Creating a custom dictionary

[Rambhutan]

I would like to create a custom dictionary for Word from novels of a particular time - in this case the Sherlock Holmes stories and Kim by Rudyard Kipling. The idea is to create something that could then be spell checked using the custom dictionary which would highlight any anachronistic words. How would I go about doing this using a text file of the novels from project gutenberg?

[The Rich Port]

I would like to create a custom dictionary for Word from novels of a particular time - in this case the Sherlock Holmes stories and Kim by Rudyard Kipling. The idea is to create something that could then be spell checked using the custom dictionary which would highlight any anachronistic words. How would I go about doing this using a text file of the novels from project gutenberg?

... Why would you want to do that?

[Rambhutan]

I would like to create a custom dictionary for Word from novels of a particular time - in this case the Sherlock Holmes stories and Kim by Rudyard Kipling. The idea is to create something that could then be spell checked using the custom dictionary which would highlight any anachronistic words. How would I go about doing this using a text file of the novels from project gutenberg?

... Why would you want to do that?

Because I am writing a novel set in that era and I want to make sure the language I use does not contain any words that would not have been in use at the time.

[The Rich Port]

... Why would you want to do that?

Because I am writing a novel set in that era and I want to make sure the language I use does not contain any words that would not have been in use at the time.

Oh. I thought it was for some weird obsession.

Honestly, it's not my area of expertise, so I don't think it's of any merit when I ask if it really matters. Maybe write it so that you INTENTIONALLY avoided using period vocabulary.

[The Tofu Islands]

I'm not sure of how Word handles dictionary files, but as far as collecting words goes, I'd suggest hunting around online for a now-public-domain dictionary of the relevant period. Searching Project Gutenberg for dictionaries yields quite a lot of hits, including this one from 1913. It seems to include particles, pronouns, conjugated forms of verbs, and such, so it should work on its own (it is liable to miss plural forms, however).

As for processing it and generating the dictionary file,

Code: Select all

ruby -ne 'print if /^[A-Z -]+\r?$/' dict.txt | uniq > words.txt

or something equivalent will generate a file containing every word in the dictionary (plus a few lines at the end that are copyright information). I'm not sure how to turn such a file into a Word dictionary, but it's a start. (If you can find a nice spot to upload it, I could throw you the 300KiB zip that it generates.)

Constructing one based on novel texts would be trickier — it would require writing something that scanned for words, and probably wouldn't be as complete.

[Rambhutan]

I'm not sure of how Word handles dictionary files, but as far as collecting words goes, I'd suggest hunting around online for a now-public-domain dictionary of the relevant period. Searching Project Gutenberg for dictionaries yields quite a lot of hits, including this one from 1913. It seems to include particles, pronouns, conjugated forms of verbs, and such, so it should work on its own (it is liable to miss plural forms, however).

As for processing it and generating the dictionary file,

Code: Select all

ruby -ne 'print if /^[A-Z -]+\r?$/' dict.txt | uniq > words.txt

or something equivalent will generate a file containing every word in the dictionary (plus a few lines at the end that are copyright information). I'm not sure how to turn such a file into a Word dictionary, but it's a start. (If you can find a nice spot to upload it, I could throw you the 300KiB zip that it generates.)

Constructing one based on novel texts would be trickier — it would require writing something that scanned for words, and probably wouldn't be as complete.

Thanks, it was easier when Word dictionaries were just a text file.