Dictionary API or Library [closed]

Answer 1

Ruby-WordNet sounds like it does what you're looking for:

Ruby-WordNet is a Ruby interface to the WordNet® Lexical Database. WordNet is an online lexical reference system whose design is inspired by current psycholinguistic theories of human lexical memory. English nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs are organized into synonym sets, each representing one underlying lexical concept. Different relations link the synonym sets.

Answer 2

there's also wrappers for dictionary.com's API (a few years old)

http://rubyforge.org/snippet/detail.php?type=snippet&id=53

http://rubyforge.org/snippet/detail.php?type=snippet&id=52

and wiktionary

http://eightpence.com/ninjawords-a-fast-online-dictionary-fast-like-a-ninja/

Answer 3

Wordnik.com has several word-info APIs, including a definitions API. More info is here: http://developer.wordnik.com/

[I work for Wordnik. We will have more APIs soon, let us know what you want!]

Answer 4

I discovered a webservice for this yesterday.

Go to the British Council homepage and double click on any word (that isn't already a hyperlink).

This should open a popup window with a Cambridge Dictionary definition in it. The API is relatively simple (and it is a public API, I checked it yesterday):

http://dictionary.cambridge.org/learnenglish/results.asp?searchword=SEARCH_PHRASE&dict=L

For reference, here's the code they use to launch this on double-click:

/* BC double-click pop-up dictionary */
var NS = (navigator.appName == "Netscape" || navigator.product == 'Gecko') ? 1 : 0;
if (NS) document.captureEvents(Event.DBLCLICK);
document.ondblclick = dict;
var dictvar;

function dict() {
    if (NS) {
        t = document.getSelection();
        pass_to_dictionary(t);
    } else {
        t = document.selection.createRange();
        if(document.selection.type == 'Text' && t.text != '') {
            document.selection.empty();
            pass_to_dictionary(t.text);
        }
    }
}

function pass_to_dictionary(text) {
    //alert(text);
    if (text > '') {
        window.open('http://dictionary.cambridge.org/learnenglish/results.asp?searchword='+text+ '&dict=L', 'dict_win', 'width=650,height=400,resizable=yes,scrollbars=yes');
    }
}