Learning English with Cowsay
· cowsay fortune greLinux has some absurd tools like fortune and cowsay. Fortune is a simple utility which displays random fortune cookies every time the user opens the terminal. Cowsay puts the message you give to it as an argument in a speech bubble with an ASCII image of a cow. You can combine cowsay and fortune to display a fortune cookie in the speech bubble of a cow. Nothing useful if you take them at face-value.
I have been repeatedly failing in my attempts to study English for GRE. I had tried Magoosh GRE flashcard, Barron’s Gre Book but kept forgetting the words. I decided to display words instead of fortune cookies in my terminal. I use my computer profusely so this might help.
First problem was to get a list of words. Someone has uploaded all the words from Magoosh GRE flashcard and Barron’s GRE on quizlet.com here and here. Now it was just a matter of scraping them and a simple python script was apt for the task. I scraped all the words and their meanings in a text file named words, each word separated by a ‘%’. This ‘%’ has a special significance. It is useful in creating a random access file for strings which is used by the fortune program.
strfile wordsThis generates a words.dat file. I moved both - the words.dat file and the words file to the folder that contains the fortune database which in my case is /usr/share/fortune. Now fortune also uses this file for selecting cookies. But I just want the words and not any other cookie. In fortune, you can specify the name of the database from which you want it to randomly select a string. So, fortune words did the task.
While exploring fortune, I also found that you can specify the probabilities with which it selects string from each database. This is helpful beacuse I want to to select words from Magoosh Basic and Magoosh Common list more frequently than Magoosh Advanced. For this, I need the words in separate files according to category. No probelm because I found the different lists on quizlet.com here, here and here, scraped them into different files and followed the same procedure. The script used for scraping and the list of words is available in a github repository here. So now my command is
fortune fortune 40% magoosh_basic 40% magoosh_common magoosh_advThis gives a word from Basic and Common list with a probability of 0.4 and from Advanced list with a probability of 0.2.
To make it more interesting, I piped the output to cowsay. In cowsay, you can specify different ASCII images as argument. There is a default set of images in the /usr/share/cows folder.
fortune -c 40% magoosh_basic 40% magoosh_common magoosh_adv | cowthink -f $(find /usr/share/cows -type f | shuf -n 1)This command selects a random ASCII image from the set of images in usr/share/cows folder for the cowsay application. I added this to my .zshrc file. And the results were interesting!
_________________________________________
( (/usr/share/fortune/magoosh_basic) % )
( dispatch noun: the property of being )
( prompt and efficient )
( )
( Synonyms : despatch , expedition , )
( expeditiousness )
( )
( She finished her thesis with dispatch, )
( amazing her advisors who couldn't )
( believe she hadn't written 60 scholarly )
( pages so quickly. )
( )
( verb: dispose of rapidly and without )
( delay and efficiently )
( )
( As soon as the angry peasants stormed )
( the castle, they caught the king and )
( swiftly dispatched him. )
( )
( This word has other definitions but )
( these are the most important ones to )
( study )
-----------------------------------------
o \ /
o \/
(__) /\
(oo) O O
_\/_ //
* ( ) //
\ (\\ //
\( \\ )
( \\ ) /\
___[\______/^^^^^^^\__/) o-)__
|\__[=======______//________)__\
\|_______________//____________|
||| || //|| |||
||| || @.|| |||
|| \/ .\/ ||
. .
'.'.`
COW-OPERATION
_________________________________________
( (/usr/share/fortune/magoosh_basic) % )
( pinnacle noun: the highest point )
( )
( Synonyms : acme , elevation , height , )
( meridian , peak , summit , superlative )
( , tiptop , top )
( )
( At its pinnacle, the Roman Empire )
( extended across most of the landmass of )
( Eurasia, a feat not paralleled to the )
( rise of the British Empire in the 18th )
( and 19th century. )
-----------------------------------------
o
o
^__^
_______/(oo)
/\/( /(__)
| W----|| |~|
|| || |~| ~~
|~| ~
|_| o
|#|/
_+#+_
_________________________________________
( (/usr/share/fortune/magoosh_basic) % )
( aboveboard adjective: open and honest )
( )
( Synonyms : straightforward )
( )
( The mayor, despite his avuncular face )
( plastered about the city, was hardly )
( aboveboard - some concluded that it was )
( his ingratiating smile that allowed him )
( to engage in corrupt behavior and get )
( away with it. )
-----------------------------------------
o ,-^-.
o !oYo!
o /./=\.\______
## )\/\
||-----w||
|| ||
Cowth Vader
_______________________________________
( (/usr/share/fortune/magoosh_adv) % )
( hauteur noun: overbearing pride )
( evidenced by a superior manner toward )
( inferiors )
( )
( Synonyms : arrogance , haughtiness , )
( high-handedness , lordliness )
( )
( As soon as she won the lottery, Alice )
( begin displaying a hauteur to her )
( friends, calling them dirty-clothed )
( peasants behind their backs. )
---------------------------------------
o _
o (_) <-- TeleBEARS
o ^__^ / \
o (oo)\_____/_\ \
(__)\ you ) /
||----w ((
|| ||>>
_______________________________________
( (/usr/share/fortune/magoosh_basic) % )
( imponderable adjective: impossible to )
( estimate or figure out )
( )
( According to many lawmakers, the huge )
( variety of factors affecting society )
( make devising an efficient healthcare )
( system an imponderable task. )
---------------------------------------
o
o
^__^ /
(oo)\_______/ _________
(__)\ )=( ____|_ \_____
||----w | \ \ \_____ |
|| || || ||