Dictionary.app and IPA pronunciation

Question

Level 6

10,025 points

Dictionary.app and IPA pronunciation

Those of you familiar with IPA will know the U.S. pronunciation of "cat" is /kæt/. But, when set to display pronunciations in U.S. English (IPA), Dictionary.app shows it as /køt/. In fact, Dictionary.app displays ALL æ IPA characters as ø.

This was a bug in Tiger too, which was easily fixed with this Terminal command:
perl -pi -e 's/\303\270/\303\246/g; tr/\313\214\313\210/\313\210\313\214/'\ /Library/Dictionaries/New\ Oxford\ American\ Dictionary.dict/\ Contents/dict_body

The Leopard dictionary file is here:
/Library/Dictionaries/New Oxford American Dictionary.dictionary/Contents/Body.data

...but it is a binary instead of the XML format used in Tiger, so the fix no longer works.

Does anybody have any fixes, or shall I file a bug report?

eMac (1.25GHz USB 2.0), 768MB, Mac OS X (10.5.3)

Posted on Jun 21, 2008 8:51 PM

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Answer 1

Király Author

Level 6

10,025 points

Jun 21, 2008 10:26 PM in response to dechamp

Yes, I have US English selected. It displays all æ characters as ø. The British English displays them as a, which does approximate the British pronunciation in some parts of the UK. But substituting ø for æ in the US English is just plain wrong. The word "hat" should be /hæt/, but instead it says /høt/, which sounds more like "hurt" than "hat."

Most native English speakers aren't familiar with IPA and so won't notice this. But anyone who has studied linguistics will be familiar with IPA, as well as anyone who has studied English as a second language.

I think I will file a bug report.

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Answer 2

dechamp

Level 4

3,495 points

Jun 21, 2008 10:12 PM in response to Király

Did you try going to the Dictionary preferences? There, you can click on the Dictionary line and chose the "US English (IPA)" or "British English (IPA) options.

Hope this helps.

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