Dictionary in ports?

[Matthew Seaman]

On Thu, Nov 13, 2003 at 11:06:42PM -0600, Bryan Cassidy wrote:
> Is there a stand-alone dictionary port? I would like to have one on the
> pc cause im gettin tired of goin online. thanks

Well, there's a built-in dictionary that comes with the system.  I say
'dictionary', but it's really just a list of words --
/usr/share/dict/words

With a little knowledge of Unix shell scripting you can cobble
together a basic spell checker for text files from that.

Rather more functional are the various spell-check programs available
from ports.  There are two main programs:

    textproc/aspell
    textproc/ispell

but each has numerous slave ports with dictionaries in a dozen
different (human) languages plus program bindings for various
different (computer) languages.

Neither of these are dictionaries in the sense of providing you wit
the definition on a word -- all they do is check the spelling.  If you
want somethin that will give you definitions, entymology,
pronunciation etc. you're going to have to fork out some money. Plus
it's unlikely that you'll get it running under FreeBSD without a whole
lot of grief.  For instance the OED on CD-Rom requires some version of
Windows to run:

    http://www.oed.com/services/cd-rom/requirements.html

In the UK and Europe, it costs £250.00 for a single user version.

	Cheers,

	Matthew

-- 
Dr Matthew J Seaman MA, D.Phil.                       26 The Paddocks
                                                      Savill Way
PGP: http://www.infracaninophile.co.uk/pgpkey         Marlow
Tel: +44 1628 476614                                  Bucks., SL7 1TH UK
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