Spotlight dictionary is now american-chinese

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Level 1

15 points

Spotlight dictionary is now american-chinese

I have just updated Mavericks to El Capitan. I am on a MacBook Pro (13-inch, Mid 2012) with a danish keyboard, and languages set to en_GB, then da_DK, then fr_FR. In Dictionary.app those languages and de_DE are selected.

I have looked in Language & Region, and nothing has changed. I tried the solution from Spotlight Characters: Apps display in Kanji or Chinese , but if I try to add or remove a language in Language & Region, System Preferences crashes.

Does anybody have an explanation and a solution?

MacBook Pro, OS X Mavericks (10.9)

Posted on Oct 2, 2015 11:51 AM

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Answer 1

RasmusMalver Author

Level 1

15 points

Oct 21, 2015 11:08 PM in response to RasmusMalver

After updating to 10.11.1 (15B42) the english results are now american, despite that dictionary being deselected within Dictionary.app. Everything else is now ... korean.

Spotlight results can no longer be sorted in a customised order, and the “definition” (dictionary) results are on the bottom.

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Answer 2

Nov 14, 2015 1:03 AM in response to RasmusMalver

I'm seeing the same thing. Very annoying.

Surprisingly little about this online. I've not yet been able to solve it.

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Answer 3

RasmusMalver Author

Level 1

15 points

Nov 14, 2015 1:33 AM in response to Johan Basberg

Weirdly, it's related input source-setting and language of operating system. If you change the language of the operating system to french, you can no longer do conversions in Spotlight (eg 1' = 30,48 cm). If you change the input source, the results are changed. But no combination provides results from the dictionaries you have selected.

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Answer 4

Dec 9, 2015 5:48 PM in response to RasmusMalver

I had this problem today and “apparently” dragging all the asian languages to the bottom of the list in Dictionary > Preferences did the trick: the english dictionary resumed to be selected by Spotlight.

Not sure how long it’ll last, but I’ll stay away from messing with the dictionaries as long as it works 😐

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Answer 5

RasmusMalver Author

Level 1

15 points

Dec 9, 2015 10:45 PM in response to Hugo Ferreira

Hugo Ferreira wrote:

I had this problem today and “apparently” dragging all the asian languages to the bottom of the list in Dictionary > Preferences did the trick: the english dictionary resumed to be selected by Spotlight.

😐

Alas this doesn't solve the problem: Apple chooses a different dictionary than you've added, and present the result in another order. Other proposed “solutions” are to delete all asian fonts, disable the “Apple Dictionary” or deleting the non-american dictionaries. So we can all be american. America, America, Apple.

Only one (1) dictionary selected: French. Apple still decides to provide american results. Now from the translating dictionary:

Apple USA! obviously USA! doesn't USA! care USA! about USA! the USA! 95 % USA! of the USA! world, that USA! do notUSA! liveUSA! inUSA. In Yosemite (which is inUSA!) we couldn't use their “new” tagging feature, and in El Capitan (which is inUSA!) we can't use the old search feature. If you write support, they ask you to call them. If you call them, they say they won't do anything about it.

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Answer 6

RaVbaker

Level 1

0 points

Dec 13, 2015 11:58 PM in response to RasmusMalver

What helps me was following this tip: Re: Spotlight search and dictionary app bug. But instead of moving to /Library/DisabledDictionaries I moved to ~/Library/DisabledDictionaries since I didn't had access to regular /Library/ folder on El Capitan

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Answer 7

RasmusMalver Author

Level 1

15 points

Dec 14, 2015 12:01 AM in response to RaVbaker

RaVbaker wrote:

What helps me was following this tip: Re: Spotlight search and dictionary app bug. But instead of moving to /Library/DisabledDictionaries I moved to ~/Library/DisabledDictionaries since I didn't had access to regular /Library/ folder on El Capitan

How many dictionaries did you move and which did you leave? Can you control the order of results from the ones you have left?

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Answer 8

RaVbaker

Level 1

0 points

Dec 14, 2015 1:17 AM in response to RasmusMalver

Since for me the issue was that it have been showing to me "Simplified Chinese" results I just removed that directory to the "DisabledDictionaries".

Regarding control over order it is still valid to rearrange dictionaries in Dictionary.app preferences. It still worked for me, except the Simplified Chinese.

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Answer 9

RasmusMalver Author

Level 1

15 points

Dec 14, 2015 2:12 AM in response to RaVbaker

RaVbaker wrote:

Regarding control over order it is still valid to rearrange dictionaries in Dictionary.app preferences. It still worked for me, except the Simplified Chinese.

What is your input source and which languages are there in Language & Region?

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Answer 10

Dec 14, 2015 2:39 AM in response to RasmusMalver

The relationship between Spotlight and Dictionary seems to be terrible and not only where "exotic" languages are concerned. Trying to get a definition of any word, I always end up with a Spanish translation. I've included the Dictionary Prefs in the screenshot. Yes, I have the Oxford Englis-Spanish dictionary as one of the selections, but why is it this that is (always) chosen by Spotlight, rather than the British English dictionary, which heads the list?

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Answer 11

Sep 7, 2016 12:03 AM in response to RasmusMalver

I know that this topic has been dormant for a while but I seem to have fixed this under Yosemite (10.11.6). Dictionary in Spotlight started giving all definitions in Korean in spite of the dictionary not even being selected under the active dictionaries. Rearranging the list did not fix the issue. What I did was to open the dictionary app then selected one of my installed translation dictionaries (specifically "German to English"). I looked up a word, got the correct translation. Then I tried spotlight (with dictionary still open) and searched a German word and it, again, gave me the correct translation. I then closed the dictionary app and searched for a standard English word ("Giraffe" in this case) and got the correct definition in English.

I don't know if this qualifies as a "fix" but it worked for me. Hope it helps somebody. 🙂

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