Dict2
Dict2 is a dictionary viewing application for GNU/Linux (GTK+). It was written with the intention to be used with the German-English dictionary files from www.dict.cc.
Features
- easy-to-use graphical interface
- regular expression (regex) search
- searching words with a common stem
- searching inflections of a word
- searching alternate forms of a word
- tabbed browsing
- caching to improve performance
Download
The latest version is 2.0.1.
Note: You must download the dictionary files directly from here. They are not included in the distribution.
Important: You should choose the old format when downloading (Elcombri / old format, cp1252). Other formats are not supported.
Short manual
Loading the files
After downloading and unzipping the file just load the textual file with the 'Load' button.
Search types
There are three search types.
- Find This is a keyword search. Any definitions containig the word searched as a single word will be displayed. Inflections and words with a common stem may be listed as well by using the 'stem', 'inflect' and 'forms' options. This search type is the default - it is invoked when you press ENTER.
- Find (regex) This is a regular expression search. All definitions matching a given POSIX extended regular expression will be displayed. For more information on regular expression see e.g. man grep.
- Find (exact) This is an exact match search. The 'stem', 'inflect' and 'forms' options are not taken into account, and only definitions matching exactly the phrase typed are displayed.
The stem, inflect and forms options
You may search words with a stem common with the word typed by checking the 'stem' checkbutton. For instance, searching 'ausmachen' gives 'machen' as one of the translations. This option may be combined with the inflection search - searching inflections of a word. If these two buttons are checked then looking for e.g. 'gemacht' gives 'machen' and 'ausmachen' among other results. If only the 'inflect' option is chosen, 'ausmachen' is not displayed.
Another option similar to the two described is the 'forms' option - checking it enables searching words which are derived from the word typed, but have a different grammatical form (e.g. you type a verb and get a noun). For instance, if you search 'Ruhe' with this option enabled, you get 'ruhig' among other results.
The more of these three options you use, the slower your searches become. If you have a slow computer you might consider unchecking all of them. On modern machines, however, the difference in speed is usually imperceptible.
Viewing a definition
If you want to copy text from one of the results, just select the desired line in the results view and click the 'View definition' button or double-click the line. This shows the definition is a separate window. This feature is also useful if the text is too long and you can't see the whole of it.
