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structure.mixed-numeric-format

What it flags

Sentences that mix digit numerals (42, 3.14, 1,000, 1 000) with spelled-out numerals (two, trois, twenty, cent) within the same sentence. Presenting numbers inconsistently forces the reader to switch surface forms mid-clause and re-anchor the referent — a known load for readers with dyscalculia and a plain-language anti-pattern.

At a glance
Categorystructure
Default severitywarning
Default weight1
Condition tagsdyscalculia, general
LanguagesEN · FR
Sourcesrc/rules/mixed_numeric_format.rs

Detection

For each sentence emitted by the tokenizer, scan for digit-numeric tokens and for entries in the per-language spelled-numeral list. If at least one of each kind co-occurs, emit a single diagnostic for the sentence citing one representative token of each kind.

Digit tokens accept ASCII digits plus an optional decimal (.) or thousands separator (,, narrow space U+0020) when flanked by digits on both sides. Spelled-out matches are case-insensitive ASCII compares against en::SPELLED_NUMERALS and fr::SPELLED_NUMERALS.

The ambiguous forms one (EN) and un / une (FR) are excluded from the spelled-numeral list because they double as indefinite pronouns and articles. This keeps the false-positive rate manageable at the cost of missing genuine mixed-format cases whose only spelled-out numeral is one. Metropolitan French and Swiss / Belgian regional forms (septante, huitante, octante, nonante) are all included.

Sentences are produced by the shared tokenizer (see src/parser/tokenizer.rs), so abbreviations, decimals, and ellipses do not spuriously split sentences. Fenced and indented code blocks are excluded upstream by the Markdown parser.

Parameters

None. The rule has no configurable threshold — a single co-occurrence of the two surface forms is sufficient.

Known caveats

  • Sentences whose only spelled-out numeral is one / un / une are not flagged, by design (see Detection).
  • Ordinals (first, premier, 2nd, 3e) are out of scope. 2nd currently reads as a digit token (2) followed by a word (nd), which does not match the spelled-numeral list — no false positive.
  • Roman numerals (IV, XIV) are neither digits nor spelled-out numerals for this rule.

Suppression

See Suppressing diagnostics.

See also

References

See References for the full bibliography.