Epub dictionaries

[GeoffC]

Originally Posted by Nate the great

Yes. I'm working on a set of tags to propose. I'll post them here on Friday.

Brilliant - you've answered my question, thankyou - a successful set of tags will
allay any worries readers may have about changes in the Bookeen pipeline for mobi and ePub....

[lslarkey]

I didn't think I would use the dictionary much when I got my Kindle, but I use it often, for example when reading books with archaic military terminology (Ulysses S. Grant), or technical terms (Joshua Slocum's Sailing Alone around the World). For a while I switched in an Italian/English dictionary, to practice reading Italian before a trip. I would like to be able to have more than one dictionary active at a time.

[Jellby]

Originally Posted by Nate the great

Yes. I'm working on a set of tags to propose. I'll post them here on Friday.

Usual Friday or Bookeen's Friday?

[GeoffC]

Originally Posted by Jellby

Usual Friday or Bookeen's Friday?

:sprayscoffeeintokeyboard:

[Tomek]

For me a build-in changeable/selectable dictionary together with the ability to mark the words I look up are essential and I would not own an eInk device otherwise.

[kacir]

Originally Posted by gerraldo

It's vital if you like to read books in other then your native language!

Well, English is my fourth language, and at the moment I am reading about 99% of fiction in English. I have been reading almost exclusively in English for many, many years.

I do not remember using dictionary when reading fiction in foreign language(*).
And I have never *ever* used a dictionary for my mother language. Except for the situation when I had a disagreement with somebody about a word and I needed to prove my point. But I am hopeless bookworm and i have read more books than an average person.

(*) When I was learning English I used to borrow "simplified editions" of books . Those simplified editions have a dictionary for the words that are out of scope for that book. I might have had a look at that dictionary. But I do not remember using this dictionary during pleasure reading.

When I was borrowing books from our local library, the "foreign" branch, I often found a book that had some words underlined and translated into my language at the margin. This annoyed me very much. But I did not despair. I knew that such a "translator" always gave up before defacing more than a dozen pages. I *never* found those translations past page 20.

[pruss]

I use Plucker on a Palm TX, and I generally do look up words that I don't know, since it's so easy (tap on word, and you go to the dictionary, assuming you set up PPI correctly). How often I come across words that I don't know depends what I am reading. If I am reading Shakespeare, it's not at all uncommon. If I am reading scifi, it doesn't happen almost at all. If I had to use a physical dictionary, I probably would rarely bother. But if it's just a tap (or three--sometimes one needs to scroll a little in the dictionary), why not?

When I'm reading Scripture with PalmBible+ on the TX, I do look up Hebrew and Greek words from time to time, but that's a rather specialized use.

In fact, having lots of dictionaries, whether for use while reading or just for ease of reference, is one of the best uses for a portable reading device. My Palm TX's dictionary collection includes a 1694 French-French dictionary (yes, it's old, but the French texts I care about are all from that era), an 1835 French-French dictionary, Latin-English, Strong's Hebrew/Greek Lexicon, Webster's 1913, Wordnet 3.0, Dal's Russian-Russian dictionary, and some astronomical reference data (NGC/IC and SAC catalogs). It's much easier to look up on the PDA than to leaf through a heavy volume.

[GreatBear]

This was one of the features that I really liked the idea of before I got my Kindle but then found that I absolutely NEVER use it.

[rebarnmom]

Originally Posted by pruss

When I'm reading Scripture with PalmBible+ on the TX, I do look up Hebrew and Greek words from time to time, but that's a rather specialized use.

I would really like to be able to do that too on my Sony-700. So far as I know all the cool Bible study packages are not available on anything but pocket-type, palm devices. I have a few different Bible versions on my Sony, but I can't go back and forth from one to another very easily. I keep pestering Olive Tree and Packard about this, but....

I do have the Webster's 1913, thanks to nrapallo on MR. But the ability to highlight a word and automatically bring up the dictionary definition and all of the other useful information that comes with it, is something I dream about! (Well, not really, but you get my meaning.)

[elena]

a good dictionary lookup function and good dictionaries (with inflection support!) are extremely usefull to me to read texts in foreign languages. I used to lookup words on my pc and on my pda, and I'm happy my CyBook supports lookup function too. I do not think I'll switch to the new firmware with epup if that means loosing dictionary support.

[GeoffC]

Originally Posted by elena

a good dictionary lookup function and good dictionaries (with inflection support!) are extremely usefull to me to read texts in foreign languages. I used to lookup words on my pc and on my pda, and I'm happy my CyBook supports lookup function too. I do not think I'll switch to the new firmware with epup if that means loosing dictionary support.

that's why I would hope someone would provide the necessaries to ePub that would allow dictionary support .... watch this space-hopefully....

[Abelturd]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

How many people here actually NEED a dictionary. Not just want, but actually NEED. I bet the numbers will be a lot different when you vote just based on NEED. So if you want a dictionary but do not NEED one, then you'd vote no.

I'd say everybody who reads books in other than his native language. I'm in dire need for a good and quick dictionary lookup and although cybook has the ability, it's too slow and clumsy to look up a word too often per page.
Let me ask you, Jon, how many languages besides English do you speak?
A liseuse can be not only an electronic counterpart of a pbook but also a great tool to learn new languages.

[Abelturd]

Originally Posted by Daithi

I'd actually prefer a built in encyclopedia -- it would lookup words just like the dictionary but give a short encyclopedia entry.

When it comes to a single word in a sentence I can almost always figure out the meaning of the word by context, and I really don't want to interupt the flow of the story. However, sometimes I'm not very familiar with a subject and would like a quick refresher. For example, I read The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova and she mentions the Carpathians a couple of times, and it would have been nice to have viewed a short encyclopedia entry on them just to refresh my memory as to who they were. (Note: The Kindle has access to wikipedia but I would prefer something that works like the built in dictionary.)

There is the offline wikipedia in the mobipocket format. It supports indices and you can search for entries. Last time I checked it had about 8 gigs in size. The site of the project was called something like penguinburg.de. Though it works only on pda, I'm afraid.

[seamad]

Born from German mother and Italian father I learned both the languages when young. But having lived in Italy till five years ago and using mostly English as a foreign language on work and holidays, my German language got rusty.

Having a dictionary allowed me to read German literature and philosophy in the native language, something I treasure.

I use the dictionary even reading English books when disaccustomed or uncommon words pop up.

Due to these consideration, try to imagine which one of my e-book readers (a Sony PRS505 and a Cybook Gen3) is the more worn out one...

[Stringer]

Originally Posted by Nate the great

I was just exchanging emails with someone at Adobe, and I was told that while it's a neat feature, most people don't use it. Let's see if that is true.

So in other words, Adobe is more interested on ruining their PDF format with embedded multimedia and virus support than helping their customer's reading experience. Way to go Adobe! Oh well, couldn't care less. I'm proud Foxit user myself and Adobe hardly is any major player on ebooks. But it is true, I wouldn't change from Mobipocket to any other format unless they have good dictionary support. I rather do the hassle with decrypting and converting to the Mobi than live without the dictionary.