[Lexicog] Re: A bit of orientation needed! (Dictionary Solftware)

Mon Feb 16 07:19:29 UTC 2009

Estimado Jorge,

 Para lo que quieres hacer no precisas comprar ningún software. Lo que tu precisas es tener una base de datos relacional. MSSQL, Visual FoxPro, MSAcess y otros y conocer un poco de programación. Con esto puedes hacer mucha cosa. Hace mucho tiempo...los diccionarios que yo ha hecho lo fueron utilizando Dbase III and FoxPro! 

Saludos y suerte en tu proyecto.

!Hasta la vista¡

Jose Luiz

--- On Sun, 2/15/09, jorcaiba <jorcaiba at hotmail.com> wrote:

From: jorcaiba <jorcaiba at hotmail.com>
Subject: [Lexicog] Re: A bit of orientation needed! (Dictionary Solftware)
To: lexicographylist at yahoogroups.com
Date: Sunday, February 15, 2009, 7:22 PM

Thank you all very much!! It's great that you've all been so kind to reply.

I have already realized that dictionaries are very complicated monsters, and I can't even imagine how the lexicographers managed in the olden days. I'll explane a bit what my project consists in, so that you have a beeter idea of what software I may need.

My intention is to bild a dictionary of all the Romance standardisedvarieti es (big ore small), but to start with I'll concentrate only onthe languages that have a fully developed codification (includingmonolingu al, bilingual and ethymological dictionarys, which I need tobild my dictionary). This includes the 5 big "national" languages(Portugues e, Spanish, French, Italian and Romanian) and Catalan, whichis fully codified and quite socialized in much of its territories (andin Internet).

Basically one could see it as a multi-dialect dictionary with the glosses in one single dialect. The "dialects" would be the different standardized Romance varieties. Features:

1. The dictionary should show the different Romance cognates which share a same ethymology as simple variants of a "same" word.  Example (por: portuguese, spa: spanish, cat: catalan, fre: french, ita: italian, rom: romanian):

dente (por and ita), dent (cat and fre), diente (spa), dinte (rom)  
2. If there are more than one cognates in one same language, the dictionary should include them all.  This could be the case, for example, of two italian cognates which have developed in different dialectes and have been included in the standard language with different meanings or as synonims (one of them, maybe, used more in poetry). Or the case of two Spanish cognates, one of which is popular and the other one a Latinism. So I don't mean all the members of an ethymological family, which its various prefixes, suffixes, etc.

3. It may be necessary to include some old versions of the cognates (this is interesting specially for French), or cognates that have been used in some language but have been lost later. Example:

fre connaÃ®tre (old fre connoistre)
4. Pronuntiation of difficult words (not all!), to help with thedifferent orthographies the readers who are learning other languages . This is interesting specially for French, but not exclussively. Example: 

ita conoscere [koâ€™noÊƒeÉ¾e]
5. When the cognates don't all share exactly the same origin, the dictionary should specify which cognates descend from which variant of the etim. If it's the case, it shoud also specify if the cognate is popular or a Latinism. Example with different popular ethymologies:

>From Latin COGNÅŒSCÄ"RE> por conhecer, fra connaÃ®tre. 

>From Vulgar Latin CONÅŒSCÄ"RE > cas conocer, cat conÃ¨ixer or conÃ©ixer, ita conoscere. 

>From Vulgar Latin CONNÅŒSCÄ"RE > rom cunoaÅŸte. 
6. The dictionary should show together (in the gloss language) the different  meanings of those cognates, specifying for example if one certain meaning is, say, true for all languages except Romanian or only true for Catalan and French. In the same way it should specify the grammatical category/ies. Following the  very first example (the one with dente, etc.): 

masculine noun (femiline in cat and fre). 
1 Tooth (all)
2 Another meaning X (only fre and ita)
4.  When a certain meaning is not shared by the cognates of all the languages, the dictionary should provide the semantical equivalent in the other languages. 

So, as you can see, it's A LOT of information. Presented as a book, the entries of the dictionary would be organized by ethymologies (in the case of Latin ones I would follow the Classical Latin variant). Between the entries I would include "semientries" with all the Romance words which are commented in the dictionary directing the reader to the different entries where those words are mentioned. For example:

MAISON (fre): see MANSIO, DOMUS, CASA

I've tried (in Words) to create some entries and I've arranged the information of those entries in an organized and understandable way. So I've got an idea of how the dictionary will look like once it's printed. My problem is how to add all the information into the computer and edit the dictionary in a XXI- century way and not in mediaeval way!! In other ways, how can I do it without investing my entire life in finishing it! :)

Would Lexique Pro be good enogh?

Mike, you've sayd:

--- In lexicographylist@ yahoogroups. com, Mike Maxwell <maxwell at ...> wrote:
> If you use something non-free-form (like 
> a relational database), then you have a programming issue.

What's that?

I'm sorry for worring you all so much!! Your orientations are very valuable for me. Thanks!

Jorge

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