Creates dictd-server compatible dictionary files using data from the English Wiktionary
Wiktionarytodict is a small program that uses data from the English Wiktionary project (http://en.wiktionary.org) to generate two-way translation dictionaries between English and various languages. Most words in the English Wiktionary have a ‘translations’ section where users have contributed translations from that word to various different languages. wiktionarytodict uses the data in those translations sections to generate dictionaries.
The simplest way is to download the program Goldendict which is available for Linux and Windows. Goldendict can read the DICT format dictionaries generated by wiktionarytodict directly. The pre-generated dictionaries are downloadable here.
The best option for Debian/Ubuntu Linux users is to install dictd and the wiktionarytodict packages from my wiktionarytodict PPA:
sudo apt-add-repository ppa:tkedwards/wiktionarytodict-ppa
Then you can list and install the dictionaries for the languages you want:
sudo apt-cache search wikt- # list available dictionaries
sudo apt-get install wikt-deu-eng wikt-eng-deu # e.g. install German->English and English->German dictionaries
Once you have dictd installed you can use the dictionaries via any of the many dictd-compatible (RFC2229) client programs on Linux. See also https://help.ubuntu.com/community/DICT
You’ll need at least a Linux installation and very basic familiarity with the bash shell. Download the project files. Run wiktionarytodict.sh to get usage information or look at regenerate_all.sh, which is a script I use to generate the dictionaries on my own machine.
Generating dictionaries is fairly processor intensive. On a desktop PC with a Quad-Core AMD Phenom II X4 (3GHz) CPU it takes over 2 hours to generate 12 dictionaries (running 4 dictionary creates in parallel, one on each core).
Just head over to the English Wiktionary, find the word in English and edit the translation for the relevant language. wiktionarytodict doesn’t alter the data in any way - it just reflects what was on Wiktionary at the time the dictionaries were generated.
wiktionarytodict can generate dictionaries for any language where there are translation entries on the English Wiktionary. So for languages like German and Spanish you’ll probably get a pretty decent dictionary, whereas the more exotic languages people put there like Old Norse will probably produce a pretty limited dictionary.
The data is only as good as what’s on the English Wiktionary, so if you want to improve it go ahead and edit Wiktionary.
Dictionaries currently pre-generated for several languages (more on request).
Tim Edwards (@tkedwards) timedwards@fastmail.com.au
If you have problems raise an issue in https://github.com/tkedwards/wiktionarytodict/issues
wiktionarytodict is free and open-source software licensed under the GPL V2. No warranty given or liability accepted.