Introducing Vale, an NLP-powered linter for prose

Example Vale output using a custom style (18F)

We’re pleased to announce the v1.0.0 release of Vale, a command-line tool that brings code-like linting to prose. Vale is cross-platform (Windows, macOS, and Linux), written in Go (Google’s open-source programming language), and available on GitHub.

Linting is the process of ensuring that written work (source code or prose) adheres to a particular style — for example, Python’s PEP 8 style guide (code) or the Google’s Documentation Style Guide (prose).

Before we get into the details of what makes Vale useful, there’s one point we’d like to clarify: Vale is not a general-purpose writing aid. It doesn’t teach you how to write; it’s a tool designed to be used by writers. More specifically, Vale focuses on the style of writing rather than its grammatical correctness — making it fundamentally different from, for example, Grammarly.

Using Vale with other software

In other words, Vale focuses on ensuring consistency across multiple authors (according to customizable guidelines) rather than the general “correctness” of a single author’s work.

Your style, our editor