Hello. That's interesting about the slang term of yardbird. I've heard of
a jailbird but not a yardbird.
Rosemarie
----- Original Message -----
From: "Yardbird" <yardbird@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <jfw@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Saturday, November 05, 2005 12:12 PM
Subject: Re: Seeking accessible offline dictionaries
Hi Jerry,
Sorry if you're offended by my having intruded to ask these questions when
you wish to be communicating only with the other person, but thanks all the
more for bearing with me.
You don't say how accessible the normal functions, reading and searches are
with jaws, but as you didn't complain, I'll assume it works with jaws.
As far as the pronunciation goes, there are times when I'm curious to hear a
conventional pronunciation of an unfamiliar word, and I don't at all trust
Jaws to know how to phonetically parse many such things. Once I'm sure of
the predominant pronunciation, *then* I can tweak the Jaws dictionary to say
the word as I want it to. But I don't think there are words I don't know
yet that Jaws knows how to pronounce. That's been my experience, so far. I
don't hold it against Jaws. I enjoy playing with the dictionary to invent a
spelling that will get Jaws to say things correctly. That's a fun
challenge.
Last, I was amused by your digging up "yardbird" from the dictionary, but I'm a little surprised, given the dictionary's virtual heft and the fact that it's American, for there to be no mention that this was the (very famous) nickname of the great jazz saxophonist, Charlie Parker. Honestly, that isn't culturally esoteric, not by a long shot. But whatever, as we say.
One last question: Thinking of other sorts of words, not slang like that
one, does the thing provide etymology, or not? You didn't say. You know
what I mean? Say, take the word "inspire." An etymology would explain that
the word's derived from the prefix "in" plus the Latin "spirar," to breathe
(and therein is the earliest meaning of the word, the idea that a brilliant
insight or creative idea was gotten by metaphorically or actually breathing
in the spirit and the breath of the gods), and from there it would relate
those syllables (morphemes, actually) to their earlier origins in earlier
languages and language groups, back to proto Indo-European, where you could
see more connections.
Does it have this sort of stuff? This isn't an academic question. A good dictionary always includes etymology, and it doesn't have to be big enough to need a stand in a library for that.
Thanks again.
----- Original Message ----- From: "G.W. Cox" <gwcox2@xxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <jfw@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Saturday, November 05, 2005 11:25 AM
Subject: Re: Seeking accessible offline dictionaries
Firstly, I was responding to Pranav, but that's OK.
My guess is it is the equivalent of those behemoths that libraries put on a pedestal. If you look in popular applications with Jaws in the help menu, you'll find it under Random House. There is another one which I believe is like the collegiate and coupled with a thesaurus.
I don't know how well the pronunciation works. I think I may not have installed that since I would have Jaws running anyway.
As far as looking up a word, I got as far as y a r d b and it echoed back yardbird for this definition-- bird (yärdÆbûrdÅ), n. Slang.
1. a convict or prisoner.
2. an army recruit.
3. a soldier confined to camp and assigned to cleaning the grounds or other menial tasks as punishment for violation of the rules.
[1940-45, Amer.; YARD2 + BIRD, by analogy with JAILBIRD]
I guess the only detraction may be that some phonetic symbols translate poorly in Jaws.
Jerry
----- Original Message ----- From: "Yardbird" <yardbird@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <jfw@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Saturday, November 05, 2005 11:55 AM
Subject: Re: Seeking accessible offline dictionaries
Jerry,
I just took a look at the listing online, and it does appear to be more the sort of "serious" dictionary" of which several different versions are sitting in one of my bookcases, untouched except for dusting for more years than I care to enumerate at this point. So far, so good but, and here there may be a Catch-22, I'm aware-- do you have experience with this, using Jaws? If so, how accessible is it in most of its uses, except of course for the illustrations? Does the search function work okay with Jaws? Do the definitions read and navigate all right? Does the pronunciation feature speak without conflicting with Jaws or being silenced by its presence?
Thanks a lot.
----- Original Message ----- From: "G.W. Cox" <gwcox2@xxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <jfw@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Saturday, November 05, 2005 10:34 AM
Subject: Re: Seeking accessible offline dictionaries
I believe you meant Francis. The one I'd talked about was the Random House Webster's Unabridged at http://www.randomhouse.com/catalog/results.pperl?title_auth_isbn=webster%27s+unabridged+dictionary
It is the CD version, about $20 and the equivalent of the 2,256-page hardcover.
Jerry
----- Original Message ----- From: "Pranav Lal" <pranav.lal@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <jfw@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Saturday, November 05, 2005 9:37 AM
Subject: Re: Seeking accessible offline dictionaries
Jerry,
The description states: How does this compare to a standard dictionary? Well, a standard desktop dictionary contains about 110,000 words with definitions and is about 800 pages. However, the UTD also includes sentences using each defined word in context, for every "sense (meaning)" of the word.
PL] Is this feature in the demo? If yes, I cannot find it. Try the following words hubris Bowdlerize definition exquisite
Finally, the lookup word combo box does not seem to support copy and paste? I have tried pasting text into it and nothing happens.
Pranav --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Pranav
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