Bable: Text readability indexes calculator

Bable is a library that will allow you calculate quantitative readability indexes of a given text. Read more about readability tests here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Readability_test.

Besides calculating indexes (currently available: Automated Readability Index and Coleman-Liau index), it will help you build your own index calculator, giving you the structure and the helper methods for making the process smoother.

Did you know? Bable [ˈbaβle] is an endangered Romance language from the Iberian peninsula.

Add this line to your application’s Gemfile:

gem "bable"

And then execute:

$ bundle install

Or install it yourself as:

$ gem install bable

require "bable"

# List of available indexes
Bable::Index.avalable_indexes # => [:ari, :coleman_liau]

# Instantiate the default index
Bable.index("text") # => #<Bable::Index::ColemanLiau @text="text">

# Instantiate a concrete index
Bable.index("text", index: :ari) # => #<Bable::Index::Ari @text="text">

# Calculate a readability index
index = Bable.index("text")
index.calc # => 7.72

If you want to implement your own index you just need to create a subclass of Bable::Index::Base and define a method #calc on it, where you'll calculate the actual formula. Note that instances of Bable::Index::Base will come with a #text attribute reader, which returns a decorator of String, the class StatisticString (look at the documentation). You can take advantage of all those methods when implementing your own index.

# A class defined in your application (i.e. in the /lib folder on a Rails app)
class MyNewIndex < Bable::Index::Base
  def calc
    # Define your formula here.
  end
end

# Then use it
MyNewIndex.new("text").calc

Alternatively, although it’s not completely recommended, you could open the library modules itself, and add the new index directly there.

# A class defined in your application (i.e. in the /lib folder on a Rails app)
module Bable
  module Index
    class MyNewIndex < Base
      def calc
        # Define your formula here.
      end
    end
  end
end

# Then use it
Bable.index("text", index: :my_new_index).calc

Finally, if you think your index could potentially be useful for other people, please add it directly to the gem via pull-request (follow the rules below).

You can take a look at how the current indexes were implemented and tested.

1. Check for issues of your interest or create a new one.
2. Fork the repo ( http://github.com/danimashu/bable/fork ).
3. Create your feature branch git checkout -b my-new-feature.
4. Implement a test covering what you're going to do.
5. Commit your changes git commit -am "Add some feature" referencing the GitHub issue.
6. Push to the branch git push origin my-new-feature.
7. Create a new Pull Request.

Many thanks!

The gem is available as open source under the terms of the MIT License.