Minor grammatical and other updates to improve clarity

LAYOUT.md

@@ -3,7 +3,7 @@ Everything curl
 
  1. Intro
  2. the cURL project
- 3. curl and open source
+ 3. curl and Open Source
  4. The curl source code
  5. Network protocols
  6. The curl command line tool

building-source.md

@@ -9,7 +9,7 @@ source code. The binaries which can be found on the download page of the curl
 web and installed from other places on the Internet are all built and provided
 to the world by other friendly people and organizations.
 
-The source code consists of a large amount of files containing C
+The source code consists of a large number of files containing C
 code. Generally speaking, the same set of files are used to build binaries for
 all platforms and computer architectures that curl supports. curl can be built
 and run on a vast amount of different platforms. If you use a rare operating
@@ -23,7 +23,7 @@ don't always necessarily succeed!
 
 When release tarballs are created, a few files are generated and included in
 the final file that is the one used for the release. Those generated files are
-not present in the git repository, exactly for that reason that they are
+not present in the git repository, exactly for the reason that they are
 generated so there's no need to store them in git.
 
 So, if you want to build curl from git you need to generate some of those
@@ -34,7 +34,7 @@ running `./buildconf` and on Windows you run `buildconf.bat`.
 
 There are two distinctly different ways to build curl on Linux and other
 Unix-like systems. There's the one using the configure script and there's the
-cmake approach.
+CMake approach.
 
 There are two different build environments to cater for people's different
 opinions and tastes. The configure based build is arguably the more mature and
@@ -43,7 +43,7 @@ more complete build system and should probably be considered the default one.
 ### Autotools
 
 The "Autotools" is a collection of different tools that used together generate
-for example the `configure` script. The configure script is run by the user
+the `configure` script. The configure script is run by the user
 who wants to build curl and it does a whole bunch of things:
 
  - it checks for features and functions present in your system
@@ -53,39 +53,39 @@ who wants to build curl and it does a whole bunch of things:
    on/off. Or even compiler warning levels and more.
 
  - it offers command line options to let the builder point to specific
-   installation paths for various third party dependencies that curl can be
+   installation paths for various third-party dependencies that curl can be
    built to use.
 
- - specify on with file path the generated installation should be placed when
+ - specifies on which file path the generated installation should be placed when
    ultimately the build is made and "make install" is invoked
 
 In the most basic usage, just running `./configure` in the source directory is
 enough. When the script completes, it outputs a summary of what options it has
 detected/enabled and what features that are still disabled, some of them
-possibly because it failed to detect the presence of necessary third party
+possibly because it failed to detect the presence of necessary third-party
 dependencies that are needed for those functions to work.
 
-Then you invoke `make` to build the entire thing and then you can invoke `make
+Then you invoke `make` to build the entire thing and `make
 install` to install curl, libcurl and associated things. `make install`
 requires that you have the correct rights in your system to create and write
 files in the installation directory or you will get some errors.
 
 ### cross-compiling
 
 Cross-compiling means that you build the source on one architecture but the
-output is created to get run on a different one. For example you could build
-the source on a Linux machine but have the output work to get run on a Windows
+output is created to be run on a different one. For example, you could build
+the source on a Linux machine but have the output work to run on a Windows
 machine.
 
 For cross-compiling to work, you need a dedicated compiler and build system
-setup for the particular target system you want to build for. How to get and
-install that is however not covered in this book.
+setup for the particular target system for which you want to build. How to get
+and install that is, however, not covered in this book.
 
 Once you have a cross compiler, you can instruct configure to use that
 compiler instead of the "native" compiler when it builds curl so that the end
 result then can be moved over and used on the other machine.
 
-### cmake
+### CMake
 
 TBD
 
@@ -101,7 +101,7 @@ TBD
 
 TBD
 
-### cmake
+### CMake
 
 TBD
 

building-tls.md

@@ -1,10 +1,10 @@
 # Build to use a TLS library
 
 To make curl support TLS based protocols, such as HTTPS, FTPS, SMTPS, POP3S,
-IMAPS and more, you need to build with a third party TLS library since curl
+IMAPS and more, you need to build with a third-party TLS library since curl
 doesn't implement the TLS protocol itself.
 
-curl is written to work with a large amount of TLS libraries:
+curl is written to work with a large number of TLS libraries:
 
  - BoringSSL
  - GSkit (OS/400 specific)
@@ -16,7 +16,7 @@ curl is written to work with a large amount of TLS libraries:
  - axTLS
  - libressl
  - mbedTLS
- - schannel (native Windows)
+ - Schannel (native Windows)
 
 When you build curl and libcurl to use one of these libraries, it is important
 that you have the library and its include headers installed on your build
@@ -67,7 +67,7 @@ point configure to a custom install path prefix where it can find nss:
 
 (cyassl was the former name of the library) configure will detect WolfSSL in
 its default path by default. You can optionally point configure to a custom
-install path prefix where it can find wolfssl:
+install path prefix where it can find WolfSSL:
 
     ./configure --with-cyassl=/home/user/installed/nss --without-ssl
 
@@ -76,7 +76,7 @@ install path prefix where it can find wolfssl:
     ./configure --with-axtls --without-ssl
 
 configure will detect axTLS in its default path by default. You can optionally
-point configure to a custom install path prefix where it can find axtls:
+point configure to a custom install path prefix where it can find axTLS:
 
     ./configure --with-axtls=/home/user/installed/axtls --without-ssl
 
@@ -86,28 +86,28 @@ point configure to a custom install path prefix where it can find axtls:
 
 configure will detect mbedTLS in its default path by default. You can
 optionally point configure to a custom install path prefix where it can find
-mbedtls:
+mbedTLS:
 
     ./configure --with-mbedtls=/home/user/installed/mbedtls --without-ssl
 
 ### Secure Transport
 
     ./configure --with-darwinssl --without-ssl
 
-(darwinssl is an alternative name for Secure Transport)
+(DarwinSSL is an alternative name for Secure Transport)
 configure will detect Secure Transport in its default path by default. You can
 optionally point configure to a custom install path prefix where it can find
-darwinssl:
+DarwinSSL:
 
     ./configure --with-darwinssl=/home/user/installed/darwinssl --without-ssl
 
-### schannel
+### Schannel
 
     ./configure --with-winssl --without-ssl
 
-(winssl is an alternative name for schannel)
-configure will detect schannel in its default path by default. You can
+(WinSSL is an alternative name for Schannel)
+configure will detect Schannel in its default path by default. You can
 optionally point configure to a custom install path prefix where it can find
-winssl:
+WinSSL:
 
     ./configure --with-winssl=/home/user/installed/winssl --without-ssl

callback-conversions.md

@@ -2,7 +2,7 @@
 
 TBD
 
-### Convert from UTF8 callback
+### Convert from UTF-8 callback
 
 TBD
 

callback-debug.md

@@ -20,7 +20,7 @@ it flows.
 
 A common use for this callback is to get a full trace of all data that libcurl
 sends and receives. The data sent to this callback is always the unencrypted
-version, even when for example HTTPS or other encrypted protocols are used.
+version, even when, for example, HTTPS or other encrypted protocols are used.
 
 This callback must return zero or cause the transfer to stop with an error
 code.

callback-header.md

@@ -13,14 +13,14 @@ received. *ptr* points to the delivered data, and the size of that data is
 *size* multiplied with *nmemb*. libcurl buffers headers and delivers only
 "full" headers, one by one, to this callback.
 
-The data passed to this function will not be zero terminated! You cannot for
-example use printf's "%s" operator to display the contents nor strcpy to copy
+The data passed to this function will not be zero terminated! You cannot, for
+example, use printf's "%s" operator to display the contents nor strcpy to copy
 it.
 
 This callback should return the number of bytes actually taken care of. If
 that amount differs from the amount passed to your callback function, it
-signals an error condition to the library. This will cause the transfer to get
-aborted and the libcurl function used will return `CURLE_WRITE_ERROR`.
+signals an error condition to the library. This will cause the transfer to
+abort and the libcurl function used will return `CURLE_WRITE_ERROR`.
 
 The user pointer passed in to the callback in the *userdata* argument is set
 with CURLOPT_HEADERDATA:

callback-progress.md

@@ -36,7 +36,7 @@ transferred, in number of bytes:
 Unknown/unused argument values passed to the callback will be set to zero
 (like if you only download data, the upload size will remain 0). Many times
 the callback will be called one or more times first, before it knows the data
-sizes so a program must be made to handle that.
+sizes, so a program must be made to handle that.
 
 Returning a non-zero value from this callback will cause libcurl to abort the
 transfer and return `CURLE_ABORTED_BY_CALLBACK`.

callback-sockopt.md

@@ -10,8 +10,8 @@ The `sockopt_callback` function must match this prototype:
                          curl_socket_t curlfd,
                          curlsocktype purpose);
 
-This callback function gets called by libcurl when it when a new socket has
-been created, but before the connect call to allow applications to change
+This callback function gets called by libcurl when a new socket has
+been created but before the connect call, to allow applications to change
 specific socket options.
 
 The **clientp** pointer points to the private data set with

callback-write.md

@@ -15,18 +15,18 @@ size of that data is *size* multiplied with *nmemb*.
 If this callback isn't set, libcurl instead uses 'fwrite' by default.
 
 The write callback will be passed as much data as possible in all invokes, but
-you must not make any assumptions. It may be one byte, it may be thousands.
+it must not make any assumptions. It may be one byte, it may be thousands.
 The maximum amount of body data that will be passed to the write callback is
 defined in the curl.h header file: `CURL_MAX_WRITE_SIZE` (the usual default is
-16K). If `CURLOPT_HEADER` is enabled for this transfer, which makes header
+16KB). If `CURLOPT_HEADER` is enabled for this transfer, which makes header
 data get passed to the write callback, you can get up to
 `CURL_MAX_HTTP_HEADER` bytes of header data passed into it. This usually means
-100K.
+100KB.
 
 This function may be called with zero bytes data if the transferred file is empty.
 
-The data passed to this function will not be zero terminated! You cannot for
-example use printf's "%s" operator to display the contents nor strcpy to copy
+The data passed to this function will not be zero terminated! You cannot, for
+example, use printf's "%s" operator to display the contents nor strcpy to copy
 it.
 
 This callback should return the number of bytes actually taken care of. If

cmdline-configfile.md

@@ -1,9 +1,9 @@
 ## Config file
 
-You can easily end up with curl command lines that use a very large amount of
-command line options, make it rather hard to work with. Sometimes the length
+You can easily end up with curl command lines that use a very large number of
+command line options, making them rather hard to work with. Sometimes the length
 of the command line you want to enter even hits the maximum length your
-command line system allows. The Microsoft windows command prompt being an
+command line system allows. The Microsoft Windows command prompt being an
 example of something that has a fairly small maximum line length.
 
 To aid such situations, curl offers a feature we call "config file". It
@@ -35,7 +35,7 @@ alternatively be written as:
     head
 
 Command line options that take an argument must have its argument provided on
-the same line as the option. For example changing the user-agent HTTP header
+the same line as the option. For example changing the User-Agent HTTP header
 can be done with
 
     user-agent "Everything-is-an-agent"
@@ -67,7 +67,7 @@ provide a URL for curl like this:
 
 When curl is invoked, it always (unless `-q` is used) checks for a default
 config file and uses it if found. The file name it checks for is `.curlrc` on
-unix like systems and `_curlrc` on Windows.
+Unix-like systems and `_curlrc` on Windows.
 
 The default config file is checked for in the following places in this order:
 
@@ -77,7 +77,7 @@ Unix-like systems (which returns the home dir given the current user in your
 system). On Windows, it then checks for the APPDATA variable, or as a last
 resort the '%USERPROFILE%\Application Data'.
 
-2. On windows, if there is no _curlrc file in the home dir, it checks for one
+2. On Windows, if there is no _curlrc file in the home dir, it checks for one
 in the same dir the curl executable is placed. On Unix-like systems, it will
 simply try to load .curlrc from the determined home dir.
 

cmdline-globbing.md

@@ -22,7 +22,7 @@ images one by one that are named numerically:
     $ curl -O http://example.com/[1-100].png
 
 and it can even do the ranges with zero prefixes, like if the number is
-three-digit all the time:
+three digits all the time:
 
     $ curl -O http://example.com/[001-100].png
 
@@ -36,7 +36,7 @@ too. This example range goes from 0 to 100 with an increment of 2:
 curl can also do alphabetical ranges, like when a site has a section named a
 to z:
 
-    $ curl -O http://example.com/secion[a-z].html
+    $ curl -O http://example.com/section[a-z].html
 
 ### A list
 
@@ -49,7 +49,7 @@ of the brackets used for the ranges:
 ### Combinations
 
 You can use several globs in the same URL which then will make curl iterate
-over those too. To download the images of Ben, Alice and Frank, in both the
+over those, too. To download the images of Ben, Alice and Frank, in both the
 resolutions 100x100 and 1000x1000, a command line could look like:
 
     $ curl -O http://example.com/{Ben,Alice,Frank}-{100x100,1000x1000}.jpg
@@ -59,7 +59,7 @@ Or download all the images of a chess board, indexed by two coordinates ranged
 
     $ curl -O http://example.com/chess-[0-7]x[0-7].jpg
 
-And you can of course mix ranges and series. Get a weeks worth of logs for
+And you can of course mix ranges and series. Get a week's worth of logs for
 both the web server and the mail server:
 
     $ curl -O http://example.com/{web,mail}-log[0-6].txt

cmdline-listopts.md

@@ -10,10 +10,10 @@ looking for. `curl --help` or simply `curl -h` will get you a list of all
 existing options with a brief explanation. If you don't really know what
 you're looking for, you probably won't be entirely satisfied.
 
-Then you can instead opt to use `curl --manual` which then will output the
+Then you can instead opt to use `curl --manual` which will output the
 entire man page for curl plus an appended tutorial for the most common use
 cases. That is a very thorough and complete document on how each option
-works. Several thousand lines of documentation. To wade through that is also a
+works amassing several thousand lines of documentation. To wade through that is also a
 tedious work and we encourage use of a search function through those text
 masses. Some people will appreciate the man page in its [web
 version](https://curl.haxx.se/docs/manpage.html).

cmdline-options.md

@@ -21,17 +21,17 @@ curl follows HTTP redirects:
     $ curl -vL http://example.com
 
 The command line parser in curl always parses the entire line and you can put
-the options anywhere you like, they can also appear after the URL:
+the options anywhere you like; they can also appear after the URL:
 
     $ curl http://example.com -Lv
 
 ### Long options
 
-Single letter options are convenient since they are quick to write and use, but
+Single-letter options are convenient since they are quick to write and use, but
 as there are only a limited number of letters in the alphabet and there are
 many things to control, not all options are available like that. Long option
 names are therefore provided for those. Also, as a convenience and to allow
-scripts to become more readable, all the short options have longer name
+scripts to become more readable, most short options have longer name
 aliases.
 
 Long options are always written with *two* minuses (or *dashes*, whichever you
@@ -48,9 +48,9 @@ and asking for HTTP redirects as well using the long format looks like:
 ### Arguments to options
 
 Not all options are just simple boolean flags that enable or disable
-features. For some of them you need to pass on data. Like perhaps a user name
+features. For some of them you need to pass on data, like perhaps a user name
 or a path to a file. You do this by writing first the option and then the
-argument, separated with a space. Like for example if you want to send send an
+argument, separated with a space. Like, for example, if you want to send send an
 arbitrary string of data in an HTTP POST to a server:
 
     $ curl -d arbitrary http://example.com
@@ -59,12 +59,12 @@ and it works the same way even if you use the long form of the option:
 
     $ curl --data arbitrary http://example.com
 
-When you use the short options with arguments, you can in fact also write the
+When you use the short options with arguments, you can, in fact, also write the
 data without the space separator:
 
     $ curl -darbitrary http://example.com
 
-### Negate options
+### Negative options
 
 For options that switch on something, there is also a way to switch it
 off. You then use the long form of the option with an initial "no-" prefix