Wiktionary: FAQ
From open-dictionary.com - the free dictionary.
| Table of contents |
General
Q. How do I add a new word?
A. You can add a new word by making the appropriate link in Wiktionary:By Topic. See also Wiktionary:How to start a page.
Q. Where is the alphabetical listing?
A. Try using the search feature instead. Special:Allpages lists all of the pages in Wiktionary, including the utility pages in the Wiktionary: namespace. You can also try Wiktionary:Quick index which attempts to allow you to jump quickly to letters further down in the alphabet as well.
Q. I've found a common use word that is missing from Wiktionary, and thought of adding a seed entry. But it seems like you want fully grown entries or nothing! I'm not a lexicologist. I'm just someone who feels he can contribute some simple dictionary definitions. I don't know anything about etymology, translations and whatever! In Wikipedia a lot of people are quite happy to come along and copy-edit, wikify etc. Does that apply here?
A. Yes! Wiktionary is still much smaller than Wikipedia, but the wiki philosophy is just as strong. If a word does not exist add it. If you know nothing about etymology that's fine; your humblest contribution is still better than nothing. Someone else can add the etymology later.
Pronunciation
Q. How do I insert IPA symbols and other special characters for pronunciation?
A. At the top of a page, there should be a pronunciation guide, like so:
- /ˈwɪkʃənrɪ/, /ˈwɪkʃənˌerɪ/
Q. How do we type those symbols, and is there a table indicating which symbols make certain sounds?
A. This table may be helpful: IPA Examples
IPA, SAMPA (better use X-SAMPA!), SAMPA chart, and SAMPA for English sounds. Copy and paste.
Q. The IPA symbols are showing up as blocks in Internet Explorer, is there a way to fix this?
A. The easiest way for Windows/Internet Explorer users is to make sure the font "Arial Unicode MS" is installed. Then, in Internet Explorer go to Tools/Internet Options.../General tab. Select the "Fonts..." button at the bottom. Make sure the "Language script" displays "Latin based", then set the "Web Page Font" to "Arial Unicode MS". Click OK twice to exit.
Q. I've tried the above, and it still doesn't work. Any other ideas?
A. Works fine when setting Skin to Classic, Nostalgica or MySkin on your Preferences side, but not with Skins Cologne Blue, MonoBook. Would be nice if somebody could fix this.
Article Format
Q. How do we format articles? Is there a standard format we should use?
A. We are still trying to come up with a standard article format. See Wiktionary:Template.
Q Some people link to other words as they type a definition. Since every English word would eventually be listed on the Wiktionary, maybe someone could add a code (which perhaps could be turned off) that made every word link to its corresponding entry.
A When an article is loaded, each linking word is checked to see if the article on the word exists, and it is marked in red or blue accordingly. If every word were being checked, it could eventually cause serious slowdowns. This already happens in the much larger Wikipedia project when you load a link rich article.
Writing definitions
Q. How should we go about writing definitions ?
A. The easiest way is to think up a number of examples where the word is used (or better still find actual uses of the word) and write the tightest definition that would be accurate for all of the examples.
Q. How shouldn't we go about writing definitions ?
A. By looking at other dictionaries and glossaries and making a definition based on them. This is for two main reasons:
- Wiktionary should represent the language as it is used in practice, and many dictionaries/glossaries are biased by age, authorship, genre or affiliation and so do not do this.
- Dictionary makers normally compare their definitions with other dictionaries to find differences, if dictionaries were based on each other this would end up making the practice akin to inbreeding, in that weak or poor definitions would survive indefinitely as they would be shared by all dictionaries.
Limiting and/or ordering definitions
Q: To avoid bias, should we sometimes limit or order the definitions so as to avoid giving the impression that rare or difficult uses of a word are more common than they are?
A: Yes, in general, the most commonly-used definitions of a word should be those listed first, and meanings that contradict or over-generalize those commonly-used meanings should not be included at all, even if they are used in the language - links to wikipedia or references to the Oxford English Dictionary are better ways to ensure that the definitions are complete.
Q: Is there a subset of the wiktionary that would include only meanings that are known to be necessary for learning English as a second language, or for learning common English idioms, or for reading (say) high school textbooks?
A: No, such a subset would be a 'defining dictionary', and would have to contain about 2000 English words, prefixes and suffixes, in order to reliably define the 4000 or so idioms that are typically considered 'part of English'. Each of these 2000 words would only be defined in one or two senses, to avoid overloaded usage that would confuse readers. This would be a major project, and it would effectively mean that the wiktionary would have to exist at three levels of complexity: this defining dictionary of 2000 or so words, a basic dictionary of perhaps 5000 with at most three to five meanings of overloaded words, suitable for a native English speaker, and a comprehensive dictionary that would be comparable to the O.E.D.
Q: But that 'simplified wiktionary' still sounds like the right idea.
A: It is, and if you have the time, you could consider a separate project aiming to do just that! A starting point is that there would have to be three pages for each word, plus a 'Talk' page where the desirability of moving senses and adding links would have to be discussed. Also index pages would have to be compiled at three levels of complexity, or more, depending on whether one wanted primary/secondary/college/specialist levels of English to be supported in their own glossaries. As you can see, it's not a simple undertaking.
Other
Q: I saw some copyrighted material in some article, submitted by user XYZ. What should I do?
A: First, make sure the copyright infringement is real from the date of publication. Remove the copyrighted material and justify your action so that it is clear to other users why you did so. Often copyright infringements come from repeated offenders. Take some time to look at other contributions by the offender. If the cleaned up articles need improvement afterwards, feel free to contribute your own original work.
Namespaces
Q: Occasionally in a discussion I see a reference to a "namespace". What is that?
A: A namespace is a zone of entries in which each entry has a name that is unique in that zone. Namespaces subdivide a Wiki into different contexts in order to allow the creation of entries with otherwise identical names. For example, the "Talk" namespace is a zone for discussion about entries in the general namespace. Namespaces are denoted by a prefix followed by a colon, as Talk:color.
Q: Where can I see a list of active namespaces?
A:
Q: When should one create a new namespace, and how would one go about it?
A:
Q: Is it possible to restrict a search to a given namespace?
A:
Wiktionary in your language
Q: What should I do if I want to start a Wiktionary in my own language?
A:
nl:Wiktionary:FAQ
Referencing Wiktionaries from Other Wikipedias
Q: What is Transwiki?
A: It's a way of moving articles from one wiki to another (e.g. from Wikipedia to Wiktionary). See m:Transwiki. Ortonmc 16:07, 24 Mar 2004 (UTC)
- The idea behind it was that a Wikipedian who felt that an article there really belonged in Wiktionary, but was not familiar with Wiktionary formatting practices could put it there as a temporary parking place until a Wiktionarian came along to move it to its proper place. Eclecticology 07:08, 26 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Q: Are [[wiktionary:Dog]] and [[wiktionary:eo:Konduto]] suitable references from other Wikipedias to Wiktionaries?
A:
Q: Why wiktionary:Dog and wiktionary:eo:Konduto do not work inside the Wiktionaries as Dog ([[Dog]]) but work in the Wikipedias?
- PS: Neither Wiktionary:Dog and Wiktionary:eo:Konduto (with uppercase "W") nor Wiktionary:dog and Wiktionary:eo:konduto (with uppercase "W" and lowercase first letter) will work inside the Wiktionaries either.
A:
Q: I supposed that [[eo:Konduto]] could be used as in the Wikipedias. It will not be displayed if it is in the source code. Watch the source code here: "-eo:Konduto-". Why?
- PS: Esperanto will be added to the "other languages" list.
A:
Q: References between Wiktionaries and Wikipedias and viceversa should not be considered as "External links". Should they be placed in a == Other Wikipedias and other Wiktionaries == section as I would propose for wikipedia:Dog ?
A:
- PS: If these issues are fixed references to items should be work properly as well. Example: Wiktionary:FAQ#Referencing_Wiktionaries_from_Other_Wikipedias
Important note about this section: Why the behaviour of using such cross references is different when the reference is made in an article or if it is made in a talk / discussion. In articles each cross reference generates an "in other languages" link, in talks / discussions not.
- Q: How can the cross references be used in articles without generating the "in other languages" link too (not using the known work around by referencing as "external links")?
- A:
- Q: The behaviour for articles is different when the referencing is done between a Wikipedia and a Wiktionary (or vice versa) from referencing between two Wikipedias (or two Wictionaries). Is this correct?
- A:
What is a template
- Q1: What is a Wiktionary template?
- Q2: How does it work?
- Q3: What can be the reason if it doesn't work (in a foreign language Wiktionary)?
(see please the first word in the interlingue wiktionary)
- Q4: If necessary, little check list please
--oui 15:53, 29 Sep 2004 (UTC)
pt:Wikcionário:FAQ
Importing other dictionaries
There exists a number of other GPL'ed dictionaries, eg. link freedict . In order to boost the usability of some of the wiktionaries with lesser entries, I think it would be a good idea to incooperate some of these dictionaries into wiktionary. It would ofcouse not result in entries in the desirable form as these dictionaries are usually purely translationary. However, I do believe that it would attract more users and thereby more contributers and the wiktionary would improve faster. Is there a way to such large amount of data?
