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I'd like to make flyspell aware of certain words I use frequently--like foreign proper names, etc. But I don't want flyspell to think that this list is a complete dictionary; rather I'd like it to take the union of this list and its default dictionary.

How can I do this?

pseudosudo
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1 Answers1

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As I understand it, flyspell is the on-the-fly minor mode that highlights misspellings. It uses ispell (or whatever you've set as ispell-program-name) to do the actual spelling.

When I correct words in flyspell, I can add them to a personal dictionary. It's one of the options.

Are you asking for a way to pre-populate your personal dictionary? (In which case, we need to know what spell checker you use, ispell? aspell?)

Are you asking for a way to switch between personal dictionaries? If so,

(setq ispell-personal-dictionary "my-personal-dict")

See also Spelling in the emacs manual. (And C-h v ispell-personal-dictionary) Of course, that assumes a correctly formatted dictionary. I think personal dictionaries are essentially just word lists, but I don't know whether they have to be sorted, or maybe there are other requirements on the format.

Dave Bacher
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  • While we are at it, I would love to learn that flyspell can handle multiple directories - not just the main, and a personal, but possibly an arbitrary length path of directories. // E.g. the ,aster, my personal, and a project specific. When I am working on Project1 I do not want to have flyspell know about Project2's dictionary wordlist, and vice versa. // I can understand how it might be necessary to flatten the path for speed (hashed into a bitvector, right?). – Krazy Glew Oct 30 '14 at 22:41
  • Any further info available on the issue of whether or not `flyspell` can handle multiple personal dictionaries yet? – StackExchanger Jul 08 '23 at 09:38