From: Gabriel Gerhardsson (mr.g@home.se)
Date: Tue Oct 22 2002 - 03:26:11 EDT
On Tue, 2002-10-22 at 04:05, Andrew Dunbar wrote:
> --- Gabriel Gerhardsson <mr.g@home.se> wrote: > On
> Mon, 2002-10-21 at 02:21, Andrew Dunbar wrote:
> > > --- phearbear <phearbear@home.se> wrote:
> > > I was just thinking about this too. Or something
> > > like it. How about showing a disabled/ghosted
> > > version of the icon when a dictionary exists but
> > > is not currently installed?
> >
> > Right now the list of available dictionaries is
> > downloaded from www.abisource.com when needed, so
> > that information isn't available to us before we do
> > that.
>
> That can't be right. The information for ispell used
> to be in ispell_checker.cpp and Dom recently moved it
> out into a separate XML file. This is all the infor-
> mation we need. I think it's much more useful to show
> an icon if a dicitonary *exists* rather than being
> available on some internet server. This is usually
> going to be the same for both anyway and we then don't
> have to make the broken assumption that everybody
> using AbiWord has a full-time internet connection.
I clearly see your point, and I thought the same way a while there. But
what made me suggest what I did was this:
The listed dictionaries in ispell_dictionary_list.xml does not guarantee
that we have a dictionary-file for all those entries.
* Now and then we may add entries in advance, before a dictionary is
made available.
* Many dictionaries is only available for little-endian.
> > When that list have been downloaded (during a
> > dictionary download) it's cached in the abi $HOME
> > directory, so then we're free to use it (of course,
> > it may not be totally accurate, not being the latest
> > version and all). A simple workaround would be a
> > menu-option somewhere "Download updated dictionary-
> > list".
>
> I'd recommend putting the focus on "supported" rather
> than "downloadable". Otherwise an icon alone isn't
> enough and is completely pointless for non-internet-
> connect AbiWord users.
My thought was that the "downloadable" dictionaries equals the
"supported". How do you define this?
I don't want to shut non-internet-users out. I was just thinking out
loud of how we currently can get the list of currently available
dictionaries. Granted, it's currently pretty much internet-only
material. So another solution, better suited for non-internet-users,
would be to ship the latest version of the abispell-list with AbiWord
releases. That way my solution above would work, and in case someone
wants an updated list, he can order AbiWord to download it (or it may be
done implicit during a dictionary download).
So, my main point is that the list that we currently ship in
ispell_dictionary_list.xml can contain more than the available
dictionaries, while abispell-list contains exactly the currently
available dictionaries.
That said, in this area I of course bow before your will whatever you
decide. I'm not a linguist nor a HCI expert :) I just wanted you to
understand my view.
Take care
/Gabriel
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