About this Forum

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Lexicon-Forum.com is an on-line community intended for every dictionary user, lexicographer, and publisher.

Dictionaries are essential for language learners. It is especially true in the world of learning English. English learners are, in a way, the luckiest group in contrast to those who learn other languages. I myself have benefited greatly from the wide variety of English dictionaries. Traditional lexicographic theories and practice have done great favor to the making of current paper version dictionaries.

In recent years, computer technology is playing a more and more important role throughout the whole process of making dictionaries. Paradoxically, the inconvenient user interface in many CD-ROM versions of the celebrated ones has turned users away. Even worse, some users, including me, fed back problems to publishers without receiving positive response.

Many of current CD-ROM dictionaries released to end users are nothing more than a beta version under software industry criteria. It is not unusual to see the drawbacks discarded in the newly released edition of a product surfaced in another new version of peer product. We may well assume that the designers of CD-ROM dictionaries have lost their sense of what a good user interface should look like. History repeats itself. This is the reason why I built this forum. I have the very sincere hope that experienced users come here to share their thoughts and comments. The golden rules for a perfect user interface, if it does exist, will gradually become clear.