Talk:Wiki Language School

I mainly created an independant page because I want to link a lot of stuff to here, or else I would have just put it into the

This page may look shallow and, well, "scrappish" for the moment. I'm working on it.

Oh yes, and of course the tile is crappy, feel free to propose alternatives. What I had in mind is maybe more like a language assistant tool, or an advanced bilingual dictionary. Flammifer 19:05, 11 Oct 2004 (UTC)

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Let's take french for english-speakers as an example :

"bateau" :

noun (m) : boat.

adjective (slang) : simple, easy.

notice that you don't need a definition like "a vehicle for moving on water" or whatnot. If the translation's straightforward just put it. If not, add more information :

"ville" :

noun (f) : a city or a town - the distinction is not made in French.

This is probably better than something like a) city and b) town - the goal here is to teach, not to define formally !

But this is not only about a bilingual dictionary (or this page would be on Wiktionary) - it should also include grammar, idioms, notes on language use, sample phrases ...

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• Unh?? What do you think bilingual dictionaries are about, if not precisely about what you have just described? Good bilingual dictionaries include grammar notes, sample phrases and all that, because translation between two languages is seldom a matter of simple word-for-word substitution (a common misconception among people who haven't dealt much with foreign languages) and because foreign-language learners (very obviously) need grammar notes even more than native speakers; in fact, a rule of thumb to sort between good and poor bilingual dictionaries is to check how much of this kind of information (grammar notes, sample phrases, etc.) they include. On the other hand, actually, I think you'd be hard-pressed to find a single bilingual dictionary where they do define the words (in the "bateau n. A vehicle for moving on water" way you mention, as if it were a monolingual dictionary) instead of giving the translation(s). At least, I can't remember having seen any so far, and I'm a hopeless language geek with dozens of bilingual dictionaries at home. Uaxuctum 14:52, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Null Project

The proposed content already falls under several projects' mandates. --[[User:OldakQuill|Oldak Quill]] 00:16, 16 Jan 2005 (UTC)

• Yes, I can't see how this should be anything other than Wikibooks:Wikiversity. Zach 20:13, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)