What's your favorite dictionary (the one with the words)?

Question

I am taking a writing class, and my professor spent 10 plus minutes extolling the virtues of a good bound dictionary. He named quite a few user interface features that satisfied his requirements more completely in a book. However, I don't desire to limit this question to the bound copy.

He went on to dismiss many online editions due to the editorial decisions of the free dictionaries online. He listed missing etymologies, shorter definitions, less examples and fewer esoteric definitions.

Regardless, writing often is listed on job descriptions as being very important, and we all know if there is any documentation, it would be nice if it were written well. Further presuming a dictionary is a good tool to facilitate ones writing; what resource(s) do you draw upon to figure out what that word means?

Answer 1

The Oxford Dictionary is the last word in dictionaries. There is an online version as well.

Answer 2

Werriam Webster is rather good, concise and usually friendly

Rhyme Zone also have a definition option which is usually pretty good.

I found myself repeatedly disappointed by Wiktionary

Answer 3

Try the Oxford Consise English dictionary. It is a good comprimise between not having enough content and being too much. The OED makes a reasonable attempt to handle British/American/Canadian/Australian/New Zealand variations.

In Australia I would recommend the Macquarie dictionary.

Answer 4

Urbandictionary definitely.

Answer 5

The only one I really ever need is the Webster's Bad Spellers' Dictionary. These days I only ever even need it when I've mangled the spelling so badly that the web-form spell checker can't figure it out (or I'm using some esoteric word it doesn't know).

I suppose you might need a proper dictionary if your vocabulary is a bit weak compared to your reading material. For writing though, I'd disagree.

Why do I dare disagree with your professor? Well, because dictionary definitions may be OK for giving you an idea of a word's meaning, but they almost always miss quite a bit of nuance. If you haven't actually gotten familiar with a word in the wild, so to speak, then you won't truly grok it enough to use it yourself properly. It is really annoying to come across some writing where a word is horribly misapplied due to someone (perhaps your own professor) roboticly using it where it some possible interpretation of a dictionary definition implied it might be appropriate. You end up looking like a clueless poser.

Answer 6

Regardless, writing often is listed on job descriptions as being very important, and we all know if there is any documentation, it would be nice if it were written well.

If you're writing documentation, you should be using simple language:

• Simpler language is easier for any reader (perhaps the technical subject matter is already challenging: don't add to that difficulty, using ten dollar words and convoluted sentences).

• Some of your readers will have English as a second language: don't add to their troubles ... write as if for a 10-year-old, as far as possible.

Use technical words in documentation, but apart from that, simple language, using simple words. If you need check a word's etymology before you use it, then think of a simpler word.

In summary: for writing documentation, no dictionary (assuming that this is your native language, etc).

Answer 7

I own the OED but don't use it much except for very obscure words or for early example usages. It is really more of a lexicographer's dictionary than a writer's dictionary.

Whatever you get, you want the edition called unabridged. Don't get "collegiate". My current favorite unabridged is the American Heritage Dictionary, but I haven't shopped around in a few years.