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<!DOCTYPE html>
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<TITLE>GF - Grammatical Framework</TITLE>
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<H1>Grammatical Framework</H1>
<P>
Version 3.5
<br>
August 2013

<P>
<div class=mainlinks>
[ <A HREF="demos/index.html">Demos</A>
| <A HREF="http://www.grammaticalframework.org/download/index.html">Download</A>
| <A HREF="lib/doc/synopsis.html">Libraries</A>
| <A HREF="doc/gf-refman.html">Reference</A>
| <A HREF="doc/tutorial/gf-tutorial.html">Tutorial</A>
| <A HREF="doc/gf-quickstart.html">QuickStart</A>
| <A HREF="http://groups.google.com/group/gf-dev">UserGroup</A>
| <A HREF="gf-book">Book</A>
| <A HREF="https://github.com/GrammaticalFramework/GF/">GitHub</A>
| <A HREF="http://www.postcrashgames.com/gf_world/">Interactive Map</A>
| <a href="http://cloud.grammaticalframework.org/"><img src="src/www/P/gf-cloud.png" alt="GF Cloud Service" title="GF Cloud Service"></a>
]
</div>
<div class=extralinks>
<p>
[ <a href="http://code.google.com/p/grammatical-framework/issues/list">Issues</a>
| <A HREF="http://code.google.com/p/grammatical-framework/wiki/SideBar?tm=6">Wiki</A>
| <A HREF="doc/gf-people.html">People</A>
| <A HREF="doc/gf-bibliography.html">Publications</A>
| <A HREF="doc/gf-reference.html">QuickRefCard</A>
| <A HREF="doc/gf-shell-reference.html">GF Shell Reference</A>
| <a href="doc/gf-editor-modes.html">GF Editor Modes</a>
| <a href="eclipse/index.html">GF Eclipse Plugin</a>
| <A HREF="doc/gf-lrec-2010.pdf">LibTutorial</A>
| <a href="http://hackage.haskell.org/package/gf-3.5/docs/PGF.html">PGF library API</a>
| <A HREF="http://www.molto-project.eu">MOLTO</A>
| <A HREF="http://school.grammaticalframework.org">SummerSchool</A>
| <A HREF="/android/">Android</A>
| <a href="/~hallgren/gf-experiment/browse/">Browse GF Source Code</a>
| <a href="http://ci.zjyto.net/job/gf-build/"><img src="http://ci.zjyto.net/buildStatus/icon?job=gf-build" alt="GF build status"></a><small style="color: red"><em>New!</em></small>
]
</div>
</div>
<H2>News</H2>

<div class=news2>

<table class=news>
<tr><td>2014-03-11:
    <td>A company for commercial applications of GF has been founded:
        <a href="http://www.digitalgrammars.com/">Digital Grammars</a>.
<tr><td>2013-11-25:
    <td>The default character encoding in GF grammar files will be changed
        from Latin-1 to UTF-8. See
       <a href="download/encoding-change.html">GF character encoding changes</a>
        for details.
<tr><td>2013-10-18:<td>New resource grammar language: Estonian.
    See <a href="lib/doc/synopsis.html">library synopsis</a>.
<tr><td>2013-09-18:<td>New <a href="https://github.com/GrammaticalFramework/gf-contrib">GF contributions repository</a>, hosted on GitHub.
<tr><td>2013-08-06:<td><strong>GF 3.5 released!</strong>
    <a href="download/release-3.5.html">Release notes</a>.
<tr><td>2013-07-26:<td>Started a page with <A HREF="lib/doc/rgl-publications.html">RGL Documentation and Publications</A>.
<tr><td>2013-06-24:<td>We are now running the IRC channel <strong><code>#gf</code></strong> on the Freenode network.
<tr><td>2013-06-19:<td>New resource grammar language: Maltese.
    See <a href="lib/doc/synopsis.html">library synopsis</a>.
<tr><td>2013-04-25:<td>New resource grammar language: Greek.
    See <a href="lib/doc/synopsis.html">library synopsis</a>.
<tr><td>2013-01-31:<td><strong>GF 3.4 released!</strong>
    <a href="download/release-3.4.html">Release notes</a>.
<tr><td>2012-12-10:<td>
  <a href="http://www.postcrashgames.com/gf_world/">Resource Grammar Library
  coverage map</a>, created by Tommi Nieminen.
<!--
<tr><td>2012-11-18:<td>
  <A HREF="http://school.grammaticalframework.org/2013">GF Summer School</A>
  in Frauenchiemsee, 18-30 August 2013.
<tr><td>2012-11-18:<td>New resource grammar language: Chinese.
    See <a href="lib/doc/synopsis.html">library synopsis</a>.
    Complete but not yet perfect.
<tr><td>2012-06-29:<td>GF sources now mirrored in GitHub, with change
  statistics and other browsing features.
  See <a href="https://github.com/GrammaticalFramework/GF/"><tt>github.com/GrammaticalFramework/GF</tt></a>
<tr><td>2012-05-07:<td>New resource grammar language: Japanese.
    See <a href="lib/doc/synopsis.html">library synopsis</a>.
<tr><td>2012-03-23:<td>There will be a
  <a href="gf-tutorial-icfp-2012/">GF tutorial at ICFP 2012</a>
  in Copenhagen.
<tr><td>2012-03-03:<td><strong>GF 3.3.3 released!</strong>
    <a href="download/release-3.3.3.html">Release notes</a>.
  <tr><td>2012-02-24:<td>New resource grammar languages: Hindi, Sindhi.
    See <a href="lib/doc/synopsis.html">library synopsis</a>.
<tr><td>2011-12-29:<td>New resource grammar languages: Latvian, Thai.
    See <a href="lib/doc/synopsis.html">library synopsis</a>.
<tr><td>2011-10-27:<td><strong>GF 3.3 released!</strong>
    <a href="download/release-3.3.html">Release notes</a>.
<tr><td>2011-09-20:<td>There is now a page collecting
  <a href="doc/gf-editor-modes.html">editor modes for GF</a>.
  Contributions are welcome!
<tr><td>2011-09-12:<td><strong>GF 3.2.9</strong> source snapshot with faster grammar compilation available. See <a href="download/index.html">Downloads</a>.
<tr><td>2011-04-22:<td><a href="android/tutorial/">JPGF Android Tutorial</a> added.
<tr><td>2011-04-15:<td>The <a href="gf-book">GF Book</a> is available.
<tr><td>2011-01-13:<td><a href="http://www.molto-project.eu/node/1177">Phrasedroid
    available on the Android Market</a>.
<tr><td>2011-01-04:<td>GF is part of the
    <a href="http://www.clt.gu.se/clt-toolkit">CLT Toolkit</a>.
<tr><td>2010-12-23:<td><strong>GF 3.2 released!</strong>
    <a href="download/release-3.2.html">Release notes</a>.
-->
</table>

</div>

<H2>What is GF</H2>
<P>
GF, Grammatical Framework, is a programming language for
<B>multilingual grammar applications</B>. It is
</P>
<UL>
<LI>a <B>special-purpose language for grammars</B>, like
  <a href="http://dinosaur.compilertools.net/yacc/">YACC</a>,
  <a href="http://www.gnu.org/software/bison/">Bison</a>,
  <a href="http://www.haskell.org/happy/">Happy</a>,
  <a href="http://bnfc.digitalgrammars.com/">BNFC</a>,
  but not restricted to programming languages
<LI>a <B>functional programming language</B>, like
  <a href="http://www.haskell.org/">Haskell</a>,
  <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisp_(programming_language)">Lisp</a>,
  <a href="http://ocaml.org/">OCaml</a>,
  <a href="http://www.smlnj.org/">SML</a>,
  <a href="http://schemers.org/">Scheme</a>,
  but specialized to grammar writing
<LI>a <B>development platform for natural language grammars</B>, like
  <a href="http://moin.delph-in.net/LkbTop">LKB</a>,
  <a href="http://www2.parc.com/isl/groups/nltt/xle/">XLE</a>,
  <a href="http://www.issco.unige.ch/en/research/projects/regulus/news.shtml">Regulus</a>,
  but based on functional programming and type theory
<LI>a <B>categorial grammar formalism</B>, like
  <a href="http://www.loria.fr/equipes/calligramme/acg/">ACG</a>,
  <a href="http://openccg.sourceforge.net/">CCG</a>,
  but specialized for multilingual grammars,
<LI>a <B>logical framework</B>, like
  <a href="http://wiki.portal.chalmers.se/agda/pmwiki.php">Agda</a>,
  <a href="http://coq.inria.fr/">Coq</a>,
  <a href="http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/research/hvg/Isabelle/">Isabelle</a>,
  but equipped with concrete syntax in addition to logic
<li>a <b>platform for machine translation</b>, like
  <a href="http://www.statmt.org/moses/">Moses</a>,
  <a href="http://www.apertium.org/">Apertium</a>,
  but based on deep structural analysis (and usually applied for
  limited fragments of language).
</UL>

<P>
Don't worry if you don't know most of the references above - but if you do know at
least one, it may help you to get a first idea of what GF is.
</P>
<H2>Applications</H2>
<P>
GF can be used for building
</P>
<UL>
<LI><A HREF="http://cloud.grammaticalframework.org/translator/">translation systems</A>
<LI><A HREF="http://cloud.grammaticalframework.org/minibar/minibar.html">multilingual web gadgets</A>
<LI><A HREF="http://www.cs.chalmers.se/~hallgren/Alfa/Tutorial/GFplugin.html">natural-language interfaces</A>
<LI><A HREF="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1bfaYHWS6zU">dialogue systems</A>
<LI><A HREF="lib/doc/synopsis.html">natural language resources</A>
</UL>

<H2>Availability</H2>
<P>
GF is <B>open-source</B>, licensed under <A HREF="LICENSE">GPL</A> (the program) and
<A HREF="./LICENSE">LGPL</A> and <A HREF="./LICENSE">BSD</A> (the libraries). It
is available for
</P>
<UL>
<LI>Linux
<LI>Mac OS X
<LI>Windows
<li>Android mobile platform (via Java; runtime)
<LI>via compilation to JavaScript, almost any platform that has a web browser (runtime)
</UL>

<H2>Projects</H2>
<P>
GF was first created in 1998 at
<A HREF="http://www.xrce.xerox.com/">Xerox Research Centre Europe</A>,
Grenoble, in the project
Multilingual Document Authoring. At Xerox, it was used for prototypes including
a restaurant phrase book,
a database query system,
a formalization of an alarm system instructions with translations to 5 languages, and
an authoring system for medical drug descriptions.
</P>
<P>
Later projects using GF and involving third parties include, in chronological order,
</P>
<UL>
<LI><A HREF="http://www.cs.chalmers.se/~hallgren/Alfa/Tutorial/GFplugin.html">GF-Alfa</A>:
  natural language interface to formal proofs
<LI><A HREF="http://efficient.citi.tudor.lu/index_noframe.html">Efficient</A>:
  authoring tool for business models.
<LI><A HREF="http://www.key-project.org/">GF-KeY</A>:
  authoring and translation of software specifications
<LI><A HREF="http://www.talk-project.org">TALK</A>:
  multilingual and multimodal spoken dialogue systems
<LI><A HREF="http://webalt.math.helsinki.fi/">WebALT</A>:
  multilingual generation of mathematical exercises (commercial project)
<LI><A HREF="http://spraakbanken.gu.se/sal/">SALDO</A>:
  Swedish morphological dictionary based on rules developed for GF and
  <A HREF="http://www.cse.chalmers.se/alumni/markus/FM/">Functional Morphology</A>
<LI><a href="http://www.molto-project.eu">MOLTO</a>:
  multilingual online translation
<LI><a href="http://remu.grammaticalframework.org">REMU</a>:
  reliable multilingual digital communication.
</UL>
<p>
Here is a <a
href="http://videos.xrce.xerox.com/index.php/videos/index/618">talk
about GF at XRCE</a>,
14 years later.

<P>
Academically, GF has been used in at least ten PhD theses and resulted
in more than a hundred
scientific publications (see <A HREF="doc/gf-bibliography.html">GF publication list</A>).
</P>
<H2>Programming in GF</H2>
<P>
GF is easy to learn by following the <A HREF="doc/tutorial/gf-tutorial.html">tutorial</A>.
You can write your first translator in 15 minutes.
</P>
<P>
GF has an interactive command interpreter, as well as a batch compiler.
Grammars can be compiled to parser and translator code in many different
formats.  These components can then be embedded in applications written
in other programming languages. The formats currently supported are:
</P>
<UL>
<LI>Haskell
<li>Java, in particular the Android platform
<LI>JavaScript
<LI>Speech recognition: HTK/ATK, Nuance, JSGF
</UL>

<P>
The GF programming language is high-level and advanced, featuring
</P>
<UL>
<LI>static type checking
<LI>higher-order functions
<LI>dependent types
<LI>pattern matching with data constructors and regular expressions
<LI>module system with multiple inheritance and parametrized modules
</UL>

<h3>Getting help</h3>
<p>
If you need some help with GF, the first places to start are the <a href="doc/tutorial/gf-tutorial.html">Tutorial</a> and <a href="doc/gf-refman.html">Reference</a> pages.
The printed <a href="gf-book">book</a> contains all the material in the tutorial and some extra bits, and is the recommended reference for GF.
</p>

<p>
We run the IRC channel <strong><code>#gf</code></strong> on the Freenode network, where you are welcome to look for help with small questions or just start a general discussion.
If you have a larger question which the community may benefit from, we recommend you ask it on the <a href="http://groups.google.com/group/gf-dev">mailing list</a>.
</p>

<H2>Libraries</H2>
<P>
Libraries are at the heart of modern software engineering. In natural language
applications, libraries are a way to cope with thousands of details involved in
syntax, lexicon, and inflection. The
<A HREF="lib/doc/synopsis.html">GF resource grammar library</A> has
support for an increasing number of languages, currently including
</P>
<ol class=languages>
<LI>Afrikaans
<LI>Amharic (partial)
<LI>Arabic (partial)
<LI>Bulgarian
<LI>Catalan
<LI>Chinese
<LI>Danish
<LI>Dutch
<LI>English
<LI>Estonian
<LI>Finnish
<LI>French
<LI>German
<li>Greek
<li>Hebrew (fragments)
<LI>Hindi
<LI><A HREF="http://www.interlingua.com/">Interlingua</A>
<LI>Japanese
<LI>Italian
<LI>Latin (fragments)
<LI>Latvian
<li>Maltese
<LI>Nepali
<LI>Norwegian bokmål
<LI>Persian
<LI>Polish
<li>Punjabi
<LI>Romanian
<LI>Russian
<LI>Sindhi
<LI>Spanish
<li>Swahili (fragments)
<LI>Swedish
<LI>Thai
<LI>Turkish (fragments)
<LI>Urdu
</ol>

<P>
Adding a language to the resource library takes 3 to 9
months - contributions
are welcome! You can start with the <A HREF="doc/gf-lrec-2010.pdf">resource grammarian's tutorial</A>.


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