Dikt Help

If someone could write the handbook based on these notes, that would be great.

Defining and Matching

There are two ways of looking up words, define and match. Define looks for the exact match, and Match looks for matches with the selected strategy. You can select the matching strategy form the drop-down list on the Toolbar. Matching strategies depend on the dictionary server, and every server has a description of available strategies.

Searching

Every server offers a different set of databases. You can select databases to search from the list of dictionaries in the Sidebar. If you don't select any database, Dikt will use the default search, which is one of two special databases, first match or all databases. Searching for the first match retrieves the first match only, and searching all databases retrieves all available matches.

Suggestions

Dikt can retrieve suggestions when no matches are found. So when you mistype a word, it will suggest possible corrections.

Looking up selected text

When the yank selections option is set, Dikt will look up the text you select in your desktop applications. There are two levels of selections that can be set up separately, from within the dictionary, and from other desktop applications.

Length of selections

You can limit the length of selections that Dikt considers, so that you don't send over the network some long text you selected during editing. Any selection longer than maximum length is ignored. You can also set a warning limit, and Dikt will ask you to confirm that you want to look up the selection.

There is also a limit for minimum length for selections, which is set to 2 by default, since it is easy to accidentally select one character when clicking on a link. It is still possible to select one letter words by extending the selection to include the space before or after the character.

Dict servers

Dikt remembers servers you visited, and databases and strategies you selected. You can change databases and matching strategy at any time. You can also switch to a different server at any time. You can change the server by selecting another server from the list of hosts, or by entering a Dict URL into the Query/Location bar.