With the advent of Internet, the knowledge and language barriers are getting removed. Knowledge is available at the click of mouse. If you don’t understand a particular word or expression, simply search its meaning on Internet. Some desktop applications like Microsoft Word also offer dictionary support. Moreover, Internet allows you to translate a document from one language to another. And, the support for translation is increasingly being provided to more and more number of languages. The other day, Google extended translation support to 345 languages into which a document from any of the supported 33 languages could be translated. Now, you’ve a combined Dictionary and Translation utility that supports live online dictionary and online translation using Google translation, both features in one tool. Moreover, this utility can help you find meaning of any word or expression or translate any paragraph(s) from within any programs on your computer including your desktop software such as Microsoft Word and also from within any browser or email software. This utility is Dictionary.Net.
Dictionary.Net is absolutely free. It is a light-weight software with the download size of only about 79 KB, and it uses Microsoft .Net 2.0 Framework to run. This framework is auto-installed in Windows 7 and Windows Vista, and is generally installed on most of Windows XP machines also (which is generally through other programs installed on your computer which use this framework). Dictionary.Net software is a portable software and you won’t need any installation. Just copy it to any folder (or even on a USB drive) and run it from there.
While Dictionary.Net can extend dictionary and translation support to any other software on your computer, it pulls live data from Internet. So, what you get is the latest definitions and translation using the updated features on the Internet. As mentioned already, it uses Google translation engine. You can use this software for finding definitions of words or expression, and for translations from one language to another, from within this software itself; or otherwise, definitions and translations functionalities can be accessed directly from within any other software on your computer including browsers. At the time of writing these lines, it supports translations from/to 59 languages. Let’s have a look at its features.
Dictionary functionality:
When you run Dictionary.Net utility, it runs in the form of a small window with a very simple interface. Type any word or expression in its search box, and it starts auto-completing those words in real-time much like Google Search. When you complete typing the word or expression, simply hit Enter to view the definition thereof. For example, see the following image, which displays the (partial) results of dictionary meaning and web definitions of “encryption”:
The program shows the dictionary meanings of the word “encryption” as also its web definitions from various websites on the Internet including that from Wikipedia.
If you want to translate this word or expression in another language or want to view the definition in such other language, simply right-click in the program window and from the popup menu select Languages option. Alternatively, directly click on the Languages button at the top-left corner of the window. You’ll get a list of all the supported languages. Under each language, you’ll get another list of languages into which text can be supported. For example, for the purposes of this illustration, I selected English -> Hindi combination; accordingly, the program displays the definition of “encryption” in Hindi language (see image below):
Please note that you can access the dictionary feature of this program also from any other software on your computer by selecting the word or expression and using its hotkey combination (default hotkey: Alt + Z). I’ll demonstrate this feature in the Translation functionality being described below.
Translation functionality:
I’ll demonstrate the translation functionality of Dictionary.Net program from some other software on the computer. I’ve chosen Microsoft Word for this purpose. Okay. I’ll translate a few lines of this document itself to German language. For translation, start Microsoft Word (or any other desktop program, including any browser). Open the document. Select (i.e., highlight) the text, which you want to translate, using mouse/keyboard. Now press Alt + Z keys which is the hotkey combination for invoking Dictionary.Net program. The program will now start. If your English -> German language combination is not selected already (of course, you can also choose any other language combination for translation), then click on Languages button at the top-left corner of this program and then select From and To language combination (as explained earlier in dictionary functionality). See, how the selected text from this document in Microsoft Word has been translated in the Dictionary.Net program window to German language:
As mentioned already, at the time of writing these lines, you can translate text from / to 59 languages directly from within any software on your computer. Or alternatively, you can translate the text directly within Dictionary.Net program itself.
Conclusion:
Dictionary.Net is thus a small program but it offers useful functionality in the form of dictionary and translation support to all software on your computer using the Internet. So, you get the best of both the worlds; your desktop applications + Internet functionality in the form of dictionary and translation of any text. And, this program is absolutely free.
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