Community Suggestion: show possible matches in dictionary from first letter
show possible matches in dictionary from first letter
Feature Upgrade · Articles & templates · Created by Careen Ligh
declined
What functionality is missing? What is unsatisfying with the current situation?
Currently, when searching for a word in the dictionary of the language template, possible matches only show up after entering three letters. This makes it impossible to search for words with only one or two letters. As many languages have such words, it makes the dictionary almost useless.How does this feature request address the current situation?
It would finally enable one to use the dictionary wihout limitations and search for any and all words of a language without having to switch to the edit interface and scroll around wildly to find a single word.note
I realise that i have submitted a similar request before which was declined for the reason that languages with too many words would result in too long loading times. My solution for this would be to limit the shown results to one hundred (or any other manageble number)The Team's Response
Thanks for the suggestion! We understand that this would be really useful for conlangers, but unfortunately this could cause the website to crash for very large lexicons. Given that many users of dictionaries use generators like VulgarLang, large lexicons are to be expected. Therefore, we can't currently implement this with the current architecture of the system.
Current score
34/300 Votes · +7104 points
Votes Cast
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+100
by oberoniron
on 2023-09-19 10:31 -
+100
by Dinq
on 2023-09-17 20:59 -
+300
by illumiinae
on 2023-09-15 19:14 -
+100
by james.a.b
on 2023-09-15 16:48 -
+1
by Masha Medov
on 2023-09-15 07:38 -
+100
by ShyriathFarstrider
on 2023-09-14 14:41 -
+300
by melzaz
on 2023-09-11 11:56 -
+300
by Jubliana
on 2023-09-09 20:42Just return the top 50 results and refine as you go like any basic search on any other platform.
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+300
by LoreParmenter
on 2023-09-08 22:38 -
+100
by namder88
on 2023-09-08 05:14 -
+1
by SebGreg732
on 2023-09-07 22:08 -
+1
by Buzzard
on 2023-09-05 01:46 -
+300
by Fiovara
on 2023-09-03 08:49 -
+300
by cedes
on 2023-09-03 03:01 -
+300
by Nimsy
on 2023-09-02 05:57 -
+100
by Kydra_Hunter
on 2023-09-01 19:06 -
+300
by olixfarwall
on 2023-09-01 18:53This is defiantly a much needed fix. I have already input many words into my dictionary - some of which function as prefix and suffix. Not having 1-2 letter searches really hinders the level of detail and comprehensibility of the language can have. "I am so confused as to how WA didnt see this as a problem. " (7/14 = 50% of this sentence would not be able to be translated with this issue)
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+1
by A Rambunctious Dwarf
on 2023-08-31 20:07 -
+300
by Observer of the Stars
on 2023-08-30 21:55 -
+100
by Willow H.R. Harper
on 2023-08-30 17:39 -
+100
by Kaleidechse
on 2023-08-30 16:55I've run into this problem frequently with prepositions, articles or pronouns. My approach so far is to list them separately in the article body, in an embedded table with searching enabled. Still, it's really annoying that I can't search for them in the dictionary.
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+100
by Tijmuhn
on 2023-08-30 15:27 -
+300
by A Fierce Ooze
on 2023-08-30 09:37I had no idea the language dictionary searches don't show matches with 1 or 2 letters. It's a feature I wanted to use in the future once I get around to it, but I was going to include root words, many of which have 2 letters and some have 1. So for the dictionary search feature to have any use for me, I guess I actually need your suggestion to be implemented, so I definitely support this. I like the other user's suggestion that when you type in 1 or 2 letters into the search, it could only show only short words until you type 3 letters to limit how long the loading times would become. That seems reasonable if it's possible to implement!
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+100
by Enoris.leinwand
on 2023-08-29 21:25 -
+300
by Ratha
on 2023-08-29 21:15 -
+300
by A Uncontrollable T-Rex
on 2023-08-29 20:58 -
+300
by hamilcarbarca
on 2023-08-29 15:32 -
+300
by ChalktheDM
on 2023-08-29 13:29 -
+100
by A Beloved Unicorn
on 2023-08-29 10:56 -
+300
by Zeer Gales
on 2023-08-29 09:10 -
+300
by Wordigirl
on 2023-08-29 08:52I don't use dictionaries as much, but this sounds like a perfectly logical idea. I'm also quite annoyed at the search functions elsewhere in the site including tagging when editing articles and the navigation bar when trying to locate them in the world. I know that improving these things could possibly increase lag, but I am rooting for some solutions that are more user-friendly. Hopefully the World Anvil team will be able to do it! <3
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+300
by amelianite
on 2023-08-29 04:49 -
+300
by Rilameth
on 2023-08-29 01:49 -
+300
by DMFW
on 2023-08-28 21:39Or another idea to trim down the number of items returned in the search might be to only return items with three or fewer letters in the full name when constructing lists from one and two letter prompts, then expand out as you reach three letters to the current selection behaviour. That would make short words very quick to select from short prompts. Could be an interesting technical challenge to deliver it, but purely from a functional perspective I'd like that behaviour.
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+300
by Careen Ligh
on 2023-08-28 19:22
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