Author Topic: Our Dictionary for eBook readers (and a little bit more) (Read 2706 times)

eanayo · « **on:** November 29, 2010, 02:35:22 pm »

Kaltxì, frapoya!

Well, I thought it would be nice to have yet another incarnation of our dictionary - this time for those new-fangled eBook reader thingies.
Behold!

What's this all about?
Quite simply, this is an eBook (mobipocket and epub) version of the Na'vi dictionary. It should be readable on pretty much all eBook readers around - and if not, there are also HTML files provided. The mobipocket file is an indexed dictionary, which means that you can quickly search primary entries or even set it as the default dictionary to get instant lookup (just in case you're reading many eBooks in Na'vi)

What's in there?
The dictionary is based on the data provided by Tuiq, which means that the words in there are the same as you get in Taronyu's dictionary. In addition, however, I've also pulled the examples, comments and cross-references from the wiki vocabulary page, which means that you also get all that information along with many of the words.
Just as Taronyu's dictionary, this one comes localized for all the languages that are currently exported. Note, however, that thus far only the translations are localized - all the extra bits are still in English (with potential for translation).

How do I get it?
You can download the eBook and HTML files from here:
English: mobipocket epub HTML
Estonian: mobipocket epub HTML
German: mobipocket epub HTML
Hungarian: mobipocket epub HTML
Portuguese: mobipocket epub HTML
Swedish: mobipocket epub HTML
Dutch: mobipocket epub HTML

Anything else?
Yes, in particular:

Feedback. Please. On anything. The layout, the way the entries are presented, anything you're missing, just let me know. Right now this is in an early test phase, nothing is set in stone and changes can be made quite easily
There will be errors. The examples and references went through a couple of half-hearted regexes and my clumsy hands. Some may be missing. Some may have weird things in them. I also added a few myself. If you see anything suspicious, please let me know.
I have deliberately removed the stress markers from the IPA and used underlines in the main word instead. The reason being two-fold: One, the IPA rendering isn't pretty on the Kindle in the first place, and with the infix and syllable markers in there it just got stretched out beyond the bounds of what is aesthetically tolerable. And two, I like underlining much more myself Any comments on that would be appreciated.
I have added two "test" words in the English dictionary (I'll leave finding those as an exercise to the reader) to show the various items that are currently supported. That's basically to gather feedback on how things should be organized in the dictionary (e.g. how many and which different types of cross-references should be used etc). Again, all comments my way, rutxe.
The Kindle at least lacks an easy way to enter ì and ä, which may make searching the dictionary a bit difficult. If anyone has a good solution for that...
The index only contains the main entries, no inflected forms. In my opinion, adding inflected forms would just blow up the dictionary file, but not add much functionality. Any thoughts on that?

The "little bit more"
(or: why this is not in the mobile apps section)
As hinted above, getting stuff from the wiki isn't fully automated or reliable, so I decided to dump all that into a database to allow for manual corrections. Or additions. Or translations. I think you might see what I'm trying to get at...
Essentially, I think that, should there be interest, this could potentially be a starting point for something else. Maybe just translations of the existing examples, maybe overhauling those. Maybe a growing collection of "extra" dictionary information that could supply data to other applications.
Let me get one thing perfectly straight: I don't want to put Tuiq out of his job or interfere with the way the current dictionary system works, and neither do I aim to set up an alternative to the wiki vocabulary. But if the community is interested in developing this forward, I am more than happy to help out. If not, this will stay what it is: an eBook version of the dictionary that is fed from Tuiq's SQL file and the wiki - no redundant information, no divergence, no duplication of efforts.

Even more
The mobipocket files, the HTML files and the SQL file below are all released under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License (summary full text).
For those of you interested in re-using this material, there is also a SQL file of the extra material (i.e. without the main word list and translations) available: clicky! Note that the database schema may change in the future - right now it's a bit... peculiar

Thanks go to the contributors to the original sources, that is the editors and translators of the PDF dictionary, Tuiq and the editors of the wiki.

Well then... have fun!

wm.annis · « **Reply #1 on:** November 29, 2010, 04:31:21 pm »

Man. I've been slacking on the wiki. Plenty of words have good, Frommerian examples that haven't been cited yet.

'eylan na'viyä · « **Reply #2 on:** November 29, 2010, 04:45:45 pm »

ill take a look at it when i set up my old pda again

eanayo · « **Reply #3 on:** December 15, 2010, 06:30:33 am »

*clears out cobwebs*

A small service notice: Unless there is overwhelming customer demand (or some serious updates), the update script won't be running between the 17^th of December and 10^th of January. Downloads will remain available as normal.

Muzer · « **Reply #4 on:** December 15, 2010, 11:48:42 am »

Wow, this looks great - I must try it on my PRS-505 (no searching there of course, though)

eanayo · « **Reply #5 on:** December 15, 2010, 01:15:27 pm »

Cool! Let me know how it works, I'm especially curious about things like formatting and IPA.

Puvomun · « **Reply #6 on:** January 07, 2011, 02:38:25 pm »

I could make epub files from the HTML files. Would anyone be interested?

eanayo · « **Reply #7 on:** January 11, 2011, 07:40:44 am »

Quote from: Puvomun on January 07, 2011, 02:38:25 pm

I could make epub files from the HTML files. Would anyone be interested?

Ma Puvomum, that sounds like a nice idea you have there. I probably won't have much use for epub files myself, but anything that makes the dictionary accessible to more people must be good

Let me know if you need anything besides the HTML.

In completely unrelated news, the updates are running again.

Puvomun · « **Reply #8 on:** January 11, 2011, 11:40:42 am »

Hmmm. First attempt is #fail, alas. The document is XHTML, not regular HTML. My epub builder only handles regular HTML. $:-\$
Is it easy for you to build regular HTML 4 documents from your source? Otherwise I could write a program to rebuild the XHTML into HTML. Epub files use standard HTML internally.

Or I could dump the output using Lynx (text webbrowser) and capture its output. But I'll first wait for your reply, ma Eanayo.

Sіr. Ηaxalot · « **Reply #9 on:** January 11, 2011, 01:02:39 pm »

I think that the problem might be that it's a hybrid between (X)HTML and another language. The HTML validator gives 2528 Errors, mostly because "element "idx:entry" undefined".

Puvomun · « **Reply #10 on:** January 11, 2011, 01:06:05 pm »

Wou... that is serious.

eanayo · « **Reply #11 on:** January 11, 2011, 03:42:52 pm »

Yeah... well... the "embedded" XML is for the dictionary index. Of course, it would be possible to keep the HTML and XML in separate files, but to be honest, I just couldn't be bothered (and mobipocket themselves don't seem too bothered in their reference implementations either). The HTML files in the OP are actually just the intermediate files that are fed to the eBook generator, and are more or less "just for reference".

Anyway, for those of you who don't want to ignore unknown tags, there's a now a set of almost valid HTML 4.01/Transitional files in the OP

Puvomun · « **Reply #12 on:** January 11, 2011, 10:35:29 pm »

Awesome. I'll look this evening after work!

Puvomun · « **Reply #13 on:** January 12, 2011, 12:56:52 pm »

We're getting there. When I download one of the files, I find I have to replace all <hr> with <hr><p> or everything is squashed in one line.
Another snag I run into with Jutoh (the program I use) is that it crashes when the dictionary is in 1 big file (over 800KB seems to be too much for one page for it).

I'd have to write a program that chops up all the separate blocks (distinct starting letters) into separate files. Not a problem to do that, but a problem to find time for that at the moment.

Not sure when I can actually get to that...

eanayo · « **Reply #14 on:** January 13, 2011, 04:40:33 am »

Hmmm... that sounds a bit odd. Probably not really worth going through all the trouble there. But many thanks for your efforts

I've just shoved the mobipocket files through Calibre, could you please check whether the epub file can be read by your reader?

Puvomun · « **Reply #15 on:** January 13, 2011, 09:27:56 am »

Quote from: eanayo on January 13, 2011, 04:40:33 am

Hmmm... that sounds a bit odd. Probably not really worth going through all the trouble there. But many thanks for your efforts

I've just shoved the mobipocket files through Calibre, could you please check whether the epub file can be read by your reader?

I can officially state that a Sony PRS 350 handles the result perfectly. Even the hyperlinks work without a problem.
Smart thinking, ma 'eylan, using Calibre. Txantsan!

eanayo · « **Reply #16 on:** January 13, 2011, 09:43:35 am »

*phew* glad it works. I'll put that into the automated process as soon as I've got time.

Thanks for the epub idea (and testing

), +1 cookie for you!

Puvomun · « **Reply #17 on:** January 13, 2011, 09:47:07 am »

Quote from: eanayo on January 13, 2011, 09:43:35 am

*phew* glad it works. I'll put that into the automated process as soon as I've got time.

Thanks for the epub idea (and testing ), +1 cookie for you!

Coolness, danke schön für den Kuchen! Werd' gleich mal in die Küche gehen...

eanayo · « **Reply #18 on:** January 13, 2011, 12:29:17 pm »

Right everyone, the epub files have been added to the OP and will be kept up-to-date automatically. Give me a shout if there are any problems.

Ma Puvomum, danke auch recht schön für's Leckerli. Kuchen und Kekse ftw!

Stawmyu Feyä Aymokrit · « **Reply #19 on:** April 22, 2011, 02:25:59 pm »

Kaltxì ma eylan,
What would be required in order to build a French dictionnary epub ?
I can use the english one of course, but it would be easier with french

Nìtxan irayo

Stawmyu Feyä Aymokrit