AceOptions

Below are the most common command-line usages of ACE, followed by a complete reference for all the command-line options.

Parsing (input is one sentence per line):

ace -g grammar.dat [input-file] [-1 | -n count]

Generating (input is one MRS per line):

ace -g grammar.dat -e [input-file] [-1 | -n count]

Compiling a grammar:

ace -G grammar.dat -g path-to-config.tdl

Complete Reference:

Option	Description	Task			Version
		P	T	G
General options
-V	Show ACE version number.
-h	Show a short synopsis of usage
-v	Increase verbosity; up to 3 -v options can be used if desired. The additional output is unlikely to be useful except for debugging.	✅	✅	✅
--license-info	Show ACE's license
Grammar loading/compiling
-g filename	Identify the grammar to be used. Normally, a compiled grammar image. When compiling a grammar, the location of that grammar's config.tdl file.	✅	✅	✅	0.9
-G filename	Enable grammar-compilation mode, and specify where to save the compiled grammar.				0.9
--gen-qc	Generate a quickcheck skeleton based on the unification failures encountered during this run.	✅		✅	0.9.31
Alternative modes
-e	Generate, rather than parse.			✅	0.9
-l	Enable LUI mode. You must have a working yzlui binary in your PATH.	✅	✅	✅
--input-from-lui	Inputs to parse are provided by LUI instead of stdin.	✅
--lui-fd=N	LUI front-end is already running and connected to file descriptor N.
--generation-server=fr	Operate as the generator in the LOGON architecture: read MRSes from ~/tmp/.transfer.$USER.fr			✅
-E	Run the REPP preprocessor on each input and output the result; do not perform token mapping or any further parsing.	✅
-m hostname	Join an arbiter grid of parsers.	✅	✅	✅
-t	Run as a [incr tsdb()] client.	✅	✅	✅
-O	Full-forest parse results; output chart edges instead of derivations.	✅
--itsdb-forest	Full-forest parse results with structured output; use with --tsdb-stdout and not with -O	✅			0.9.7
Input/output options
-f	Format each EP on its own line when printing MRSes.	✅	✅	✅
-y	Enable YY input mode (experimental).	✅			0.9.4
--yy-rules	when in YY mode, require input tokens to undergo specific lexical rules	✅			0.9.4
-q	Suppress printing the input sentence in cases of successful parsing.	✅
-R	Do not output results.	✅		✅
-T	Only output MRSes, not trees.	✅
--udx(=all)	decorate lexeme nodes with their type; "--udx=all" decorates rule nodes too	✅		✅	0.9.24
--tsdb-stdout	produce structured output as expected by tsdb	✅		✅	0.9.24
--tsdb-notes	output structured run and parse notes	✅		✅
--report-labels	add a tree with the labels (e.g., DT, VP as specified in parse-nodes.tdl in ERG defined in config in the parameter parse-node-labels)	✅		✅	0.9.24
--rooted-derivations	include the root in the derivation (if multiple roots apply, the first listed in roots.tdl will be used)	✅		✅
--show-realization-mrses	output the final MRS for each realization			✅
--show-realization-trees	output the derivation for each realization			✅
--show-probability	output the probability from the parse reranker	✅
Processing/filtering/robustness options
-n count	Use selective unpacking to enumerate only the top count results.	✅		✅
-1	Equivalent to -n 1.	✅		✅
-X	Stop when the first result is found, rather than generating the complete packed forest. Not recommended.	✅	✅	✅
-r roots	Supplies a space-delimited list of root instances (overriding the setting compiled into the grammar image).	✅
-L lexemes	Disable certain lexemes when parsing.	✅
-p	Turn off packing.	✅	✅	✅
--equivalence-packing	Disable packing under subsumption; only pack edges that are fully equivalent.	✅		✅
--disable-generalization	Turn off subsumption under generalization (useful for debugging)	✅	✅	✅	0.9.17
--disable-subsumption-test	Turn off the subsumption check in generation (underspecified generation)			✅
--ubertagging=0.001	enable ubertagging	✅			0.9.21
--pcfg=pcfg	use a pcfg approximation to parse (c-saw) and combine its results with the HPSG	✅
Performance
-i	Perform a fine-grained timing profile of the operation requested (experimental).	✅	✅	✅	0.9.3
--max-chart-megabytes=X	Use up to X megabytes of RAM on chart edges before terminating the forest creation portion of parsing (default 1200).	✅	✅	✅
--max-unpack-megabytes=X	Use up to X megabytes of total RAM for chart edges and unpacking operations before cancelling a parse (default 1500).	✅	✅	✅
--max-words=X	ignore sentences with more than X words (default 70)	✅			0.9.26
--timeout=X	Use up to X seconds of time before cancelling a parse. Off by default.	✅	✅	✅
Undocumented options
-j	Reserved for experimental modes.
-s	Don't unspecialize extra constraints implied by input EPs.			✅
-F	Show all potential PRED values associated to the input tokens by the lexicon and morphology subsystems.	✅
-P	Broken.
--packed-edge-ids	Show internal edge IDs instead of sanitized ones. Can be useful for debugging.	✅		✅
--show-gen-chart	With -l and -e, browse the chart after attempting generation.			✅
--maxent=model.mem	Read model.mem and use it for disambiguation.	✅		✅
--tnt-model=/.../path	Invoke TNT for tagging, using the given model.	✅
--tnt-max-tags=N	Allow TNT to suggest up to N tags per word.	✅
--transfer-config=file.txt	Only enable transfer rules whose names are listed in file.txt (one per line).		✅