Wiktionary – the community-driven dictionary app
by Paul Wilks
Aug 21, 2012 8:10 AM –
Install
Wiktionary is an online community-contributed dictionary, from the Wikimedia Foundation. Much like their better known Wikipedia, users can register and contribute to the project; editing, tweaking or discussing definitions. The Wiktionary app offers a number of useful features, including sharing, pronunciation and the ability to save and read later, even offline. The question might be however, how does it compare to something like Dictionary.com?
Price: Free
Tested on: HTC One X
Content Rating: Everyone
Pros & Cons:
Pros
- Nice layout!
- Responsive user interface!
- Multiple translations!
- Ability to listen to pronunciations!
Cons
- Some of the audio quality isn’t great.
- Doesn’t offer as much in terms of functionality compared to other dictionary apps.
Features:
Wiktionary is an online collaborative project in which the community creates and edits the online dictionary, anyone can edit and add to it. The app offers an easy-to-use interface for exploring, in addition to audio files you can listen to (for pronunciation). It offers a ‘Word of the day’ feature, the ability to save words for later or offline reading, in addition to being able to switch to more than 40 translated languages.
The app’s user interface is great, very responsive, easy to use and very smooth. Some entries even feature photographs which can be expanded. Much like the Wikipedia application, you can link easily to associated words via links in the description. The range of information is good too. You have an etymology (essentially how the word originated), the pronunciation (also check the audio files which are linked to in the menu), link to Wikipedia if the word has an associated article, usage notes, derived terms, related terms, hyponyms, translations and references. It should be stressed that Wiktionary is a work in progress so not all languages are translated yet.
Large online collaborative projects are always ambitious, but the work of the Wikimedia Foundation is a testament to how effective it can be. While Wiktionary offers a huge range of languages- which in itself is great for translating purposes, it’s perhaps not as useful (as a dictionary) currently to apps such as Dictionary.com. Dictionary.com seems even easier to use, and features an included thesaurus, trends and lots of other ways to explore words and improve your vocabulary. So Wiktionary is a brilliant project but, in its current form, not the best dictionary app on Android.
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Wiktionary – Typical entry
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Wiktionary – With menu
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Wiktionary – Good use of pictures
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Wiktionary – Expanded picture
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Wiktionary – Zombie
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Wiktionary – Extended definitions
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Wiktionary – Multiple translations
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Wiktionary – Saved pages
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Wiktionary – Settings
Usefulness:
If you’re a big fan of the Wiktionary project, this is a great way to access it but it doesn’t offer anything in the way of editing or the ability to discuss words- as you can on the main website. Therefore, in many ways it really is just a standalone dictionary app. The inclusion of so many languages does, however, have translating applications. If you need to translate a word to another language, this is a neat resource to try out.
Ease of Use:
The app is extremely easy to use. The user interface is very user-friendly and navigation is simple. The menu button offers a number of additional functions like saving, sharing and more.
Frequently Used:
This perhaps depends very much on the user and how they intend to use it. If you’re a frequent traveller for example, you might use it more than someone who doesn’t visit other countries very often. If you’re studying a new language, this could be a great way to integrate your learning into everyday life.
If, however, you want to use it as a basic dictionary, the frequency with which you use it will depend on your own vocabulary.
Interface:
As previously discussed the interface is really good. Occasionally, I noted there were times when the page title behaved as a layer which scrolled down the page- obscuring the words beneath it, but fortunately this didn’t occur very often. The UI is otherwise clean, simple and tidy.
Tags:
Android App,
Android Apps,
AndroidTapp.com App Review,
Dictionary,
Dictionary Apps,
Dictionary.com,
Language Translation Apps,
Wikimedia,
Wikipedia,
Wiktionary
Categorised in: Education
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