[developers] Typediff - a tool for exploring types used in the processing of DELPH-IN grammars

[Ned Letcher]

Hi all,

I've been working on a little tool for assisting me with exploring the
implementation of syntactic phenomena across DELPH-IN grammars. Here's a
little overview of 'Typediff' as I think there's some chance that others
might find a use for it...

The general idea is that by feeding the tool pairs of sentences that are as
similar to each other as possible but differ in that one exhibits a
particular phenomenon and one does not (ie minimal pairs), and then doing a
diff of the types used to process them, you can quickly drill down to
components of the grammar potentially associated with the implementation of
the phenomenon.

The tool extracts the types used in the diff by reading off every type
label found in the full AVM of the parse. The advantage of this approach is
that you can very quickly see differences between items that could be
hidden deep down in the depths of their AVMs that might not otherwise
normally see the light of day. (Doing the diff over supertypes also goes
some way towards solving the problem of how far up the hierarchy to look).

There's a live installation running over
here<http://hum.csse.unimelb.edu.au/typediff/>.
Here are also some examples of diffs from the ERG intended to pinpoint the
passive<http://hum.csse.unimelb.edu.au/typediff/#count=10&mode=difference&Agrammar=terg&A=The%20dog%20was%20bitten%20by%20the%20man.&Bgrammar=terg&B=The%20man%20bit%20the%20dog.>,
right node raising<http://hum.csse.unimelb.edu.au/typediff/#count=10&mode=difference&Agrammar=terg&A=We%20relied%20on%20and%20hired%20consultants.&Bgrammar=terg&B=We%20relied%20on%20consultants%20and%20we%20hired%20consultants.>and
subject
relative clauses<http://hum.csse.unimelb.edu.au/typediff/#count=10&mode=difference&Agrammar=terg&A=I%20like%20the%20dog%20that%20ran.&Bgrammar=terg&B=I%20like%20the%20dog.%7C%7C%7CThe%20dog%20ran.>.
(I've hooked up all grammars that I know of with ACE support -- if I've
missed one, let me know). There's also a page for Typediff on the
wiki<http://moin.delph-in.net/TypediffTop>
.

This tool could also potentially be useful for grammar documentation and
exploring unfamiliar grammars. One potentially useful feature is that you
can also diff input parsed by different versions of the grammar.

If you are able to make use of it for any of these applications (or
otherwise) I would greatly appreciate hearing about how it was useful, and
what kind of input you were feeding it. Also, if there are any missing
features that you think might greatly improve its utility, drop me a line
and we might be able to come to some kind of an arrangement...

Cheers,
Ned

-- 
nedned.net
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