Too many colon lead-ins to lists
colon-lead-inon by default (info)Japanese
Section after section that opens with a sentence ending in a colon before a list
Example
The rule measures the whole document, so this example was tried with an ordinary passage (about 200 words) after it that gives chaff nothing to report.
How to fix
Turn some of the lists back into sentences and say how the items connect. Real lists (steps, parts) can stay.
Why it matters
A sentence ending in a colon that hands the reader to a list ("Here's what you need to know:"). Once, it guides; section after section, the prose shrinks to list captions and the links between the items go unwritten. A shape common in generated text.
What it does not flag
A single colon lead-in, and a lead-in that does not end in a colon, are not counted. Nor is the same noun label repeated before each entry's list (a bold 参考:), which names a field of the entry. Documentation, legal and specification (technical/spec) genres do not run this rule. Short documents are not measured. Japanese documents only, and in them only Japanese sentences; an English sentence inside (Examples include:) is not counted.
Turning it off or relaxing it
Technical details
- Layer
- L1
- Status
- stable
- Severity
- info
- Languages
- ja
- Suited to
- technical/readme, blog, business, legal, docs, academic, literature, speech
Levels
Set a level for this rule under rules in chaff.yaml. With nothing set, it runs at the level its genre gives it (see By genre below).
| strict | colon lead-ins to lists: up to 1 per 1000 characters |
|---|---|
| normal | colon lead-ins to lists: up to 2 per 1000 characters |
| relaxed | colon lead-ins to lists: up to 4 per 1000 characters |
By genre
- Runs by default in
- technical/readme, blog/tech, blog/essay, blog/owned-media, business/proposal, business/report, business/email, business/press-release, business/meeting-notes, academic/paper
- Turned off by the genre in
- legal/contract, legal/statute, legal/judgment, legal/patent, docs/manual, docs/faq, docs/glossary, literature/fiction, literature/essay, literature/poetry, literature/play, speech/address, speech/transcript
- Not suited to, and not run in
- technical/spec
Message
{density} colon lead-ins to lists per 1000 characters (limit {limit})
Rewrite depth (chaff fix-plan --depth): structure — sections, headings and paragraphs are reorganised
This page is built from the rule's definition file:packages/chaff/rules/colon-lead-in.yaml