Interview with the author of Armenian PowerSpell Program Arman Boshyan and Director of “Sahak Partev-Papyan” Ltd. Hayk Papyan to Mediamax Agency and Itel.am portal

- How long have you been dealing with production of Armenian PowerSpell program? The full name of the program is Armenian PowerSpell Extended Edition 5.2. So, it turns out that there have been previous versions as well? 

A. Boshyan: The prototype of Armenian PowerSpell – ArmOrfo, was created 9 years ago and was the first program, which checks orthography of the Armenian language. Such programs are usually called spell checkers. ArmOrfo possessed quite limited capacities: the dictionary contained 60 000 words. Nevertheless, the program enjoyed quite significant demand, since there were no alternatives to it at the time. The program was quite poorly protected from illegal distribution, the fact becoming an obstacle to its development. After the issue of the new Microsoft Windows operational system, illegal distribution of the program stopped, since ArmOrfo did not operate with the new Windows.  

Thus, the program stopped developing because there was no necessary funding. In 2005, I made a decision to continue funding at the expense of my own resources and give a new birth to the program, calling it Armenian PowerSpell. I involved linguists and translators in the work. We decided to create a program, which would take into account the rules of Armenian orthography, the simple grammar, and, most importantly, which would work basing on phonation.

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