We Review | The Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary
Written by: J.P.

It weighs fifteen pounds and found in every school
library in the USA.  The Merriam-Webster Unabridged
Dictionary.  An imposing tomb. Students would rather
guess a word than try to find it in the biggest
dictionary on American English.  It is available
on CD for both PC and Macintosh computers. There
are a few differences between the book and
the CD.

The CD version allows you to look up a word and
adds a few features.
Entry Word is...  The standard lookup feature.

Defining Text Contains ... A useful research
tool where you can find words that are linked by
definition.  Abkari, agist, boomage, and
"usual covenant" all use the word tax in the
definition.

Rhymes With ...  Good for young poets but not
accurate.  It does find passementerie as a
rhyme for entry but no rhyme for month
and chimney (or orange) but claims dias is a
rhyme of lice.

Forms a crossword of... This is cool.  You
type in the letters you know and put in question
marks for the rest. "L?xi???" will result in five
possibilities (including "lexicon").

Is a cryptogram of... Another handy search for
solving puzzles.  "Qubrwe" is a cryptogram of
winter, pyrone, abodes, etc. There is no way to
identify a solved letter in the puzzle.  This
limits the usefulness of the feature.

Is a jumble of ... This can be fun.  Type in
a word and it will find all the anagrams of
the word.  Unite can become untie and intue.

Homophones are ...  Not fully functional.
It can find row, rho, and roe but it cannot
find homophones for rose. (Rows, and Roes.)

There is more. Usage note contains...
Author Quoted is ... and more.  There is
even a browse feature.  (People do browse
dictionaries!  This might explain how some
people can use "fecund" in a sentence.)

It also comes with a template that can allow
the program to be called by Microsoft Word.
By itself, it can be a great tool for
writing.  For looking up a word, and for copying a word.  Some words are too
long to spell. Such as pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis,
which is the longest word in the dictionary.

There are a few things missing from the print
edition.  Word lists are great just for discovering
that "overnumerousness" is a word.  You
would look up over- and see a list of words that
exist without the meaning listed.  The meanings
are (usually) obvious.  Those lists are gone.

This may be the way of the future. Notebook computers
with the CD installed are lighter than the actual
dictionary.

The Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary
on CD is available bundled with the print edition.
Franklin Electronics sells Merriam-Webster Dictionary
on a hand-held device.