Dictionary of Foreign Words
Quick summary{#Krotko}
This project brings Słownik Wyrazów Obcych (Dictionary of Foreign Words) to a palmtop. 20,651 entries in a 1.5 MB file!
Why this idea?{#Pomysl}
A palmtop is perfect as a portable data store. Databases, dictionaries — it’s exactly what these devices were made for. Despite a decent choice of software, I couldn’t find a dictionary like this, so I decided to build one myself.
More details{#Wiecej}
This dictionary is a conversion of Władysław Kopaliński’s Dictionary of Foreign Words. The original source was www.slownik-online.pl.
I pulled the entries from the website using a simple Perl script.
Initially I planned to store the .txt entries in a Palm database, similar to my previous project, using MobileDB.
Unfortunately the raw data was almost 3 MB. MobileDB doesn’t compress records, so the final file was too large for typical Palm devices.
As a temporary solution I used iSiloX and the iSilo reader. The output shrank to 1.45 MB — much better.
Plans{#Plany}
Write a standalone dictionary app with compression. When? If I find the time and skills. If anyone wants to take this on, please [contact me][4].
Change log{#Historia}
1.00 – 2005‑05‑16 – added internal links between entries.
Cosmetic fix: the headword is now bold in the definition.
The output file grew slightly, but the usability improvement was worth it.- 0.02 – 2003‑12‑23 – added files with Polish WIN‑1250 encoding and without Polish characters.
- 0.01 – 2003‑12‑22 – data download and conversion to iSilo format.
Requirements{#Wymagania}
Download{#Download}
- Database (~1.4 MB): Polish ISO, WIN, without Polish characters
- iSilo
- Plfonts