Interview: Carlos Eduardo Dantas de Menezes
2006-05-17
Working in a large team, Carlos Eduardo Dantas de Menezes and his group recently 完全にするd a grammar checker for OpenOffice.org, which the Brazilian OpenOffice.org team has now made 利用できる for 即座の download. It is a pluggable module written in Perl/Java that can be used from 見解／翻訳／版 1.1.x 同様に as the 2.0.x 見解／翻訳／版s and 作品 with Brazilian Portuguese.
The 事業／計画（する）, 指名するd CoGrOO (Corretor Gramatical acopl?vel ao OpenOffice), was developed by Prof. Carlos Menezes' team at USP - Universidade de S?o Paulo and by the Centro Universit?rio SENAC-SP--and partly 基金d by the 政府. (OpenOffice.org is used by millions in Brazil and is 堅固に 促進するd by the public 部門.) I would hope that this grammar checker 代表するs the first of many 出資／貢献s by Brazilian developers, and in part to see the status of OpenOffice.org 開発 in Brazil (and in part to 刺激する it), I asked to interview Professor Menezes; he generously agreed, and the interview below was 行為／行うd over a period of several days 経由で email.
Tell us about yourself...
I'm a 35 years-old professor; I teach Programming, 人工的な 知能, and others 支配するs at two 私的な colleges here in S?o Paulo, Brazil. I just began to train for Olympic 体操 (it's very funny!), and I ーするつもりである to start my doctoral programme as soon as possible. I have been 熟考する／考慮するing NLP for about 11 years, and OOo gave me 適切な時期s to 適用する my 熟考する／考慮するs.How did you get 伴う／関わるd in OpenOffice.org? And who is 含むd in your team?
Almost three years ago, I watched a 解放する／自由な ソフトウェア 会合, called "Semana de ソフトウェア Livre no Legislativo". A speech which 動機づけるd and 奮起させるd me to begin this new FOSS 事業／計画（する）. I was 納得させるd that a grammar checker was a 要求するd to migrate to 解放する／自由な ソフトウェア, at least here in Brazil. And this area of knowledge, Natural Language 過程ing (NLP), is challenging and very 利益／興味ing to 熟考する／考慮する and 研究.
So, I 招待するd two friends to 参加する in this idea, Prof. Jorge Kinoshita, 専門家 in NLP, and Prof. La?s do Nascimento Salvador, 専門家 in formal languages and compilers. Prof. Kinoshita, because his experience in NLP, 人物／姿／数字d like 事業／計画（する） 調整者／コーディネーター.
We submitted our 事業／計画（する） to "解放する／自由な ソフトウェア Edictal/2003" of FINEP (a 政治の 機関 that sponsors 戦略の 事業／計画（する）s). There were about 300 事業／計画（する）s submitted; about 30 were aproved, 含むing CoGrOO.
I guess it's fair to 特記する／引用する all 協力者s of 事業／計画（する） (I know it's boring, but I want all in the team to receive credit):
- Prof. Dr. Jorge Kinoshita, 調整者／コーディネーター, technical 経営者／支配人, Grammar Checker server's programmer.
- Prof. Dr. La?s Salvador, documentation 経営者／支配人, grammar 支配するs writer.
- Prof. MSc. Carlos Menezes, technical 分析家, GUI's programmer, installer's programmer.
- Sueli Uliano, linguist, grammar 支配するs writer.
- William Colen Silva, Grammar Checker server's programmer.
- Marcos Oku, Grammar Checker server's programmer.
- F?bio Gusukuma, Grammar Checker server's programmer.
- Marcelo Suzumura, Grammar Checker server's programmer, installer's programmer.
- F?bio Blanco, GUI's programmer, installer's programmer.
- Edgard Lemos Jr., GUI's programmer.
- Bruno Sant'Anna, OOo interface programmer.
How did you develop the grammar checker? And did you consider making it proprietary? It's a fair question: here, at least, a grammar checker is 望ましい by many companies.
CoGrOO follows 伝統的な （弁護士の）依頼人-server architecture: server written in Perl language; listens to a socket port and answers its checker requisitions; （弁護士の）依頼人 is a short piece of Java code that 会談 with OOo and sends paragraphs to server. Grammar Checker Server's architecture is very modular: pre-加工業者, part-of-speech tagging, chunker, grammatical relation finder, error-支配するs applier (see http://cogroo.incubadora.fapesp.br/portal/負かす／撃墜する/Doc/LREC_2006.pdf). We ーするつもりである to 配達する 2 見解／翻訳／版s of CoGrOO: one of them will be 解放する／自由な, and the other one, proprietary. Some successful 解放する／自由な ソフトウェア 事業／計画（する）s follows this 戦略, like ワイン/CodeWeavers, Fedora 核心/Red Hat Linux, OpenOffice.org/StarOffice, etc. Another 計画（する）: we ーするつもりである CoGrOO will be the grammar checker 基準 to OOo. We could port it to English language, for example, if we had volunteers and some 資源s.
What would be 要求するd to port it to English or any other language?
CoGrOO has language-扶養家族 and language-独立した・無所属 parts. For example, to port it to English, we need to build a part-of-speech tagger and a chunker of phrases; in CoGrOO, these parts are statistically trained, so, morpho-syntactic annotated corpora are needed, but these 資源s are very expensive (see, for example, http://catalog.elda.org:8080/索引.php?language=en or http://www.ldc.upenn.edu/Catalog/ ). Maybe someone can say: “Use a 解放する／自由な corpus”, but there are few and small corpora (http://www.grsampson.逮捕する/資源s.html). CoGrOO （悪事，秘密などを）発見するs errors by using a handwritten 支配する 始める，決める (Brazilian CoGrOO uses about 100 支配するs), then, we need linguists to 令状 these 支配するs and check their possible 味方する-影響s. Finally, CoGrOO needs sponsor to developers.
As a professor, are you teaching OpenOffice.org coding (how to code for OOo) to your students?
Unfortunately, no. To 検査／視察する OOo codes 要求するs 広大な／多数の／重要な 成熟 in programming. But, 2 students of 地雷 are CoGrOO's programmers.
Have you considered teaching students how to work on addons, plugins, etc?
No. I'm not sure that it's a good approach. Honestly, I have to analyse this idea better.
If so, how have you 組織するd the students and the course work? For instance, do your students work on the OOo 事業／計画（する）? If so, how? and if not, why not?
I try to 招待する good students to 参加する in our 事業／計画（する）.
Are they 利益／興味d?
Yes! These 2 students considered OOo programming challenging and 受託するd the 仕事.
We recently created a new Education 事業／計画（する）; Sophie Gautier and I are the leads, and the 事業／計画（する） is 焦点（を合わせる）d on 開発. We'd be happy to work with you, though the 最初の／主要な language will have to be English, as it is 関係のある to 開発.
Could you explain this to me better?
Yes. The idea is to 跡をつける work 存在 done in computer science classes and to help those classes in using OOo as a training/learning 乗り物. For instance, one could learn C++ or architecture 経由で OOo; or localization 戦略s; whatever. We could 蓄える／店 the course programme (syllabus) on the 場所／位置 for others to 追加する to, etc.
Good!
In conversation at fisl 6.0 last year, you について言及するd that there were very few OpenOffice.org developers in Brazil. Is that still the 事例／患者? What can be done to encourage more OOo developers?
As I said to you last year, there are many Brazilian 協力者s working in the OOo 事業／計画（する）, and they are おもに doing translations (it's a 広大な／多数の／重要な 職業!). But, there are very few programmers. I would guess 率先s like "解放する／自由な ソフトウェア Edictal/2003" of FINEP and Google Summer of Code can give a 上げる to this 欠陥／不足.
Yes. Can you speak more about 解放する／自由な ソフトウェア Edictal/2003?
This Edictal made 利用できる a 予算 of R$ 4 millions (or almost US$ 2 millions, now) for 解放する／自由な ソフトウェア 事業／計画（する）s that were of importance to companies. “Companhia do Metropolitano de S?o Paulo”, a 集まり 輸送（する） company here in S?o Paulo, was 開拓する at StarOffice/OOo 移住 several years ago. This company was 利益／興味d in CoGrOO. About 30 事業／計画（する）s were 認可するd (out of 300 were submitted). We bought some computers and 契約d programmers and a linguist with the 基金s.
What more can OOo or Google do? Is money the real 誘導? or is something else needed?
Unfortunately, I suppose money is 必須の. There are many 利益／興味d professionals and students, but they need to earn money to live. Because this 誘導, Google is successful.
同様に, as you probably know, OOo 受託するs any number of 拡張s and these can also be Java 拡張s. Would that change things?Maybe. Using UNO interface to 延長する it can do OOo 切り開く／タクシー／不正アクセスing more popular. But, UNO interface is 限られた／立憲的な. You can not do everything with it. It's one of CoGrOO's difficulties, because there is 非，不，無 API to draw a wavy line under a word, for example. We need to 令状 the API.
Have you raised this 問題／発行する with the API 事業／計画（する）?
No. Many developers and I 地位，任命するd this problem at dev@lingucomponent.openoffice.org. The answer of Sun's guys were about: “..excuse me, we are very busy with 解放（する）ing of OOo 2.0. Wait for OOo 3.0.” And I agreed with them. There was much work to do! So, we decided we had to do something.
Recently--on 1 May--the ISO (International Organization for 標準化) 認可するd a 草案 of the OpenDocument 判型, which OOo uses; it will be ISO/IEC 26300. Many 政府s will only consider ISO 基準s and so this 是認 carries a 広大な／多数の／重要な 取引，協定 of 負わせる. Has it 影響する／感情d the perception of OOo yet? Do you think it will?
Not yet. But I guess it will.
大統領 Lula has made strong 声明s about Livre ソフトウェア (FOSS), as have the 大統領，／社長s of Venzuela and Bolivia and others in South America. But is FOSS something known の中で developers? How is it conceived?
FOSS is an unknown 支配する to developers, yet. But it's changing, because universities have given students 適切な時期s to know FOSS's philosofy and practice. We can't ignore the Internet strength to spread FOSS's 原則s.
Do you have any suggestions how we can better advertise FOSS to university students?
Advertise FOSS to professors (they are opinion 製造者s)! It's what the 広大な／多数の／重要な companies do!
What can we do to encourage more FOSS 開発 and 投資 in Brazil?
株 the news of successful 事業／計画（する）s made in Brazil! We had 広大な／多数の／重要な 事業／計画（する）s like Window 製造者, Kurumin Linux distro; the maintainer of Linux kernel (見解／翻訳／版 2.4) is Brazilian, etc. We have to 株 the news of what is happening in Brazil at events and どこかよそで!
Thanks!
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