_hard_time_getting
a_harder_time_getting
...
as_things_were_getting
as_time_was_getting
as_to_avoid_getting
as_to_ensure_getting
as_to_his_getting
as_to_my_getting
as_to_my_getting
as_to_our_getting
as_to_the_getting
...
assist_clients_in_getting
assist_her_in_getting
assist_him_in_getting
...
be_accustomed_to_getting
be_achieved_by_getting
be_active_in_getting
be_adopted_for_getting
be_afraid_of_getting
be_aided_in_getting
be_aimed_at_getting
...
expressed_concern_about_getting
expressed_interest_in_getting
extraordinary_power_of_getting
extreme_difficulty_in_getting
extreme_difficulty_of_getting
extreme_passion_for_getting
extremely_desirous_of_getting
extremely_effective_in_getting
extremely_fortunate_in_getting
extremely_helpful_in_getting
extremely_important_in_getting
extremely_interested_in_getting
extremely_useful_in_getting
...
within_despair_of_getting
within_minutes_of_getting
...
your_work_is_getting
yourself_began_by_getting
yourself_for_not_getting
zero_chance_of_getting
The results for '
getting_*':
...
getting_a_better_chance
getting_a_better_class
getting_a_better_deal
getting_a_better_education
getting_a_better_feel
getting_a_better_grade
getting_a_better_grasp
getting_a_better_grip
...
getting_a_hand_on
getting_a_handful_of
getting_a_handle_on
getting_a_handle_on
getting_a_handle_on
getting_a_handle_on
getting_a_hard_on
getting_a_hard_time
...
getting_along_very_fast
getting_along_very_nicely
getting_along_very_slowly
getting_along_very_well
...
getting_as_much_fun
getting_as_much_good
getting_as_much_help
getting_as_much_in
getting_as_much_information
...
getting_started_on_an
getting_started_on_her
getting_started_on_his
getting_started_on_it
getting_started_on_its
getting_started_on_my
getting_started_on_our
...
getting_yourself_ready_for
getting_yourself_ready_to
getting_yourself_talked_about
getting_yourself_to_the
getting_yourself_very_wet
getting_yourself_worked_up
getting_youth_by_years
Having all these suggestions is not enough, here comes the last but not least part: visualization.
Well, I cannot show anything but the suggestive outcome is something like:
Step 1: write '
getting'
two pop-up flowing windows appear each filled with above suggestions.
Step 2: you write '
in getting'
the useful part here is that the entered 2gram is to be searched not into 4grams but say 5grams (3 words from both sides, again) and so on until a suitable sentence (or 9gram) appears.
For example one suggestion is: '
helpful in getting information'.
Step 3: you have obtained a stable/proper 4gram containing needed words from left and right, and you finish the sentence by yourself.
The magical part is that (even if you are not sure what you are looking for) the sheer abundance of phrases will guide/supply/form your thought dynamically i.e. writing and thinking will happen (hopefully) simultaneously.
I recall a funny scene from 'Captain Apache' movie in which Lee Van Cleef was being asked 'What are you searching?' and his answer was something like: 'Nothing. It is amazing how many things pop-up when you just search.'
Let there be greediness ...
The style choosing would be try-once-give-me-more i.e. addictive/indispensable, as in the next example:
getting_a_handle_on [Google books]
getting_a_handle_on [Australian magazines & newspapers]
getting_a_handle_on [Agatha Christie - anthology]
getting_a_handle_on [Arthur Conan Doyle - 'Sherlock Holmes' collection]
getting_a_handle_on [Irish legends]
getting_a_handle_on [Fairy tales translated into English]
Obviously relying on one corpus alone is not remotely as useful as using hundreds-why-not-thousands of corpora.
It must feature smooth scrolling and animated-like appearance, but this is up to Graphic-Interface designers and gadget manufacturers.
Yes, the futuristic way of writing is neither left-to-right nor right-to-left anymore but from middle-to-edges, he-he.
I believe/KNOW the time (for such an assistant) is nearer than most of us think.