# Dictionary: English-Spanish as a default



## hly2004

Hi, everyone:


Every time before I ask a question, I would search with the function on top of the website. But sometimes when I fogot to set it to "english-definition", and since the default is "english-spanish". I have to search it again. Btw, it is a little annoying to click the scroll down list and carefully select 'english-definition".

I wonder if the default could be set to "english-definition"

Best wishes.


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## Jana337

I vote for Italian-English. 

***

Seriously: Unless Mike can invent a cookie that will be saved on your computer and remember your preference, it is not possible to please everyone. I'd say that the Spanish dictionary is the most popular one, hence it makes sense to have it on the first place. 

Did you know that you can easily toggle among dictionaries without typing the word again and using the drop-down menu when you make a mistake?

*table:*

* English definition |* in French |      in Italian
conjugator |     in context |     images *

Listen: *

US - UK

From the Diccionario Espasa Concise © 2000 Espasa Calpe:

*table* ['teɪb_ə_l] 
I _nombre_ 
*1* _(mueble)_ mesa
*to clear the table,* quitar la mesa
*to lay* _o_ *set the table,* poner la mesa 
*2* _(en un texto)_ tabla, cuadro 
*3*   clasificación: *we are last in the table,* somos los últimos


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## DearPrudence

Funny, we had the same remark with another forer@ ...
A cookie would be nice indeed because I don't use the Spanish-English very often I must say.
Sometimes when I'm lazy I type the French word in it as you have noted, Jana. The problem is that as this word doesn't exist in Spanish or English it leads me nowhere and in the end I have to make the great effort of switching to French-English  (yes I'm very lazy  )

That forer@ had also suggested that maybe there could be a code with colours grouping English-Spanish/Spanish-English dictionaries, French/English-English/French together, ... so that they are more easily found ...


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## Philippa

DearPrudence said:


> ...That forer@ had also suggested that maybe there could be a code with colours grouping English-Spanish/Spanish-English dictionaries, French/English-English/French together, ... so that they are more easily found ...


I've wondered about colour-coding the choices in the drop down menu too - particularly as once you've chosen something different to usual their order swaps around and so you can 'lose' your favourite ones.


hly2004 said:


> ...I wonder if the default could be set to "english-definition"


The default is 'english definition' if you're in the English only forum and it switches to English-French etc. in the appropriate forums, as far as is possible for the dictionaries that we have.
Saludos
Philippa


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## DearPrudence

Philippa said:


> The default is 'english definition' if you're in the English only forum and it switches to English-French etc. in the appropriate forums, as far as is possible for the dictionaries that we have.


True enough.
But personally 95% of the time I use the French-English dictionary (& it's the English-French dictionary that is used by default) so I always have to change the dictionary except maybe once every 2 months when it happens that I look up an English word 
But I know I shouldn't be that lazy


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## hly2004

Thank you for your replies. 

I notice it's indeed defaut to "English-definition" in English only forums. It's helpful indeed.


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## Philippa

DearPrudence said:


> True enough.
> But personally 95% of the time I use the French-English dictionary (& it's the English-French dictionary that is used by default) so I always have to change the dictionary except maybe once every 2 months when it happens that I look up an English word  But I know I shouldn't be that lazy


Hi!
I'm lazy too, very!!  And even though the dictionary is set to English-->Spanish I often type in a Spanish word and the dictionary automatically swaps to Spanish to English (this can occasionally cause problems when the same word exists in both langauges, but usually it works beautifully and it's nice and quick for the lazy! I bet French<-->English works the same! It does, although I had some weird results with bonjour and lapin (who'd have thought they were _English_ words too!!) before success with grenouille!! Does this help you to enjoy a lazier WR lifestyle or wasn't that the issue?
P


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## KaRiNe_Fr

We can  add a bookmark for our favorite dic and keep it open on another tab of our favorite browser. It's the way I use it.


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## DearPrudence

Philippa said:


> I bet French<-->English works the same! It does, although I had some weird results with bonjour and lapin (who'd have thought they were _English_ words too!!) before success with grenouille!! Does this help you to enjoy a lazier WR lifestyle or wasn't that the issue?
> P


Simple example but the word "chat" exists in both languages but doesn't mean the same thing at all so that in the end, I have to choose French-English otherwise it brings me completely somewhere else.



KaRiNe_Fr said:


> We can  add a bookmark for our favorite dic and keep it open on another tab of our favorite browser. It's the way I use it.


Yes I suppose one window more could not do much harm now that I've installed Mozilla & that I can open far more windows than before ... My father would be crazy, he hates that


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## roxcyn

If you have Firefox you can add your word reference searches to the search box, it is so nice to have that feature 

http://mycroft.mozdev.org/download.html?name=wordreference&submitform=Find+search+plugins


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## KaRiNe_Fr

roxcyn said:


> If you have Firefox you can add your word reference searches to the search box, it is so nice to have that feature
> 
> http://mycroft.mozdev.org/download.html?name=wordreference&submitform=Find+search+plugins


Oh yes, I almost forgot it. I rarely use it that way as I've other search engines (TLFi!) and have to change the value on the list-box as it's not my default choice.
But I agree it's a great feature.


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## mkellogg

OK, as a fellow lazy person, I've taken pity on you all.  

Please test the new functionality with the "Fixed Width" style.  (Choose "Fixed Width" in the menu at the bottom left of this page.)  If everything works as planned Tuesday or Wednesday, I'll put it on all the styles. \

The way this works: 
If you have the cookie, it shows your last search dictionary.  
If you don't have the cookie, it shows the default for the forum (or En>Es if you are not in a forum).

Edit: Let me make this clear.  With the new method, if you search in the French-English dictionary, it will always say French-English even if you are in the Italian forum.


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## Jana337

Excuse-moi, how do I get rid of French-English?

Edit: Ah, got it, work in progress.


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## DearPrudence

Yippie! That is magic: French-English dictionary and nothing to do!
But on the other hand, the small width is scary indeed  
If it does work with a normal width, *thank you so much, merci, danke, gracias, grazie*, Mike, that's great


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## mkellogg

You might learn to like the narrow width, too. They say it is easier on the eyes than scanning back and forth.  That's why newspapers have such narrow columns...


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## Jana337

mkellogg said:


> You might learn to like the narrow width, too. They say it is easier on the eyes than scanning back and forth.  That's why newspapers have such narrow columns...




Fixed width helps me keep my windows better organized. And I indeed read faster.


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## DearPrudence

mkellogg said:


> They say it is easier on the eyes than scanning back and forth.  That's why newspapers have such narrow columns...


Boo  It is so strange!
Who said that?
But newspapers have several columns next to each other so the paper is not one mile long  and you have everything under your eyes.
OK, even more difficult to read the cultural forum with its very very long answers where it's quite convenient to see the whole post at a glance and not to go up & down ("they" prefer to scan up & down then? Strange ...  )
(I know, I'm such a bore  )


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