Question:
Does anyone know of an online English dictionary other than the Webster's?
Despite my name, I really don't like Webster's dictionaries very much.
I needed to look up some alchemy words this afternoon, and the online
Webster's was woefully inadequate: not only did it not have the rare/obscure
word "sophic," it didn't have "aludel" (which is in the Random House) or even
the plain ol' Latin-derived "cohabitation" (!!)(which obviously has a
non-alchemical meaning as well). I have an O.E.D., of course, but I was
hoping that there might be an online dictionary that would allow me to take
advantage of the speedy hypertextual medium for exploring a word's meanings.
(As opposed to the slow, manual, way of doing hypertext, that is...)
And while I'm asking, what's the current status of the CD-ROM version of the
O.E.D.? Has anyone on r.a.b. or m.w. taken it for a spin? Does it still cost
$800- or whatever ghastly amount it was?
The good news is that I did find a (small) online Spanish-English dictionary,
so maybe now I can look up those cool words in Ted Samsel's postings.
Answer:
There is not one Webster's dictionary. Webster is in the public
domain, and there are lots of cheap dictionaries with the Webster name in
front. *Merriam*-Webster is the one that is descended from ol' Noah
Webster's company.
In addition, the Webster floating around on the 'Net (which may
or may not be *Merriam*-Webster) is an old, out-of-copyright edition.
So, it doesn't necessarily reflect current print versions of Merriam-Webster
dictionaries. (BTW, there is another good "Webster" in a similar red
cover, published, I think, by Random House.)
OTOH, nothing can beat the OED for history of the language and
etymologies.
: And while I'm asking, what's the current status of the CD-ROM version of the
: O.E.D.? Has anyone on r.a.b. or m.w. taken it for a spin? Does it still cost
: $800- or whatever ghastly amount it was?
I've played with it at conferences. It's a wonderful way of
searching through all the information that's in the print version. You
can find any word in any quotation, not just the head word under which it
occurs. You can search roots and parts of words. You can search authors
of the quotations. I'm coveting now.
Ideally, Oxford should make it available in an online version and
charge a few dollars a search. They'd probably make more money than they
do now, because people who want to make a few searches would use it,
whereas those people don't want to pay $800 to get the whole database.
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