[Lexicog] lexicography software

Tue Mar 3 21:44:53 UTC 2009

Periodically someone on the LexicographyList asks for advice on choosing a
software package for their dictionary project. I’m not sure if we are all
aware of the resources on our LexicographyList website. (I wasn’t.) There is
a page on the website that contains links to quite a few software packages.
The URL is:

http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/lexicographylist/links/Software_001073452
817/

I’ve compiled the information I have into a Word document and have pasted
the contents below. There is some overlap between my list and the list on
the LexicographyList page. I would welcome any additions and corrections. It
would be nice if we could expand our website page to include all the
resources that we are aware of and if we could give a brief review and/or
endorsement of those that we have used. [note to Wayne Leman: Wayne, can the
information below be added to the website and modified as necessary?] Then
we can merely refer future inquiries to that page.

Ron Moe

Lexicography Software

Professional lexicography software

Fieldworks Language Explorer (FLEx)

Fieldworks is still being developed (as of 2009) but is perhaps the most
well developed and complete system for investigating, managing, and
formatting dictionary data. It is based on a well-thought through and
sophisticated model of the lexicon and has very powerful tools for rapidly
developing a dictionary. It is designed to describe a single language, and
enables you to produce a monolingual, bilingual, or multilingual dictionary
of that language. It has an active email user support group that is very
good at answering user questions.

Their website gives the following description:

FieldWorks Language Explorer is the lexical and text tools component of SIL
Fieldworks. It is an open source desktop application designed to help field
linguists perform many common tasks. It can help you:

*	elicit and record lexical information
*	create dictionaries
*	interlinearize texts
*	study morphology

FieldWorks was reviewed in vol 1 of Language Documentation & Conservation:
http://hdl.handle.net/10125/1730 

Website: http://www.sil.org/computIng/fieldworks/ 

Cost: free

Indiana Dictionary Database.

Their website gives the following description:

“A multimedia dictionary database program that has been created specifically
for compiling dictionaries of American Indian languages. The program, now in
its final stages of development, is designed to support standard textual
linguistic material as well as sound data, graphical images, and video
clips.”

Website: http://www.indiana.edu/~aisri/software/index.shtml

Cost: (unknown, password needed)

Lexique Pro

Lexique Pro was designed to display and publish a dictionary, both in print
and electronically. It was not designed to facilitate the production of a
dictionary and has limited editing capability. However some people have used
it to edit a dictionary. It accepts files created by Toolbox (MDF),
FieldWorks, and WeSay. Their website gives the following description:

“Lexique Pro is an interactive lexicon viewer and editor, with hyperlinks
between entries, category views, dictionary reversal, search, and export
tools. It's designed to display your data in a user-friendly format so you
can distribute it to others.”

Website: http://www.lexiquepro.com/

Cost: free

Lexus

Their website gives the following description:

“Lexus is an [sic] web-based tool to create and edit lexical databases.

“LEXUS is the web based lexicon tool currently being developed by the
Technical Facilities Group at the MPI [Max Planck Institute].”

Website: http://www.lat-mpi.eu/tools/lexus/ 

Matapuna

Their website gives the following description:

“The Mātāpuna Dictionary Writing System is a free, easy to use, web-based,
multi-user, multilingual dictionary writing system. It is currently being
used to compile Te Taura <http://www.tetaurawhiri.govt.nz/>  Whiri i te Reo
Māori / The Māori Language Commissions monolingual dictionary of the Māori
language.

“The system assists with many aspects of lexicography, including team
collaboration, routine error and consistency checking, corpus searching,
publishing, and progress monitoring in addition to the traditional headword
and entry management.”

Website: http://www.matapuna.org/ 

Cost: free

Multi-Dictionary Formatter (MDF)

MDF is not essentially a software package, but a standardized list of
database fields. It was designed to be used with the popular Shoebox (now
called Toolbox) dictionary data management software. MDF includes software
tools to print a Shoebox/Toolbox dictionary, but its primary contribution
has been to provide a set of standard format markers. Other software such as
Lexique Pro will accept MDF formatted files. MDF has a published user guide:

Coward, David F., and Charles E. Grimes. 1995. Making dictionaries, a guide
to lexicography and the Multi-Dictionary Formatter. Waxhaw: Summer Institute
of Linguistics.

You can download the user guide from the MDF website. The MDF website gives
the following description:

“Printing a dictionary frustrates many linguists and anthropologists.
Converting lexical databases to formatted documents has been so difficult
that—for some—it never gets done before editing is completed. The
Multi-Dictionary Formatter (MDF) enables ordinary computer users to print a
dictionary. Removing the difficulty from printing saves time; adding the
ability to inspect fully formatted lexical entries throughout the
dictionary-making process improves quality.

“MDF is flexible enough to organize lexical data from all over the world for
a variety of purposes and print it in several formats. It defines about 100
data field markers. The average dictionary compiler will use about 20 to 30
of them on a regular basis. The markers follow a mneumonic system for ease
of learning and recall. Please note that Shoebox does not require you to use
MDF. If you already have a well-organized set of markers for lexical data,
you can continue to use them (by defining your own database type).

“Shoebox includes MDF as a kind of export process in the Export command (on
the File menu). If you use its system of data field markers, MDF can
automatically format your lexical data as a dictionary or reversed index
(finderlist).”

Website: http://www.sil.org/computing/shoebox/MDF.html 

Cost: free

Shoebox/Toolbox

The original Shoebox program was rewritten to support Unicode and renamed
Toolbox. The greatest advantage of Toolbox is its extreme flexibility. It
can be used to manage any sort of dictionary project. It has been around for
a long time and has been used by hundreds of projects, perhaps as many as a
thousand. However it is based on older technology and lacks features that
newer programs have. Their website gives the following description:

“Toolbox is a data management and analysis tool for field linguists. It is
especially useful for maintaining lexical data, and for parsing and
interlinearizing text, but it can be used to manage virtually any kind of
data.”

Website: http://www.sil.org/computIng/toolbox/ 

Cost: free

TshwaneLex Dictionary Compilation Software

The TshwaneLex website gives the following description:

“TshwaneLex is a professional commercial software application suite for the
compilation of dictionaries ('dictionary writing system') or terminology
lists. It contains many specialized features that allow any organisation
producing dictionaries to dramatically reduce dictionary compilation time,
increase the quality and consistency of their dictionaries, and manage
larger projects with larger teams. These features include an integrated
Corpus Query System, immediate article preview, full customisability, styles
system, automatic cross-reference tracking, automated lemma reversal, online
and electronic dictionary modules, export to MS Word and typesetting systems
(such as InDesign and XPP), and teamwork (network / multi-user) support.”

TshwaneLex was reviewed in vol 1 of Language Documentation & Conservation:
http://hdl.handle.net/10125/1729 

Website: http://tshwanedje.com/tshwanelex/ 

Cost: 1900 Euro (commercial version), 150 Euro (academic license)

WeSay

WeSay is being designed as a tool for native speakers, rather than
professional lexicographers. However lexicographers can use it to engage
speakers of the language in the development of a dictionary for their
language. It is designed to work on small inexpensive battery-operated
machines that can be taken to remote areas. Their website gives the
following description:

“WeSay is an Open Source project aimed at providing computer tools to help
communities perform several language development activities on their own. It
is extremely simple, task oriented, and will be available on hardware that
is appropriate to their environment.

“Our first version helps people build a dictionary in their own language. It
has various ways to help native speakers to think of words in their language
and enter some basic data about them (no backslash codes, just forms to fill
in).”

Website: http://www.wesay.org/wiki/Main_Page

Cost: free

Other useful lexicography tools

Dictionary Development Process (DDP)

DDP is a method for rapidly collecting the lexemes of a previously
undocumented language. It uses a list of 1800 semantic domains to help
native speakers of a language to think of and write down the words and
lexical phrases of their language. Each domain includes elicitation
questions and sample words. Several hundred dictionary projects have used
DDP to collect 10,000-25,000 lexemes in a two week workshop. The DDP
materials have been incorporated into Fieldworks Language Explorer. Other
software such as Toolbox and LexiquePro support DDP.

Website: http://www.sil.org/computing/ddp/index.htm 

Cost: free

Wikis (online collaborative dictionary projects)

DACCO

DACCO is an online collaborative Catalan-English English-Catalan dictionary
project.

Website: http://www.catalandictionary.org/eng/ 

Cost: free (online wiki)

LingoZ

LingoZ is an online collaborative dictionary of English with definitions in
English and seven other major languages.

Website: http://lingoz.com/en/ 

Cost: free (online wiki)

Wiktionary

Wiktionary is an online collaborative project to support the development of
a dictionary for any language in the world. Unfortunately it does not appear
to be possible to upload an existing dictionary.

Website: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wiktionary:Main_Page 

Cost: free (online wiki)

Leo

Leo appears to be an online collaborative project to produce bilingual
German dictionaries. They welcome additions and suggestions, but it appears
that the content of each dictionary is managed by editors. Currently they
have German-English, German-French, German-Spanish, German-Italian, and
German-Chinese.

Website: http://dict.leo.org/ 

Cost: free (online wiki)

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