#rtfreader# Read an RTF or flat text file and output the text, one line per sentence. RTF formatted lay-out is used to spot 'sentences' that behave in special ways: headings and list items. When flat text is given as input, an empty line is understood as a sentence delimiter, even if a full stop is absent. Also, certain symbols at the start of the line, if repeated on following lines, are interpreted as 'bullets' in a list. The output can optionally be tokenised. The program can be informed about abbreviations and multiple word units by adding extra paramaters.
RTF is chosen as rich input format because
- it is an open standard
- it is practically always valid because it is machine-made (contrary to e.g. HTML)
- it is fairly easy to parse, without the need to also read style sheets (contrary to XML)
- there are tools out there that can convert other formats to RTF while retaining essential lay out
Online availability
RTFreader is used as segmenter and tokeniser at CST's website (http://ada.sc.ku.dk/tools/index.php?lang=en) and an integrated webservice in the CLARIN-DK infrastructure (https://clarin.dk/).