zbedic - electronic dictionary

zbedic is an electronic dictionary reader for Sharp Zaurus and Linux desktop.

Highlights:

Over 90 free mono- and bi-lingual dictionaries (most of them free)
Efficiently compressed dictionary files (English WordNet dictionary - about 120,000 entries - is only 6MB)
All dictionaries can be edited
You can create your own dictionaries
Can handle huge dictionary files, such as the Wikipedia
History, back/forward navigation, links between dictionary entries
Well designed interface - keyboard shortcuts for all major functions
Can be integrated with QtReader
Can be installed on CF/SD card to save internal memory
It's free!

News

07.06.2007 zbedic 1.2 released

The history and the back/forward navigation buttons has been throughly reimplemented to make them the same as the corresponding functions in a web-browser. Additionally, for faster switch between often used dictionaries, the dictionary pop-up list shows three most recently used dictionaries at the top. The history listing is a great help for those who learn languages, as it makes easy to revisit the unknown words that one has come upon recently. The words can be then copied to the favorite learning software (SuperMemo in my case) to make sure they will be memorized and not forgotten.

28.02.2007 Comprehensive list of zbedic dictionaries

zbedic has amazingly large collection of free dictionaries, which are nevertheless very difficult to find. To make searching for these dictionaries easier, I created a large list of available dictionaries. The list is probably not be complete or may have many wrong entries. I would therefore appreciate your help in correcting existing entries or adding new dictionaries. More information on the 'Dictionaries' page.

27.02.2007 New discussion forum

After a bad experience with the SourceForge trackers and mailing lists (spam, poor system of notifications, terrible administration), the suggested method of reporting problems, posting comments, advertising new dictionaries, is the zbedic Google group. Please direct any posts to this group.

Download

The latest version for Sharp/CACKO ROM can be downloaded from the files section of the zbedic project at SourceForge. OZ/Opie version can be found at OZ feeds (check always for the latest version in the upgrades section). The latest sources can be found in the CVS (releases are tagged). zbedic can be installed on CF/SD card or in internal storage. Uninstall an old version before installing the new one - no configuration or dictionaries will be lost.

Starting with version 1.0 there are two zbedic packages available for Sharp/CACKO ROMs:

zbedic_/version/_arm.ipk (recommended) - the sqlite3 library must be installed before installing this version . You can download the sqlite3 package from ELSI. The sqlite3 package from Cacko ROM's feed should work as well.
zbedic_/version/_static_arm.ipk - this version already includes sqlite3 and does not require any additional packages (is statically linked with the sqlite3). Use this package if you have problems installing the non-static version. Note however that the static version is bigger, takes more memory and takes longer to launch the application.

Starting with version 1.1 there are two zbedic packages available for i386 Linux:

zbedic_/version/_i386.deb - debian package to be installed using dpkg.
zbedic_/version/_i386.tgz - generic Linux binary package. It must be installed in /usr/local to function properly.

Note for OZ/OPIE users: If searching for dictionaries does not work, try putting dictionary files under: ~/Documents/application/bedic/

Documentation

A complete user manual is available as an online help in the application. The link below contains a copy of this documentation:

ZBEDic user manual

If you would like to create your own dictionaries, check the description of the bedic-format, see an example dictionary in a simplified format and read the man pages of xerox and mkbedic. xerox and mkbedic commands can be found in libbedic sources (binaries will be soon available too).

Man pages:

Help needed!

Help making zbedic even better!

Donate to support new features!
Test it on your Zaurus and report on things that do not work. zbedic is currently tested only on SL-5500 and SL-C1000 - I cannot affort all possible Zaurus models.
Report any problems or suggestions for enhancements at the bedic-user mailing list
If you create / convert dictionaries to zbedic format and they are not copyrighted - donate them

Actively help in the development of zbedic:

New icons. The exiting icons look ugly. Create better ones, so I can include them in the next reselase.

Other zbedic related web pages

BEDic for PMA430
OpieReader (QtReader) - an electronic book reader for Zaurus, which can be configured to look up words in zbedic

History and Current Status

zbedic was originally created by Latchesar Ionkov based on the kbedic by Radostin Radnev. Starting from version 0.9.2 zbedic is further developed by Rafal Mantiuk. However, the desktop version of the program - qbedic - is no longer updated. Instead, zbedic can be compiled both for QTE/Qtopia and Linux desktop starting from release 1.1.

This page is hosted by