Technology Medical Dictionary Plug-in for Mac OS X Leopard Dictionary.app

[tscottturner]

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The Dictionary.app application in Mac OS X Leopard allows for the use of plug-ins. Does anyone know if a medical dictionary plug-in for Dictionary.app currently exists or is being developed? If not, is anyone interested in helping put one together?

 

[technodude]

I'm not sure what you mean about a medical Dictionary plug-in. Are you referring to NaturallySpeaking? If so I've read a bit about this at [Edit: Link Removed] but again I'm not sure what you're referring to.

 

[tscottturner]

I'm not sure what you mean about a medical Dictionary plug-in. Are you referring to NaturallySpeaking? If so I've read a bit about this at [Edit: Link Removed] but again I'm not sure what you're referring to.

In Mac OS X Leopard, there is an application that comes with the OS called Dictionary.app that is actually quite useful and pretty easy to use.

As is, this dictionary application contains The New Oxford American Dictionary as a "plug-in" file (or reference library), and the application is capable of having additional dictionaries (or references) "plugged-in". For instance, there is a Japanese-English Dictionary and a group has recently put together a Chinese-English Dictionary. There is also a thesaurus available. My original question was whether or not anyone has thought about putting together a medical terminology dictionary (because the New Oxford simply doesn't cover a significant amount of medical terminology) or knew of one that was already available. In Leopard, with developer tools installed, you have the capability of putting together your own reference library. I figured with enough interested people, we should be able to cobble together something useful.

 

[ablau]

I've been thinking about doing exactly this for a while. Have you found any other people who are interested in pitching in?

Cheers,
Alex

 

[tscottturner]

I've been thinking about doing exactly this for a while. Have you found any other people who are interested in pitching in?

Cheers,
Alex

I've gotten a few PM's about it, but no one else has been interested in helping. Ideally it would be something that could be quickly adapted for the iPhone (upon release of the SDK) and expanded upon easily (say with basic drug dosing information/indications/contraindications or other info).

 

[ablau]

Exactly my thinking. I've got an iPhone as well and have been jonesing pretty bad for the SDK so we can get a version of ePocrates. And an iPhone medical dictionary would be an excellent corollary.

Why don't you drop me an email when you get a chance and we can talk about next steps: [email link removed].

cheers,
Alex

 

[jh1hotc]

If so please post a reply or message me, please.

 

[dasartis]

I don't know if this will help, but I ran across this blog post about adding other foreign languages to the dictionary app when I was looking for a medical dictionary.

http://davidtse916.wordpress.com/20...e-built-in-dictionary-application-in-leopard/

But I'd definitely be interested in trying it out if you can get it to work!

 

[adobetoby]

I have been searching High and low and not found a plugin, I would be willing to pitch in to make this happen. send me a message if this gets off the ground. I think this is an essential plug-in.

 

[avenable]

I have stedman's for windows... is there a way to transfer it to a mac w/o having to repurchase the product? Or maybe is there a way to take its dictionary files and put them into the built in dashboard dictionary?

Thanks

 

[tscottturner]

I have stedman's for windows... is there a way to transfer it to a mac w/o having to repurchase the product? Or maybe is there a way to take its dictionary files and put them into the built in dashboard dictionary?

Thanks

Not that I'm aware, but I haven't tried.

 

[Midazolamb]

.

 

[chad5871]

Hosford Medical Terms Dictionary
http://www.ptcentral.com/university/medterms_zip.html
Found while looking for a universal .dic file.
You can make this the custom dictionary for Microsoft Word (works in OS X).

I was looking through the list of words included in the dictionary and found this one: cockapoo. Is that really a medical term?

 

[AlbaSurf]

Has any headway been made on this? I'm interested in participating!

 

[lupine]

A friend of mine created a medical dictionary that works with Dictionary.app. I think he said it has more than 30,000 definitions in it.

To install: extract this zip file into the Library/Dictionaries folder in your home directory (you'll probably have to create this folder yourself). The open up Dictionary.app, go to the Preferences, and make sure Medical Dictionary is checked.

The only catch is that the sub-definitions don't work. If you want to find the definition of "anterior cerebral artery", you need to look up "artery" instead and scroll down.

http://www.mediafire.com/?iymyvuz22wt

 

[chronox]

sweet.. been looking all over for this!.

 

[Slevin]

Tried it... couldn't get it to work... just kept showing up as a folder with an extension didn't work as part of the dictionary

 

[lupine]

Tried it... couldn't get it to work... just kept showing up as a folder with an extension didn't work as part of the dictionary

That's what you want -- copy the folder named "Medical Dictionary.dictionary" into the folder "Home > Library > Dictionaries" (you may need to create the "Dictionaries" folder yourself). Start Dictionary.app, and it should appear in the list under Preferences.

 

[marooner]

the terms don't show the meaning... how to make this work?

 

[jfcarroll]

A friend of mine created a medical dictionary that works with Dictionary.app.
...
http://www.mediafire.com/?iymyvuz22wt

Lupine,

Wow, this is great! It worked as described, without a hitch! I'd like to get in touch with the original author. At the very least, I'd like to credit his or her work: this is a great dictionary. Will you please PM me any contact information you have for your friend that put this together?

Thank you,
jfcarroll

 

[peanutbutt3r]

the terms don't show the meaning... how to make this work?

I have this same problem - the words show up fine, but the definitions do not appear at all. Any solution to this? I am on Snow Leopard - perhaps this is why?

 

[shard]

I have this same problem - the words show up fine, but the definitions do not appear at all. Any solution to this? I am on Snow Leopard - perhaps this is why?

For anyone that finds this page... I had this same problem. I figured out a hack to get it working again (at least temporarily). Go into the Info.plist file in the Medical Dictionary/Contents folder.

Change `<string>com.apple.dictionary.MedicalDict</string>` to something else like `<string>com.apple.dictionary.MedicalDict2</string>`. Then it worked. Weird.