[Attempto] Small mistake in paraphrasing?

[Kaarel Kaljurand]

Hi,

On Wed, Jul 11, 2012 at 5:10 PM, Theodore H. Smith <delete at elfdata.com> wrote:
>
> I tried this one: "A customer inserts a card and the machine checks the code."
>
> I got this output:
>
> Paraphrase:
> There is a customer X1.
> The customer X1 inserts a card.
>
> There is a machine X1.
> The machine X1 checks a code.
>
> [...]
>
> I think the X1 in the second paragraph should be X2?

this paraphrase is intended and correct as far as ACE is concerned.
The reason is that variable names can be reused if they occur in
different paragraphs because the scope of the variable is the
paragraph. Compare e.g.:

(1) There is a customer that inserts a card and there is a machine
that checks the card.

for which the paraphrase consists of a single paragraph:

    There is a customer X1.
    There is a machine X2.
    The machine X2 checks a card X3.
    The customer X1 inserts the card X3.

(2) There is a customer that inserts a card and there is a machine
that checks something.

for which the paraphrase has two paragraphs:

    There is a customer X1.
    The customer X1 inserts a card.

    There is a machine X1.
    The machine X1 checks something.

The paraphraser is essentially a DRS verbalizer. It first splits the
DRS into multiple independent DRSs (independent in the sense that they
don't share variables). Then each of them is independently verbalized
resulting in a single ACE paragraph each.

Best regards,
Kaarel