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Oxford English Dictionary for OS X?

S

Suzuki

macrumors member
Original poster
Aug 7, 2006
33
0
United Kingdom
By default OS X ships with the Oxford American Dictionary installed. I happen to be English, and would like to have my spelling and dictionary done in English English (with words like colour, aluminium, realise, through, etc.) as opposed to American English.

Does anybody know if it's possible to download a new dictionary, or change the installed American dictionary to be an English one?

Any help appreciated. :)
 
Suzuki said:
By default OS X ships with the Oxford American Dictionary installed. I happen to be English, and would like to have my spelling and dictionary done in English English (with words like colour, aluminium, realise, through, etc.) as opposed to American English.

Does anybody know if it's possible to download a new dictionary, or change the installed American dictionary to be an English one?

Any help appreciated. :)
Click to expand...

This has really bugged me as well. I can not stand the need to put zeds or zees (z) everywhere.
 
You can change it in the preferences for the Dictionary. For spell checking in Safari you have to open up the Spelling panel and pick British English.
 
Right, I've got British English selected in Safari now, but the only option the built-in dictionary in OS X gives me is for British pronunciation. Whilst better, this isn't exactly what I want.

I've had a look on the Oxford site, and can't find any way to download a new dictionary for OS X. Also, I've not found a way within the dictionary app to go off and get new dictionaries, even though it appears to support multiple dictionaries.

Strange.
 
Super Macho Man said:
"manoeuvre" is just wrong. :D
Click to expand...

Haha!

You can blame the French for that one getting in. Damn Gauls! ;)

On the topic of nasty words (with respect to their spelling, pronunciation, or otherwise) ... 'diarrhoea' is pretty nasty!

haha
 
Suzuki said:
Haha!
...
On the topic of nasty words (with respect to their spelling, pronunciation, or otherwise) ... 'diarrhoea' is pretty nasty!

...
Click to expand...

Oddly enough, a study was done where non-english speaking people were told various english words (but not the meanings), and were asked to pick the nicest sounding word in the english language....and the word that won? Diarrhea....that's right, diarrhea is the most beautiful sounding word in the english language....

Who knew?

Gonorrhea also made it to the short list, but it didn't come in first...
 
Have you dragged British English to the top of the Languages list in the International pane of System Preferences. I have Australia English there and my dictionary seems to comply with that quite well. :)
 
Oooh, got it sorted now. For some reason British English wasn't on the list, but I've managed to add it now. :)

The dictionary app does give me English spellings, I just wish I could have a dedicated English dictionary. Never mind though, plenty of other cool stuff on my new mac to play with! :D
 
Suzuki said:
Right, I've got British English selected in Safari now, but the only option the built-in dictionary in OS X gives me is for British pronunciation. Whilst better, this isn't exactly what I want.

I've had a look on the Oxford site, and can't find any way to download a new dictionary for OS X. Also, I've not found a way within the dictionary app to go off and get new dictionaries, even though it appears to support multiple dictionaries.

Strange.
Click to expand...
Hmm..that is odd. I only seem to get pronunciation preferences in the Dictionary preference pane.
 
Eidorian said:
Hmm..that is odd. I only seem to get pronunciation preferences in the Dictionary preference pane.
Click to expand...

how do you listen to the pronounciation in dictionary?
 
New OED for Mac OS 10.4 and above

I have been told by the OUP [Oxford University Press] that a new Mac version of the OED will finally be released in April:

"I'm pleased to be able to tell you that we have a new version of the OED CD-ROM - 2nd Edition Version 4.0 - in development at the moment, due for publication in April 2009. This version will have brand new software and a new design of user interface, a new word-wheel which supports incremental letter-by-letter browsing, an additional 5,000 news words and meanings, and will be Windows and Mac compatible.

"Information is available on our website at: http://www.oup.com/uk/catalogue/?ci=9780199563838

"Registered Users of the Version 1.0d Mac software such as yourself will be entitled to purchase this software for £127.17 plus VAT and £3.00 postage. This price includes a 25% discount off the standard price of £169.57 plus VAT and postage. "

No idea about the upgrade path in the U.S. and elsewhere.
 
Does anyone know of a way to get my mac to spellcheck in OED "Oxford English" rather than the rather odd "British English"? It seems to think everything ending in -ize should be corrected to -ise amongst other irritations. Being the boring old fart that I am, I prefer traditional spellings.
 
Fruiteatingbear said:
Does anyone know of a way to get my mac to spellcheck in OED "Oxford English" rather than the rather odd "British English"? It seems to think everything ending in -ize should be corrected to -ise amongst other irritations. Being the boring old fart that I am, I prefer traditional spellings.
Click to expand...

I asked about this several years ago, and I didn't hear a definitive answer from anyone.

The alternative which I fell on is instead to use ‘Canadian English’. In the Canadian dictionary on OS X words are spelt -ize, -izer, -ization, etc., but the French spellings of Romance words (colour, manoeuvre, etc.) are retained.

Drag ‘Canadian English’ to the top of the list in System Preferences > Language and Text > Language (on Snow Leopard). Choose ‘Canadian English’ for Spelling in the ‘Text’ tab. Be aware that some applications—including, irritatingly, the iWork applications—have their own language/spelling settings. In Pages this can be adjusted on a per-document basis (in the Text section of the Inspector).

One funny side-effect of this is that occasionally websites establish your location based on your language settings rather than through the geolocation of your IP. This is especially true for Microsoft websites, where I am often redirected to Canadian sites. This has never been a serious problem for me, though.
 
Change spelling dictionary

You can set in terminal the following for you user:
defaults write -g NSPreferredSpellServerLanguage "en_GB"

Or system wide: sudo defaults write -g NSPreferredSpellServerLanguage "en_GB"

Additionally, you can set in the Dictionary app's preferences the pronunciation guide to "British English (IPA)" when selecting the "Dictionary".

Logout & in and your are good to go.
 
I've found I can download a Chambers English Dictionary for free trial.
It works perfectly. I shall purchase it at the end of the trial period.
Ann King
 
xUKHCx said:
This has really bugged me as well. I can not stand the need to put zeds or zees (z) everywhere.
Click to expand...

Oxford English Dictionary Spellings... To make real, to give reality to (something merely imagined, planned, etc.); to convert into real existence or fact; †to show the reality or truth of (a statement) as Realize. "Realise" is a new misspelling of Realize.
 
Fruiteatingbear said:
Oxford English Dictionary Spellings... To make real, to give reality to (something merely imagined, planned, etc.); to convert into real existence or fact; †to show the reality or truth of (a statement) as Realize. "Realise" is a new misspelling of Realize.
Click to expand...

Actually, it depends. OUP strengthens the ~ize in modern publication making a difference for the origin of the words. Greek/ Latin origins, it argues, should maintain the ~ize spelling. However, other dictionaries as Cambridge, i.e., tend to support the modern usage of ~ise. Nevertheless, one can't generalise about since many Latin based words were introduced during the "French" period into the English language giving them the ~ise form as origin, i.e. realisé, or so one would think. It is true that American English mistakingly ~ize-ed a lot of vocabulary to a point where it shouldn't, i.e. analyse, but it seems that recently the same is happening to the UK English to differentiate itself victimising original ~ize vocabulary.
 
Ann King said:
Has anyone out there managed to get BRITISH ENGLISH dictionary on Mac? Ann
Click to expand...

Old thread, but yes, go to System Preferences -> Language & Text -> Edit List (and make sure British English is selected).

From there you can go to the Dictionary preferences and drag British English up the top.
 
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