Detection & Correction of errors in german grammatical case

• US 20020128819A1
• Filed: 03/06/2001
• Published: 09/12/2002
• Est. Priority Date: 10/20/2000
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Jessee, Andrea, Helfrich, Antje, Quirmbach-Brundage, Yvonne, Cardon, Paul
• Granted Patent: US 7,136,808 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 704/10
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/253 Grammatical analysis; Style critique

Abstract

A method and apparatus for grammar checking a German language sentence. The grammar checker parses the sentence into a verb phrase and an initial noun phrase combination associated with the verb phrase. The grammar checker accesses a morphology table to define an initial case combination associated with the initial noun phrase combination. The grammar checker accesses a lexicon to define a correct case combination associated with the verb phrase. The grammar checker compares the initial case combination to the correct grammatical case combination and generates a case error combination. The grammar checker generates a combination of sentence rewrites that includes a grammatical case change to a noun phrase that corrects the case error combination.

Claims

1. A computerized method of grammar checking a German language sentence, comprising:

parsing the sentence into a verb phrase and an initial noun phrase combination associated with the verb phrase;

accessing a morphology table to define an initial case combination associated with the initial noun phrase combination;

accessing a lexicon to define a correct case combination associated with the verb phrase;

comparing the initial case combination to the correct case combination and generating a case error combination; and

generating a combination of sentence rewrites that includes a grammatical case change to one noun phrase that corrects the case error combination.

2. The computerized method of grammar checking of claim 1, further comprising:

displaying the sentence rewrites in an order from the most likely to the least likely to be accepted by a user.

3. The computerized method of grammar checking of claim 1, further comprising:

limiting the number of sentence rewrites presented to no more than three rewrites per noun phrase.

4. The computerized method of grammar checking of claim 1, further comprising:

including a subject and any direct object and any indirect object associated with the verb phrase in the correct case combination.

5. The computerized method of grammar checking of claim 1, further comprising:

generating the case error combination without access to the meaning of the sentence.

6. The computerized method of grammar checking of claim 1, further comprising:

including corrections to the case endings of determiners, adjectives and nouns in the noun phrase in the sentence rewrites.

7. The computerized method of grammar checking of claim 1 where the German language sentence has an implied subject, and further comprising:

inserting a fake subject in the initial noun phrase combination to facilitate the comparing.

8. The computerized method of grammar checking of claim 1, further comprising:

filtering out of any sentence with a suspiciously complex combination before the comparing.

9. The computerized method of grammar checking of claim 1, further comprising:

detecting noun phrase (NP) disagreement in the sentence and filtering out the sentence before the comparing.

10. A computerized grammar checker for a German language sentence, comprising:

a lexicon and a morphology table stored on a computer readable medium;

a sentence analysis engine receiving the sentence and generating a parsed initial noun phrase combination and a verb phrase, the sentence analysis engine accessing the morphology table and providing an initial case combination associated with the initial noun phrase combination;

an error detecting function accessing the lexicon and generating a correct case combination associated with the verb phrase;

the error detecting function comparing the initial case combination to the correct case combination and generating a case error combination;

a target case calculation function generating a combination of sentence rewrites that includes a grammatical case change to one noun phrase that corrects the case error combination.

11. The computerized grammar checker of claim 10, further comprising:

a display of the sentence rewrites in an order from the most likely to the least likely to be accepted by a user.

12. The computerized grammar checker of claim 10, further comprising:

a display of sentence rewrites limited to no more than three rewrites per noun phrase.

13. The computerized grammar checker of claim 10 wherein the correct case combination includes:

a subject and any direct object and any indirect object associated with the verb phrase.

14. The computerized grammar checker of claim 10 wherein the case error combination is generated without access to the meaning of the sentence.

15. The computerized grammar checker of claim 10 wherein the sentence rewrites include;

corrections to the case endings of determiners, adjectives and nouns in the noun phrase.

16. The computerized grammar checker of claim 10 where the German language sentence has an implied subject, and the parsed initial noun phrase combination includes:

a fake subject inserted in the initial noun phrase combination to facilitate the comparing.

17. The computerized grammar checker of claim 10, further comprising:

a filter removing any sentence with a suspiciously complex combination before the comparing.

18. The computerized grammar checker of claim 10, further comprising:

a detector of noun phrase (NP) disagreement in the sentence and a filtering out the sentence before the comparing when there is noun phrase disagreement.