After you've entered atheword OneLook will provide you anywhere from 4 to 40 links, eg

http://onelook.com/?w=lay&ls=a

If you are a frequent user of this facility, which link is your first choice under General, ie, do you have a favorite dictionary and upon what criterion do you base your choice: accuracy, completeness, authority etc

1. Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionary, 11th Edition (it's the online version of the popular M-W Collegiate)

2. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language (or, AHD4) [I really dislike all the advertising and the popups, which often cause my windows to shrink]

3-1008. (nearly) everything else, in no particular order

1009. Urban Dictionary, the most useless user-developed site of all

Good of you to mention this. Through various computer changes I forgot about this one: Webster- The Rosetta Edtion. I Like that one very much. Webster-online ( got it back now)
From the OneLook choice I often take dictionary.com as this one has no pop-ups. American Heritage is very slow + pop-ups. And anyway, it depends on what you're after.

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I agree tsu it's probably the most athoritative based with my experience in the realm, esp with the ink-and-paper version



Thank you I certainly will include it among my faves



Not sure about that but I gather you consider most of them pretty good

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I couldn't agree more on that last one. For what it's worth you might there look up dalehileman for what it's worth. I had asked them to delete whereupon they agreed but didn't comply. Meantime however I have heard from a more liberal correspondent that he found it amusing so I decided to leave it

Thank you Bran for that link



Again thank you. I too find this one useful or its apparent plenitude



Mainly after authority and plentitude but open to all other recommendations, and thanks all once more

1. dalehileman

an irritating, repetitive message board poster.
yo, if you dalehileman one more time, dude, I'm gonna ban you from this forum!
(eponyms sockpuppets dale hileman dale barage)

heh. he don't know you too well, do he‽
-joe (bugs) friday

that makes my day!!

My first is OED then M-W and that is about all in English dictionaries.

I couldn't agree more either, but then I don't agree at all and that's as far as I'm willing to go. There are terms in there that you're not going to find anywhere else and you have user feedback to give you an idea how valid they are.

>user feedback

isn't that just a popularity vote??

I assume you mean the Compact OED, as that's all you'll get via OneLook.

Sorry I did not the thread was about OneLook. I saw the thread title and thought it was asking for our preferred dictionaries. I have dalehileman on my ignore list so did not see his post.

That's why this ignore list is a dumb thing. (message to those who ignore-listed my post )

A word means what we choose it to mean. A popularity vote is better than a prescriptive ukase.

I am old school and I've found that the most useful dictionary for me is the Webster's unabridged 2nd edition.

again, I don't think that's indexed by OneLook.

edit: unless you mean
Webster's Revised Unabridged, 1913 Edition and not the far superior Webster’s New International Dictionary (second edition)

better? not necessarily; not when it's just a set of yahoos exclaiming, 'oh, that's clever'.

e.g., here's one that's really poor that gets a 'thumbs up'
It is what it is
March 31
8057 up, 1032 down
Used often in the business world, this incredibly versatile phrase can be literally translated as "f*** it."
The client changed the deadline to today? Well, it is what it is.
*** expurgated by me

I dislike the phrase, but here is a much more useful def'n (also user developed): link

I love the Webster's 1913, just to see how things used to be!

"I saw the thread title and thought it was asking for our preferred dictionaries. I have dalehileman on my ignore list so did not see his post."--lat

"That's why this ignore list is a dumb thing. (message to those who ignore-listed my post )"--Bran

Actually lat's right, alas I tend to the offhand if not contumelious. Trouble is, many bloggers appear to be always angry about nearly anything no matter how innocent the provocation and so one expects to be assailed no matter how unintended the supposed slight

No lat, not you, but being an intensely curious fellow I'd like specifically to learn why, giving me a better chance at my next years' resolution

Annually I do resolve to change my tactics and approach without however much success. But thank you for your support, Bran, it is mightily appreciated in this hotbed of mutual recrimination we call the Internet; though for the life of me I cannot imagine why anyone would place you on their ignore list

I disagree before ignoring his posts I had read nothing but bakvaas that seemed designed to stir up antagonism something for which he does seem to have an abundant natural talent. So I don't normally post at all in any thread started by him because reading the posts by other people not ignored seems to confirm my view of his posts like the shades of bygone days thread. This thread is an exception because even without his posts which I am sure are as worthless as usual I have learned a lot about various dictionaries.

Yeh, well..that's partly thanks to the fact that some do not use the ignore list. Even so, there's always gonna be someone irritated by someone.

[quote=BranShea]Yeh, well..that's partly thanks to the fact that some do not use the ignore list. Even so, there's always gonna be someone irritated by someone.

Yea, verily.

Still intensely curious what it was I said that so set off latishya

dale, what is it about "ignore" that you don't get? (or, do you really expect a response from latishya??)
-joe (maybe I should use ignore) friday

tsu my goodness, what do you have for breakfast that keeps you so furious all day

Not that it's not beneficial, recent studies having confirmed that

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q...mp;aq=f&oq=

Anyhow out of my sheer laziness I had hoped someone else might remember. Occasionally too I find that an intensely responsive participant becomes so deeply involved in such matters as to perform a search, saving me the trouble

Yes, we all know that anger within certain limits can be good for health and productive as well, but please don't take it upon yourself to be our benefactor in this matter.

>what do you have for breakfast that keeps you so furious all day

many days it seems to be your own sheer laziness and/or intense curiosity. other times it's just the frumious Bandersnatch.
-ron o.

Yes curiosity is reportedly also good for you

http://www.freeratio.org/showthread.php?t=266931

I think Merriam-Webster Dictionary is the best one.
I user it since I'm in grade school and my young cousin still use my dictionary.
Sometime I use Encarta DVD when searching some items.

ash, welcome

My mom if she were still around would agree with you about M-W which must be one of the very best since the name "Webster" has been misappropriated by so many followers