dictccfe - front-end for offline dictionaries

An application for an offline use of the English-German (or German-English) dictionary available on http://www.dict.cc, for the Universal Dictionary Database plain text files available on http://www.dicts.info/uddl.php, as well as for the German and Polish thesaurus files http://www.openthesaurus.de and http://synonimy.wx.pl.

There are currently the following versions of the dictionary frontends:

• Java ME front-end for these dictionaries, see dictme documentation for more details.
• Android frontend, see dictand documentation for more details.
• A .NET/Forms based front-end for Windows Mobile/CE, Windows and Mono.

Neither dict.cc nor Universal Dictionary Database dictionary files are included in the package. because it is mostly not allowed and the dictionary files expand from day to day.

Quick How-to for the .NET version

1. Download the most recent version from the download page
2. If you want to compile from sources (recommended):
   1. Get and install NANt
   2. Get and install NET Compact Framework Redistributable, if you want to compile for PDAs. Set the environment variable NETCF to the installation directory of the Compact Framework, eg. SET NETCF=C:\progs\netcf\WindowsCE
   3. Compile using nant or nant doc
3. Alternatively use the precompiled binary versions:
   1. dictccfe-r<n>-bin.zip compiled for desktop PC with MS .NET Framework 2.0
   2. dictccfe-r<n>.cab cabinet installation for MS .NET Compact Framework 2.0 (Windows CE/Mobile). Copy it to the PDA, execute, the program installs in Program Files\dict with a shortcut in Start\Programs. Warning! The binaries located in the cabinet file were compiled for .NET Compact Framework v2, which is usually installed on Windows Mobile 6. Windows Mobile/CE 5 and older may have no .NET Compact Framework at all or its older versions. In this case you'll have to download the NET Compact Framework Redistributable (NETCFSetupv2.msi) and install the current Compact Framework cabinet files to your device. The cabinet installation files are usually located in the sub-directory WindowsCE\wce<num>\<arch>, eg. WindowsCE\wce500\armv4i\NETCFv2.wm.armv4i.cab for a Windows Mobile 5 driven device with an ARM processor (the most common case).
4. Get the recent offline dictionary files. For dict.cc use: http://www1.dict.cc/translation_file_request.php, the UDDL files can be downloaded from http://www.dicts.info/uddl.php. The program also supports thesaurus files available at http://www.openthesaurus.de and http://synonimy.wx.pl.
5. Start dict.exe (or mono dict.exe)
6. Select menu item Dictionary/Config
7. Enter the full path to the dictionary file in the input box "Dictionary file". Enter the full path to the index file to create in the input box "Index file". Please always select the correct dictionary type before creating the index file. The program won't work for a wrong dictionary type!
8. Click on the button "Load" in order to create the index file
9. Click "OK". From now on the dictionary may be used
10. Enter the keyword to translate in the input box of the main form
11. Select menu Search/Exact in order to translate the keyword
12. Alternatively the keyword may be a regular expression according to System.Text.RegularExpressions.Regex.IsMatch(). In this case the translation should be performed using Search/Reg. Expr.
13. Warning! The index creation especially for huge dict.cc dictionary files may fail on small portable devices. In this case create the index file on the desktop PC and copy it to the PDA to the same directory, where the dictionary file is located. Then enter in the input box "Index file" of the config form the full path to the dictionary file copied before and close the config form using the OK button. Don't recreate the index file using the button "Load" in this case!
14. See the online documentation for more details. See the project page for screenshots and further details.

Links

1. Project page
2. Download
3. Browse repository
4. Online documentation

Daniel Stoinski, stoyac@gmx.de, project hosted on sourceforge.net