An edit step is a transformation from one word x to another word y such that x and y are words in the dictionary, and x can be transformed to y by adding, deleting, or changing one letter. So the transformation from dig to dog or from dog to do are both edit steps. An edit step ladder is a lexicographically ordered sequence of words w1, w2, ... wn such that the transformation from wi to wi+1 is an edit step for all i from 1 to n-1.