FreeDict HOWTO – Introduction

Introduction

FreeDict is a project to develop and redistribute dictionaries under a free and open license for use by everone. The dictionaries are archived in a flexible XML format that allows for further use and development.

FreeDict also ensures that the dictionaries can be converted into a variety of formats, including the the dictd database format (cf. RFC 2229), that works with dictd (see http://www.dict.org) and other dictionary servers. At the same time we're trying to convert to more formats and to extend the usage of the dictionaries for other usage scenarios.
The content of the dictionaries is left up to individual developers. We ourselves can't speak every language on the planet and so rely on the contributing writers and users to produce high-quality, useful dictionaries. We can, however, try to ensure that the dictionaries are formatted and organised correctly, are as easy as practicable to produce and will work on free operating systems.

You are probably reading this HOWTO to get an idea of what is involved in producing a translation dictionary. The approach taken in this HOWTO is task oriented. We hope you can just jump to the point you are aiming at and continue forward.