style

[Rouben Rostamian]

In article <920004 at hpavla.HP.COM> rowland at hpavla.HP.COM (Fred Rowland) writes:
>> I recently discovered a command on my workstation which I had previously
>> been unaware of.  It it on a DECStation 3100 (Ultrix) and it is called
>> "style".  What I would like to know is what are the supposed meanings of
>> the various "readability grades"?  
>> ...
>> David L. Battle
>
>There's a complete writeup of 'style' and its companion programs 'diction'
>and 'explain' in an article
>
>     Writing Tools - The STYLE and DICTION Programs
>
>     L. L. Cherry and W. Vesterman
>
>dated November 22, 1980.  Unfortunately, my copy doesn't include the name
>of the journal, but I'd say there's a good chance that it was Communications
>of the ACM.  Good luck!
>...
>Fred Rowland

The article mentioned above is bundled with the volume "ULTRIX-32
Supplementary Documents, Vol. 1, General Users".  This volume, available from
DEC (order number AA-BG66A-TE) contains an excellent hodge-podge of articles
written by the fathers (and Mothers) of UNIX -- Ritchie, Thompson,
Kernighan, Joy, Bourne,  et.  al. -- a highly stimulating reading for those
who need to "hear it from the horse's mouth."  An article by Bourne is titled
simply "An Introduction to the UNIX shell"; obviously predating the babel of
UNIX shells that we deal with nowadays.

In the credits section of the volume there is a note that the document
"Writing tools - the STYLE and DICTION Programs" is copyrighted 1979 by AT&T
Bell Laboratories.  No additional publication information is given there.

--
Rouben Rostamian                               Telephone: (301) 455-2458
Department of Mathematics and Statistics       e-mail:
University of Maryland Baltimore County        rostamian at umbc.bitnet
Baltimore, MD 21228                            rostamian at umbc3.umbc.edu