[Lexicog] email to send to Lexicography list

Tue Oct 13 06:04:54 UTC 2009

Dear Inam,

I have found that the task of collecting data for a dictionary and the task
of preparing a dictionary for publication are very different. Even if you
have collected all your data, you may need help getting the data in the
correct form for publication. If you have been using Toolbox for a long time
and you are close to finishing, I would not recommend that you change to
FieldWorks. It would take a long time to learn the new program. FieldWorks
does some things differently from Toolbox and you may find that you have to
do a lot more work to get everything correct in FieldWorks. This is
especially true if you don't know how to correctly import your data into
FieldWorks. You can easily create problems for yourself if your data is not
correct or if you don't import your data correctly into FieldWorks.

I would recommend that you finish collecting your data. Then you should
import your data into Lexique Pro and use Lexique Pro to publish your
dictionary. I would not recommend that you print the dictionary using MDF.
Lexique Pro is a very good program and fairly easy to use. However you may
need help, especially if you have not rigorously followed the MDF standard.
There are programs and techniques that you can use to clean up your Toolbox
database, but I cannot explain them all in a short email. You may need to
find someone who can help you. I am in Uganda doing research right now and
will not have any time until January.

I hope this helps,

Ron Moe

  _____  

From: lexicographylist at yahoogroups.com
[mailto:lexicographylist at yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Inam Ullah
Sent: Monday, October 12, 2009 10:07 AM
To: lexicographylist at yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [Lexicog] email to send to Lexicography list

Dear Ron, 

I've been using Shoebox/Toolbox since long and my lexical database is still
in the Toolbox program. I too had similar problems with MDF while exporting
my database. I'm doing  experiments with Lexique Pro but not fully
successful. My dictionary project is now closer to the end and I want to get
my dictionary print. What I should do? Do you recommend me to the
Fieldworks? Can my data file be opened in the Fieldworks program? 

Regards,

Inam Ullah 

Center for Research in Urdu Language Processing  (CRULP) 
FAST National University, Faisal Town, Lahore Pakistan. 
Cell: +92 0314 7651446

--- On Mon, 10/12/09, Ronald Moe <ron_moe at sil.org> wrote:

From: Ronald Moe <ron_moe at sil.org>
Subject: RE: [Lexicog] email to send to Lexicography list
To: lexicographylist at yahoogroups.com
Date: Monday, October 12, 2009, 11:22 AM

Naomi Keith wrote:

"Our team has a question about MDF - is MDF being maintained or is it
basically a dead format now? Other than Toolbox, what programs can
manipulate or import MDF files?"

My understanding is that MDF is no longer being maintained. I know of one
person who made some changes a few years ago. The problem is that the
Consistent Changes tables that are used to prepare the database for printing
are very complicated. So trying to change one thing may require searching
lots of code for unexpected consequences.

Another problem with MDF is that the user is limited to the standard fields.
If you want to do anything nonstandard (for instance if your language family
has a tradition of dictionaries that is different than the MDF format), you
must "misuse" one of the standard fields or otherwise play with the standard
fields to get MDF to format your dictionary the way you want it.

MDF was designed to be used with the Shoebox/Toolbox program. You can import
an MDF database into Lexique Pro and FieldWorks. However I have never seen a
Shoebox or Toolbox database that was clean and consistent. In my experience
it has always required some cleanup and manipulation of the data to bring it
up to the MDF standard. If you neglect to do this, you are very likely to
get errors when trying to print with MDF or import the database into another
program. Consequently newer programs like FieldWorks and WeSay use a
standardized format to ensure that the data is consistent. In fact a number
of programmers are working on a new standard for lexical data called LIFT.
WeSay keeps its data in the LIFT format standard. FieldWorks can export and
import from the LIFT standard, and Lexique Pro can import a LIFT file.

Toolbox users have also developed other tools to work with MDF files. For
instance I know of one tool that helps to clean up an MDF file, but I've
never used it. There is a Toolbox users email discussion list similar to
this one. You might want to join it.

Having said all this, MDF is still useful and many people have successfully
used it to organize and print their dictionaries, including me. However I
have switched to FieldWorks, which I consider a vastly superior program for
handling dictionaries. I still use Toolbox for other kinds of databases, but
not for dictionaries.

Ron Moe

  _____  

From: lexicographylist@ yahoogroups. com [mailto:lexicograph
ylist at yahoogroup s.com] On Behalf Of Naomi Keith
Sent: Thursday, October 01, 2009 8:49 AM
To: lexicographylist@ yahoogroups. com
Cc: 'Robert Hunt'
Subject: [Lexicog] email to send to Lexicography list

Hi,

Our team has a question about MDF - is MDF being maintained or is it
basically a dead format now? Other than Toolbox, what programs can
manipulate or import MDF files?

Thanks very much,

Naomi Keith

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