Consistent point of view (e.g. second person to first person inconsistency)

[jlengstorf]

This might be harder than it sounds, but it would be fantastic if there was a way to check for a consistent point of view throughout a file or set of files.

For example:

...you should now have a working widget. At this point, we can...

Would be flagged with something like:

Inconsistent point of view: using both "you" and "we". Consider using a consistent point of view.

I can see this being a problem in some contexts, though:

At BigCorp, we believe in building tools to help you...

Despite the false positives, having warnings would benefit teams who contribute to documentation or other collaborative writing.

[wooorm]

That sounds awesome! do you think it’s doable though?

[jlengstorf]

As a really rough check, yes, but it'd have a ton of false positives. Something like, "Find the first use of a point of view pronoun, then watch for any that conflict with it and warn if any are found."

As far as the more nuanced version, I have no idea. Natural language processing isn't something I know a lot about. 😕

[ChristianMurphy]

Thanks for starting the discussion @jlengstorf !
We're in the process unifying ideas in with discussions unifiedjs/collective#44
If you'd like to continue this thread, or start a new one https://github.com/retextjs/retext/discussions/categories/ideas will be the home for ideas going forward.