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Re: [lojban] Re: [bpfk] Technical, Help Request: What information *should* a Lojban dictionary system have?



Robin Lee Powell wrote:
I'll respond to the rest later, but just to be clear: I have no
particular aversion to that format as such *for a print dictionary*.
My issue is with storing the definitions that way internally to the
database.

Then, as I understand what you want, I agree with the other person who said this is an NLP problem.

In particular, I think we shouldn't try to reinvent the NLP wheel.

There are numerous AI systems out there with predicate based languages, which need and have engines that store and process the definitions of predicates. Most of those could serve as a model, but those like the CYC project, which were designed specifically to enable NLP, would seem especially likely.

Whether we can use our non-profit nature and our academic ties to perhaps get CYC or one of the other such projects to let us use (or possible modify) their tools for Lojban is something I don't have the expertise or the connections for. But there are academics in the Lojban community who might be able to help or suggest people to contact (Nick Nicolas being an obvious person to start with since I know he has considered the NLP aspects of Lojban, but I'm sure he is hardly the person in the community who has worked in that arena).

I'm not really sure you will ever come up with a way to automatedly turn whatever internal format you use into a publishable print-dictionary without any need for hand-editing, especially since jbovlaste and its ilk aren't trying to serve merely as a Lojban-English dictionary, but as a Lojban-everything dictionary.

In any case, designing the database strikes me as a project that needs serious research into how large-dictionary databases are designed. At one point, we sought a grant that would have been used for such research - the only grant (pre-)proposal that we've ever prepared. But that didn't get very far %^).

lojbab

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