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RobertJSawyer · 10-23-2024, 10:22 AM

I posted this on the Kobo beta-testers Slack group today; I'd have also sent it by email to Kobo but their website no longer offers an email address for support:

Over on MobileRead, people are unhappy about the 2024 update to the English dictionary from Oxford University Press. The older 2019 edition had etymologies (word origins) and a nicer layout. People are speculating that Kobo is being charged a lower licensing fee from Oxford for the new, stripped-down dictionary.

I certainly preferred the 2019 edition myself. Kobo used to have a significant gap over Kindle in English dictionary quality when you were using a stripped-down Merriam-Webster one, but you caught up when you switched to Oxford in 2019 — but this 2024 "update" seems like a step backward.

Any chance of getting a 2024 version with the etymologies? I agree after five years, it was time for a vocabulary update, but I'd rather have the older database with more information.

The 2019 dictionary was 15,682,049 bytes; the 2024 is just 12,975,705 bytes.

(Yes, I know I can salvage the old dictionary from a backup and install it in the custom dictionary folder, but the choice of dictionary is not sticky; it defaults back to the 2024 with each new word lookup. Also, this is hardly an easy solution for most users.)

Thank you.

10-23-2024, 10:22 AM	#46
RobertJSawyer Guru Posts: 733 Karma: 3911762 Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: Toronto Device: Kobo Libra 2, Clara 2E, and Clara HD; Kindle PaperWhite	I posted this on the Kobo beta-testers Slack group today; I'd have also sent it by email to Kobo but their website no longer offers an email address for support: Over on MobileRead, people are unhappy about the 2024 update to the English dictionary from Oxford University Press. The older 2019 edition had etymologies (word origins) and a nicer layout. People are speculating that Kobo is being charged a lower licensing fee from Oxford for the new, stripped-down dictionary. I certainly preferred the 2019 edition myself. Kobo used to have a significant gap over Kindle in English dictionary quality when you were using a stripped-down Merriam-Webster one, but you caught up when you switched to Oxford in 2019 — but this 2024 "update" seems like a step backward. Any chance of getting a 2024 version with the etymologies? I agree after five years, it was time for a vocabulary update, but I'd rather have the older database with more information. The 2019 dictionary was 15,682,049 bytes; the 2024 is just 12,975,705 bytes. (Yes, I know I can salvage the old dictionary from a backup and install it in the custom dictionary folder, but the choice of dictionary is not sticky; it defaults back to the 2024 with each new word lookup. Also, this is hardly an easy solution for most users.) Thank you.