

Ask HN: Where can I find good language dictionary databases? - alex_c

I'm working on a small webapp for learning languages (the spoken kind, not programming), and want to integrate a dictionary lookup.  I would prefer something on the server to something that makes remote API calls.  What are some good places to find language dictionaries?<p>The only one I found so far is this:<p>http://www.language-databases.com/<p>At 390 euro for a language pack (e.g. English &#60;-&#62; Spanish), or 49 euro/month, it's a bit expensive but not out of reach.  The content seems pretty good but not outstanding.<p>Are there any good alternatives?<p>Edit: to clarify, I'm looking for bilingual dictionaries (e.g. look up a Spanish word and get meanings in English)
======
ramchip
I think it's a bit language-specific. For example, many websites that offer
Japanese <-> English lookup use the free EDICT:
<http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~jwb/j_edict.html>

You could also check out the list of free dictionaries included with a
translation app like Lingoes and see if the source data files are available:
<http://www.lingoes.net/en/dictionary/index.html>

The Vicon series of dictionaries covers a lot of languages, but I have no idea
where they come from. You may also need some logic on a per-language basis if
you want to consider conjugation, plurals, etc., since these dictionary files
don't list all alternative forms.

------
cskau
I find that I quite often simply look up a word on answers.com when I need a
bi-lingual translation. They have a rather long list of dictionaries
incorporated into their dataset. I did a quick digging around and found that
they apparently got them from Wizcom Tech [<http://www.wizcomtech.com/>] See:
<http://www.answers.com/library/Translations>

I'm actually also building a language webapp atm, but I'm lucky enough to have
the excellent EDICT dataset from Jim Breen, which has already been linked
here. If I were expand beyond Japanese, I'd definitely start out looking for
other such datasets.

Good luck

------
Nick_C
*nix systems have a dictionary daemon dictd that can talk to many dictionaries. I remember running a Latin-English/English-Latin dictionary on my Debian system years ago.

You could try googling for that and the FreeDict dictionary databases.

------
tgflynn
Are you looking for mono-lingual or bi-lingual dictionaries ?

I'm pretty sure there are freely available mono-lingual dictionaries available
for many languages but I don't know about bi/multi-lingual.

~~~
alex_c
Thanks, I should have specified - I'm looking for bilingual dictionaries. They
don't have to be free, as long as the price isn't exorbitant - I should be
able to charge for the webapp (or at least a freemium model), so I don't mind
a modest investment.

------
hackerku
Take a look at Wordnik. It has a REST API for dictionary lookups and more.

<http://docs.wordnik.com/api>

------
pierrefar
Would WordNet or Wiktionary work for you?

~~~
alex_c
They might, thanks! I'm mainly looking for bilingual dictionaries, but
something like Wiktionary may not hurt as a bonus feature - I hadn't really
thought about it.

~~~
pierrefar
Wiktionary does provide equivalent terms in other languages. For example:
<http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/trawl> . The problem is that this feature is no
where near as ubiquitous as it needs to be for it large-scale use.

