The Official Motion for Introduction of the Epub Dictionary Format

[zelda_pinwheel]

Originally Posted by ahi

Thanks, Zelda and JGray!

But how practical is it to have every in-dictionary word on a given page highlighted and selectable, without a touch-screen?

There can easily be as many as 200 words (or more) on a 6 inch page. What if I want to look up a word in the middle of that page? Am I to press the left or down button 100 times?

If it is a dictionary for rare and foreign terms, it ought to be more feasible, I suppose. But if it is a foreign language dictionary, or a general one, can it really be made viable without a touch-screen or a physical keyboard?

- Ahi

this is why i think it's much easier to implement with a touchscreen, since you can just tap the word you want to look up (eb1150 method) or enter it via a keyboard (sony 700 search method) ; but :

Originally Posted by jgray

Two dimensions, not one. Down to the line you want, over to the word, press OK.

that's how it works on the cybook. somewhat more laborious, but still nothing near 200 keypresses to navigate to one word !

[ahi]

Originally Posted by jgray

Two dimensions, one one. Down to the line you want, over to the word, press OK.

About 15 clicks then.

And, assuming people are smart enough to find the shortest way to getting to their word, an average of 8 clicks to get to the right word on a 23 line 9 word/line page.

If they are not smart enough to find the shortest way, they may be clicking as many as 30 times to get to words at the bottom of the page.

I suppose this is tolerable--but I don't see myself being able to put up with it.

Touchpad with word-poking for dictionary look-ups sounds delightful though!

- Ahi

Ps.: Fewer clicks, if common words like "the", "a", "an", "for", "you", "with", et al are explicitly excluded from being highlighted. But that would only be reasonable for a single language dictionary... and not always even for that.

[zelda_pinwheel]

Originally Posted by ahi

About 15 clicks then.

And, assuming people are smart enough to find the shortest way to getting to their word, an average of 8 clicks to get to the right word on a 23 line 9 word/line page.

If they are not smart enough to find the shortest way, they may be clicking as many as 30 times to get to words at the bottom of the page.

I suppose this is tolerable--but I don't see myself being able to put up with it.

Touchpad with word-poking for dictionary look-ups sounds delightful though!

- Ahi

don't forget that for instance bookeen has now implemented key-repeat ; you can click *once*, hold the key, and the cursor will skip down the lines until you release. then press to go sideways and allow it to skip along to your word. i agree with you, personally ; i find it a bit laborious to use this method. but nonetheless it's not so laborious as you think, and can be improved (with key repeat, for example).

but obviously the touchscreen word-poking method is much faster and easier. it's one of my favourite features of the eb1150.

[ahi]

Originally Posted by zelda_pinwheel

don't forget that for instance bookeen has now implemented key-repeat ; you can click *once*, hold the key, and the cursor will skip down the lines until you release. then press to go sideways and allow it to skip along to your word. i agree with you, personally ; i find it a bit laborious to use this method. but nonetheless it's not so laborious as you think, and can be improved (with key repeat, for example).

Does bookeen have keys with better tactile feedback than my beloved but imperfect Sony PRS-505?

- Ahi

[zelda_pinwheel]

Originally Posted by ahi

Does bookeen have keys with better tactile feedback than my beloved but imperfect Sony PRS-505?

- Ahi

i don't have enough experience with a 505 to know. perhaps someone else can reply. but i have tested the key-repeat on the cybook gen3 and it works quite well.

[Abelturd]

First thing: look -> here <- for an example of a well thought out user interface for dictionary lookup, it even supports search for words you type in. All that with the very limited UI of netronix eb-100(600), which is basically Cybook.
Dictionary lookup on cybook takes up to 15 button pushes. But cybook's lookup interface is very basic and user unfriendly, but this could be easily relieved by putting some invention in the UI design.
In the future I assume that most, if not all liseuses, will have a touchscreen interface with the capability of onscreen keyboard. And that will make dictionary lookup very straightforward and, above all, FAST. I can see it on my touchscreen PDA, one tap to lookup the word, another tap to return to the book.

[ahi]

Originally Posted by Abelturd

First thing: look -> here <- for an example of a well thought out user interface for dictionary lookup, it even supports search for words you type in. All that with the very limited UI of netronix eb-100(600), which is basically Cybook.
Dictionary lookup on cybook takes up to 15 button pushes. But cybook's lookup interface is very basic and user unfriendly, but this could be easily relieved by putting some invention in the UI design.
In the future I assume that most, if not all liseuses, will have a touchscreen interface with the capability of onscreen keyboard. And that will make dictionary lookup very straightforward and, above all, FAST. I can see it on my touchscreen PDA, one tap to lookup the word, another tap to return to the book.

Good to see my math is reasonably on the mark. And yeah, I agree that touchscreens seem to be the way to go.

Do people on the Cybook find themselves using the dictionaries a lot though, despite the onerous button pressing to get to words?

- Ahi

[Abelturd]

Originally Posted by ahi

Good to see my math is reasonably on the mark. And yeah, I agree that touchscreens seem to be the way to go.

Do people on the Cybook find themselves using the dictionaries a lot though, despite the onerous button pressing to get to words?

- Ahi

I can speak only for myself, but the answer is NO. The interface is so bad, slow, cumbersome for me that I rather use mobi dictionary on my pda. I have to type the word in, but there's always autocomplete and all in all it's faster this way than to push the buttons for your life on cybook.

[nrapallo]

Originally Posted by nrapallo

On-screen keyboard, like the iPod Touch, or EBW1150/REB1200. Even the REB1100 had

I think, though, a touchscreen interface is almost a must for the proper use of a dictionary.

Thought you might want to see what my REB1200 on-screen keyboard looks like:

The triangle tab at the bottom allows the keyboard to retract to see the underneath text and to deploy if I tap it again!

p.s. the attached image below shows what iPod Touch users see only when they have to type something...

[ahi]

Originally Posted by Abelturd

I can speak only for myself, but the answer is NO. The interface is so bad, slow, cumbersome for me that I rather use mobi dictionary on my pda. I have to type the word in, but there's always autocomplete and all in all it's faster this way than to push the buttons for your life on cybook.

That's what I thought.

How many clicks away do you think would still tolerable to use? If any.

- Ahi

[Sparrow]

I use the CyBook dictionary lookup and don't find it cumbersome personally.

What is awkward is when a word could have several meanings - the Cybook shows a list of the word, but no indication why you would select one of the choices over any of the others. So it's pot luck.

[ahi]

Originally Posted by Sparrow

I use the CyBook dictionary lookup and don't find it cumbersome personally.

What is awkward is when a word could have several meanings - the Cybook shows a list of the word, but no indication why you would select one of the choices over any of the others. So it's pot luck.

And would you also agree the 5-15 clicks is what words generally take to select with a general dictionary on a reasonably full page?

- Ahi

[Sparrow]

Originally Posted by ahi

And would you also agree the 5-15 clicks is what words generally take to select with a general dictionary on a reasonably full page?

- Ahi

I'd say 10 was about average - depends on the font size.

[Abelturd]

Originally Posted by ahi

That's what I thought.

How many clicks away do you think would still tolerable to use? If any.

- Ahi

Adding a dedicated button for entering the lookup mode would help, keeping the ability to turn pages in lookup mode (e.g. with the +/- buttons). Saving the last position of the cursor. Speeding up the cursor navigation on the page via some ingenious solution - e.g. spliting the page into 3 areas, so you first choose the area and then you go after the individual word, using a special menu for this etc. Always with effectivity in mind.
Or using the key repeat function with increasing speed of cursor movement depending on how long you hold the button.
If the word wasn't found to display the closest match.
Though with touchscreen interface the whole process could be reduced to TWO taps, as I've already said.

[ahi]

Thanks, everybody! I'll stop steering this thread off course.

Good luck with this endeavour! I look forward to its fabulous fruits.

- Ahi