Ray Saintonge <saintonge(a)telus.net> wrote:
For my part translation is a secondary function of a
dictionary.
Documenting the history of a word, citing quotations that support uses
of the word, and commentary on the usages of a word are more interesting
and important. I recently did a little of this to raise awareness of
the divergence of [[gourmand]] in English and French. I find our
present software essentially adequate for the task.
Gerard has been talking about his Ultimate Wiktionary for a long time,
but so far I have not seen examples of what Gerard's Wiktionary will
look like, how it will work or how it will be editable. Perhaps if he
presented more concrete examples attitudes could change.
I agree. As I have said ... probably many times now, 99% of Wiktionary
articles are stubs.[1] Taking these as a model for a stricter dictionary
format may relegate the "Ultimate" Wiktionary to the status of a mere
glossary. But without even having had a mock-up of what the product will
look like or how it will work, noone can tell. A lot of the work for
this is apparently being done by a small few behind closed doors, which is
not very encouraging at all.
*Muke!
[1] And having five thousand one-word translations attached to each won't
make them any less stubby.
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