Author Topic: Mobysaurus Thesaurus v1.0 Released (Read 46632 times)

Wordzilla · « **on:** August 16, 2006, 04:41 AM »

Mobysaurus Thesaurus is an offline, free English thesaurus software based on Moby Thesaurus II

It's different from other thesaurus tools in several ways:

Comprehensiveness - database encompasses 30,260 roots and over 2.5 million synonyms
Wildcard word search
Look up history and bookmark your favorite words and phrases
Integrates various online linguistic search engines
Suggest-as-you-type
Instantly finds related/synonyms roots
Full-text print and copy to clipboard

Release Notes

Homepage https://www.donationcoder.com/Software/Other/mobysaurus
Version 1.0
Date 16 August 2006
Download Size 4.81MB
License Donationware (Freeware)
Mobysaurus Thesaurus fully complies with the software licensing policy on DonationCoder.com

System Requirements

Microsoft's .NET Framework Version 2.0

Supported operating systems:
Windows 98/ME/2000/NT/XP/2003/Vista

Special thanks to Mouser for offering me so much support and guidance!

- Anderson

mouser · « **Reply #1 on:** August 16, 2006, 04:50 AM »

One of the coolest things about this is the hierarchical tree of synonym roots so that you can go exploring. It's not obvious but you can double click on words in the root tree to go deeper and deeper.

Hard to describe in words. maybe josh can make a screencast. definitely has to be tried to experience it. And I love the new streamlined user interface

NeilS · « **Reply #2 on:** August 16, 2006, 01:23 PM »

The download link on the moby page gives me a "not found" error.

Looks great though. Looking forward to trying it out.

Wordzilla · « **Reply #3 on:** August 16, 2006, 01:53 PM »

The download link on the moby page gives me a "not found" error.

Looks great though. Looking forward to trying it out.
-NeilS (August 16, 2006, 01:23 PM)

Thanks Neils, and sorry for that trouble.

We just tweaked a bit (like wording) in the AboutBox to make it look same as other DCware.

Already uploaded, and the download link works now.

- Anderson

Josh · « **Reply #4 on:** August 16, 2006, 03:38 PM »

Perhaps a way to link to dictionary.com (so you can look up a word) while highlighting a word? Would that be possible for the future?

KenR · « **Reply #5 on:** August 16, 2006, 03:45 PM »

Perhaps a way to link to dictionary.com (so you can look up a word) while highlighting a word? Would that be possible for the future?
-Josh (August 16, 2006, 03:38 PM)

Great idea Josh! I know he had one in previous versions and removed - I think due to space issues. But on line linking would circumvent that issue.
Ken

GradyWard · « **Reply #6 on:** August 23, 2006, 11:59 AM »

A few days ago I couldn't recall the term used by Neal Stephenson in his The Diamond Age, or A Young Lady's Illustrated Primer for Mr John Percival Hackworth's custom-built nanotech programming.

I looked in several on-line Thesauri including Roget's Interactive and Merriam-Webster's. Nothing. Used Mobysaurus and bang! "Bespoke," a gentleman's word for a gentleman's technology.

Simple and useful. Great job, Anderson.

mouser · « **Reply #7 on:** August 23, 2006, 12:47 PM »

Wow, what a treat to have Grady post here

For those who don't know, Grady quite a character, and is the person who compiled the Moby Thesaurus which is the actual data that Mobysaurus uses(!), as well as dictionaries you can learn about below.

See

Really an honor to have a post from Grady, and Anderson should feel very proud.

Wordzilla · « **Reply #8 on:** August 24, 2006, 01:41 AM »

A few days ago I couldn't recall the term used by Neal Stephenson in his The Diamond Age, or A Young Lady's Illustrated Primer for Mr John Percival Hackworth's custom-built nanotech programming.

I looked in several on-line Thesauri including Roget's Interactive and Merriam-Webster's. Nothing. Used Mobysaurus and bang! "Bespoke," a gentleman's word for a gentleman's technology.

Simple and useful. Great job, Anderson.
-GradyWard (August 23, 2006, 11:59 AM)

What an honor (and surprise!) to have you here, Grady! I don't think we can thank you enough for publishing such an awesome thesaurus.

It's also a huge encouragement for me to work harder on this thesaurus so as to benefit more people.

Any plan for Moby III?

- Anderson

GradyWard · « **Reply #9 on:** August 24, 2006, 11:43 AM »

You ask about a Moby Thesaurus III...

Back in the day, I did most of the work on a Macintosh IIfx (68020 processor at 40 MHz, 8 MB RAM, 80 MB hard drive; even my 60% off employee discount the machine cost about $3,000) Most of my custom software to perform set operations on large (for the day) word data sets was written in C using the Macintosh Programmer's Workshop shell while enjoying the view from Pacific Grove, California and taking care of my two young boys. Since this was the early 90's, the Internet was pretty much limited to universities and larger companies; individuals had to settle for bulletin board systems that were rarely linked to one another.

Now of course we have the WWW and companies such as Google who have billions of dollars and immense server farms ready to do this kind of research:

http://googleresearc...e-belong-to-you.html

To lobby for a particular data set, you might contact Peter Norvig: "Dr Peter Norvig has been at Google Inc since 2001 as the Director of Machine Learning, Search Quality, and Research." pnorvig (at) google.com at Google and -- first of all thank him for the above research that has already been donated to the public domain -- and ask him to publish fresh sets of raw language data to the public domain. I would be happy to contract with him to produce this work, if I could use Google resources to assist me.

I spoke with Peter a few years ago when he was using Moby data to construct "the world's longest anagram." I believe he shares a mission to better the resources available to all developers, especially the individual contributor from whom all innovation originates.

My model was to originally license the data to institutions such as MIT, NSA, Getty, Lotus, Apple... and once they had paid for my time in creating the datasets, I put the entire work into the public domain. This I did. I preferred the public domain rather than a FSF license because I really do not want not to impose any limits upon re-use.

If a person wants to profit from re-use of the Moby data, that is perfectly fine by me. My goal was to give developers a "leg up," not to impose some idiosyncratic view about capitalism or freedom. The existence of new works predicated upon Moby makes us all more free to think, to express ourselves, and by subsequent lucid dreaming, to work toward a civilization. My personal thanks comes from enjoying the works by Anderson and others which in turn enrich my life and the lives of others who like to use English. Maybe it will make a crucial difference to someone in expressing a significant idea and in turn cure malaria, measles, HIV/AIDs, or a political conjecture that will save a hundred million lives.

So the shorter answer is that I am not planning personally to release a new data set, but I hope that years of tedious work can be used to bully a proportionate similar contribution by a company such as Google.

Thank you, Anderson, for Mobysaurus.

Grady

cemole · « **Reply #10 on:** September 04, 2006, 09:37 PM »

I have been using WordWeb and I really wanted to give this software a try after seeing its screenshots in Donationcoder website. I was successful after several attempts of installing Mobysaurus (dot net problem unfortunately). I'm very impressed and want to commend/thank you for your time/efforts. I would like to make several suggestions and observations (in no particular order):

1. Minimize the program to tray instead of taskbar or maybe install a tray icon to keep the program in the background. Close to tray when minimized and exited.

2. Retain history after Mobysaurus is closed. I know you can add words etc. to your favorites but it seems like that's what you wanted to have when you included a command to erase the search history. At least this could be an option to save history across sessions.

3. Help us improve link does not work in program.

4. Updating gives the following error: Error Loading/Verifying Update Configuration from Server (Check your Internet connection or contact your Administrator).
I don't think there is a problem in my connection. Maybe an update server is not available?

5. One feature that is very useful in WordWeb is that it recognizes copied and/or highlighted items from programs.

Thank you again.

mouser · « **Reply #11 on:** September 04, 2006, 09:50 PM »

Great suggestions cemole -
I think we all need to make an effort to figure out ways to take Mobysaurus to the next level of polish and features. I know Anderson is very interested in making it as good as it can be, and the thing he probably needs most of all now are suggestions and testers.

Retain history is important to me too, as would be recognizing words on the clipboard when resumed from tray. WordWeb is a great program to study in terms of a nice efficient interface.

I'd love to see a dictionary module added.

cemole · « **Reply #12 on:** September 04, 2006, 10:22 PM »

Thanks mouser. I'm no programmer but I'll try to make suggestions and share my experiences.

I agree that a dictionary would be great. But probably this would make the program very large due to the database of word descriptions. I guess the question then becomes about the purpose of the program. Now, I see it more as a thesaurus then a full-fledged dictionary with antonyms/synonyms/phonetics etc.

I tried the "Add to Favorites" option and realized that not just the word that I'm interested is saved but all the other options as well. For example, with the word "use" the following are also saved "ill use" and "use up" which I am not particularly interested.

The up and down arrows seem to be navigating the history instead of going up and down on the word list (right panel). So, the only option to navigate the word list is through the mouse which is a bit counter-intuitive.

Cavalcader · « **Reply #13 on:** September 08, 2006, 02:50 PM »

I'm very impressed with the database and the UI. Very nicely done, to both Grady and Anderson.

One small bit of feedback after first use: the update applet needs to be a little more patient. Once I acknowledged various security dialogs from my firewall, the app had already given up with a connection error dialog. Took me three tries to get it to work, although of course now that my system recognizes it as an app having Internet permissions it works flawlessly.

Cavalcader · « **Reply #14 on:** September 08, 2006, 02:52 PM »

Hey, here's one: what about a way to call WordWeb for definitions, rather than reinventing the wheel? Wouldn't that be slick? WordWeb's already a very polished app with a good selection of definitions, supplemented by online search capabilities, and has a free version.

Wordzilla · « **Reply #15 on:** September 08, 2006, 11:03 PM »

I have been using WordWeb and I really wanted to give this software a try after seeing its screenshots in Donationcoder website. I was successful after several attempts of installing Mobysaurus (dot net problem unfortunately). I'm very impressed and want to commend/thank you for your time/efforts. I would like to make several suggestions and observations (in no particular order):

1. Minimize the program to tray instead of taskbar or maybe install a tray icon to keep the program in the background. Close to tray when minimized and exited.

2. Retain history after Mobysaurus is closed. I know you can add words etc. to your favorites but it seems like that's what you wanted to have when you included a command to erase the search history. At least this could be an option to save history across sessions.

3. Help us improve link does not work in program.

4. Updating gives the following error: Error Loading/Verifying Update Configuration from Server (Check your Internet connection or contact your Administrator).
I don't think there is a problem in my connection. Maybe an update server is not available?

5. One feature that is very useful in WordWeb is that it recognizes copied and/or highlighted items from programs.

Thank you again.

-cemole (September 04, 2006, 09:37 PM)

Thanks cemole!

I have updated Moby to version 1.0.1, most changes were based on your suggestions.

1. Minimize the program to tray instead of taskbar or maybe install a tray icon to keep the program in the background. Close to tray when minimized and exited.

Implemented. There's a "Minimize to Tray" option in "Tools" menu for users to decide whether they want to keep the program in the background or close it instantly on click.

2. Retain history after Mobysaurus is closed. I know you can add words etc. to your favorites but it seems like that's what you wanted to have when you included a command to erase the search history. At least this could be an option to save history across sessions.

I like the idea but not yet sure about this, because I don't know if most users would like to keep their search history across sessions esp. after they have the "minimize to tray" option. I'll think more about it.

3. Help us improve link does not work in program.

Thanks, I think there was a glitch with the link. Now in v1.0.1, "help us improve" is replaced by a link to the moby discussion forum (still under construction) in the hope that it will help improve user experience more than just a feedback form.

4. Updating gives the following error: Error Loading/Verifying Update Configuration from Server (Check your Internet connection or contact your Administrator).

I didn't test the updater with different firewalls (I disabled mine long ago), my own fault.

v1.0.1 is not packed with the updater since I discovered it ran into troubles with firewalls and also due to the relative small size of the installer, I wonder if we really need an online updater option.

Anyway, it's of course possible to re-include the updater in future release if ppl really want to have it.

5. One feature that is very useful in WordWeb is that it recognizes copied and/or highlighted items from programs.

It would certainly offer more convenience if we could let Moby auto recognize highlighted words in other programs.
Not sure how to code this function right now, I did some google search and it looked to me that you have buy very expensive on-screen text capture dll to do this. I'm going to discuss this with Mouser and other site developers.

Thanks again cemole.

Wordzilla · « **Reply #16 on:** September 08, 2006, 11:14 PM »

The up and down arrows seem to be navigating the history instead of going up and down on the word list (right panel). So, the only option to navigate the word list is through the mouse which is a bit counter-intuitive.
-cemole (September 04, 2006, 10:22 PM)

Ah.. what an oversight! I forgot to code that bit in v1.0.

Fixed in v1.0.1. And also in the case of multiple results returned, the app auto-navigates to the nearest based on your query.

For example, search "good", v1.0 by default highlights "for good" since it's the first list item (A-Z alphabetically sorted), however v1.0.1 highlights "good" so you won't have to navigate up and down to get "good" which is the one you are after originally.

cemole · « **Reply #17 on:** September 10, 2006, 12:59 AM »

Thank you both mouser and Mobysaurus for the quick response. I appreciate your efforts in implementing suggestions. I have downloaded and installed the updated version. So far so good.

I have a suggestion for updating. Program could check at the beginning of a session (when the program first starts-up) to see if the user is online and if so, make a check to see whether there is an update or not. Then the user could be notified of this update and maybe linked to the updater site. This could be a option: check for an update (it would follow the same routine as initial start-up), do an automatic update at the beginning of each session or disable updating.

Have a great rest of the weekend.

cemole · « **Reply #18 on:** September 10, 2006, 04:01 PM »

2. Retain history after Mobysaurus is closed. I know you can add words etc. to your favorites but it seems like that's what you wanted to have when you included a command to erase the search history. At least this could be an option to save history across sessions.

I like the idea but not yet sure about this, because I don't know if most users would like to keep their search history across sessions esp. after they have the "minimize to tray" option. I'll think more about it.
-Mobysaurus (September 08, 2006, 11:03 PM)

I don't really understand what you mean by your association of "minimize to tray" and "saving search history across sessions". I was thinking in the lines of keeping saved searches even after exiting the program and the ability to have a quick look at them without having to do another search.

5. One feature that is very useful in WordWeb is that it recognizes copied and/or highlighted items from programs.

It would certainly offer more convenience if we could let Moby auto recognize highlighted words in other programs.
Not sure how to code this function right now, I did some google search and it looked to me that you have buy very expensive on-screen text capture dll to do this. I'm going to discuss this with Mouser and other site developers.
-Mobysaurus (September 08, 2006, 11:03 PM)

I don't think Moby T needs to be capturing every highlighted item in every program, only those used for writing (text editors, Word, Writer) and maybe the first item in clipboard.

Thank you.

Wordzilla · « **Reply #19 on:** September 17, 2006, 04:11 AM »

Hey, here's one: what about a way to call WordWeb for definitions, rather than reinventing the wheel? Wouldn't that be slick? WordWeb's already a very polished app with a good selection of definitions, supplemented by online search capabilities, and has a free version.
-Cavalcader (September 08, 2006, 02:52 PM)

What a witty idea, Cavalcader! I didn't even think of it b4 and I'm now in love with this feature.

Thank you!!

p.s. implemented in v1.0.20

- Anderson

Wordzilla · « **Reply #20 on:** September 17, 2006, 04:26 AM »

Thank you both mouser and Mobysaurus for the quick response. I appreciate your efforts in implementing suggestions. I have downloaded and installed the updated version. So far so good.

I have a suggestion for updating. Program could check at the beginning of a session (when the program first starts-up) to see if the user is online and if so, make a check to see whether there is an update or not. Then the user could be notified of this update and maybe linked to the updater site. This could be a option: check for an update (it would follow the same routine as initial start-up), do an automatic update at the beginning of each session or disable updating.

Have a great rest of the weekend.

-cemole (September 10, 2006, 12:59 AM)

The current (v1.0.20) update checker works in this way:

1. If you are using Moby for the first time, it asks you whether or not to enable the Auto-check for Updates feature (defaulted "No" in v1.0.20 since I thoguht it'd be a better practice than "Yes").

2. The user can enable/disble the Auto-check features anytime by going to "Tools -> Options"

3. If this feature is enabled, the program connects to internet and download from mobysaurus.com a 6-byte text file (here http://mobysaurus.co...thesaurus/update.msu), comparing with the local installation to determine if a newer version is available.

This happens when no user search-related action on the program is detected in 120 seconds (auto idle-state detection)

4. You can also manually check for updates by clicking "Help -> Check for Updates Now"

What do you think?

- Anderson

Wordzilla · « **Reply #21 on:** September 17, 2006, 05:01 AM »

I don't really understand what you mean by your association of "minimize to tray" and "saving search history across sessions". I was thinking in the lines of keeping saved searches even after exiting the program and the ability to have a quick look at them without having to do another search.
-cemole (September 10, 2006, 04:01 PM)

Hah, I can't recall what I was thinking at that moment, looks ridiculous to me now. Sorry.

"saving search history across sessions" is implemented in v1.0.20 and is by default enabled in "Tools -> Options"

It saves most recent 100 searches, available both in dropdown and the History tab.

Thanks again for the idea!

- Anderson

Wordzilla · « **Reply #22 on:** September 17, 2006, 06:30 AM »

I don't think Moby T needs to be capturing every highlighted item in every program, only those used for writing (text editors, Word, Writer) and maybe the first item in clipboard.
-cemole (September 10, 2006, 04:01 PM)

Thanks, def we need such clipboard capture function, would be very handy for ppl who write a lot coz they don't want to switch windows everytime they need to find synonyms, just imagine working on a big prose/essay in MS Word or drafting a post on the DC forum.

I thought about this last week and here's my proposal:

1. Show MSN-style Pop-up in the tray area

2. Semi-Transparent Docking/floating windows or something like an auto-hide sidebar

So everytime the Moby applet senses a text change in clipboard. it grasps the first item, looks it up, and displays synonyms in the pop-up/window/sidebar.

Cavalcader · « **Reply #23 on:** September 17, 2006, 02:25 PM »

What a witty idea, Cavalcader! I didn't even think of it b4 and I'm now in love with this feature.

Thank you sir! Sounds like you've added some great ideas as well. One thought about the clipboard capture, though: I've already got a program that monitors the clips (ArsClip 2.8.7) and they might clash. Also, as one that uses the clipboard a lot, I would strongly recommend making the monitoring optional. Still, since Mobysaurus Thesaurus will only be running here when it's in direct use (for the most part) it might be a handy option.