to boldly justify my perscriptivism

The following is a retort to an email attacking Sonnet and spell checking in general. I had initially written a vindictive reply, which I decided not to send and instead rewrote for a more general audience without, I hope, the angry overtones.

Languages are living, changing, amorphous things. Whilst it is possible to categorize them for certain uses, such classification seems to fail in other contexts. If we were to honestly demarcate a category for every language on Earth, there would be one for every human being on the planet. We all have our lexicons, grammars and even orthography. Of course, a personal language would be near useless if there was not a group to comprehend it. Therefore, we often classify languages into groupings of mutual intelligibility and hierarchies by degree thereof.

Spelling and grammar rules exist to convey our information in a manner that can be understood by others who also understand these rules. Style guides (should) provide hints on presenting information in a way less ambiguous. There is great tension among scholarly and armchair linguistics alike in characterizing certain aspects of language as correct. I've certainly felt this tension internally, while working on Sonnet. Yet, the need to communicate dictates a priori the necessity of common protocols and widely used convention.

So, to the angry woman (who thankfully was not a contributor to KDE, although was bitter user) who deemed it worth her time to write and send a tirade outline the alleged hypocrisy of descriptive linguists creating prescriptive software I suggest that she consider my true purpose.

The need to communicate clearly outweighs the disadvantage of using a language in a “non-standard” manner. But how are “non-standard” uses defined? Should we follow decree, common convention or the prescription of articulate, but deadline driven and uniformed writers? I certainly won't (and don't) posit myself as the arbiter of linguistic rule; although, I have my opinions of English usage. I simply wish to improve upon the existing technology that enables better communication. Providing optional languages aids is but one part of this desire. Furthermore, seeking to empower users of minority tongues does not force them to abandon their unique and valuable linguistic traditions. Merely providing users with tools, allows those that wish to ensure their writing is understood by others to verify that it is.