OED Help

1. The OED on CD-ROM

This CD-ROM offers unparalleled access to the world’s most important reference work for the English language. The Oxford English Dictionary is the accepted authority on the evolution of the English language over the last millennium. It is an unsurpassed guide to the meaning, history, and pronunciation of over half a million words, both present and past. It traces the usage of words through 2.5 million quotations from a wide range of international English language sources, from classic literature and specialist periodicals to film scripts and cookery books.

This CD-ROM has been furnished with a new interface and functionality, the entry structure and display have been redesigned, and data search and retrieval have been simplified and enhanced.

The text of this version is that of the second edition, 1989, and also includes the Oxford English Dictionary Additions Series (Volumes 1–3), published in 1993 and 1997, and now almost 7,000 new words and meanings from the OED’s ongoing research programme.

Here is a summary of the main features of the new OED on CD-ROM:

  • • Quick search and easy-to-use navigation features
  • • Select how entries are displayed by turning pronunciations, etymologies, variant spellings, and quotations on and off
  • • Advanced searching to allow full exploitation of the data. You can look for quotations by date, author or work, search pronunciations, find words which have come into English from a particular language, etc.
  • • Automatic cross-referencing: click on any word in any entry to find it in the Dictionary
  • • Automatic look-up feature enabling fast access to OED headwords from other applications.

2. The workplace

2.1 What’s happening in the main window?

When you first open the Dictionary you see the Home page. Click the Dictionary button to open the main window. This is where you view entries, browse the entry list, and look up words. It is divided into three areas:

The entry area

The entry itself takes up most of the window. The entry you see on startup is the Word of the Day. Above the Entry Area is the Find Word box. Use this box to search for both main and subordinate entries, phrases, compounds, etc. Alternatively, use the entry list search box (see next) to quickly browse main entries only.

The entry list

On the left is the list of Dictionary entries, from A to Z. This list can be ordered chronologically using the Sorted by date button at the bottom. The name of the current entry is highlighted. Browse the list using the scroll bar or by typing into the box above the list. The entry list moves to the closest match.

Buttons

At the top and bottom of the window are various buttons which help you to move through the Dictionary, copy and print text, and access facilities such as Advanced search, Results, and Help, etc.

2.2 What do the buttons mean?

Advanced search
Opens the Advanced search pane.
Back
Moves back to the previous entry viewed.
Bookmarks
Displays a list of entries you have bookmarked.
Copy
Copies an entry.
Dictionary
Returns to the main window.
Etymology
Switches the display of etymologies on and off.
Help
Opens detailed Help with using the OED on CD-ROM.
Home
Returns to the Home page.
Results
Moves to the most recent Results list.
History
Displays a list of the entries you have viewed so far.
Licence
Opens the legal terms for looking at the product.
Lost for Words
Opens a random entry.
Options
Opens the Options pane.
Print
Prints an entry or results list.
Pronunciation
Switches the display of pronunciation information on and off.
Quotations
Switches the display of quotations on and off.
Results
Moves to the most recent Results list.
Spellings
Switches the display of spelling information on and off.

If you want to find a word in the current entry, type it into the Find in entry box at the foot of the entry display area.

↓
Moves to the next match in the entry.
↑
Moves to the previous match in the entry.

3. Looking up a word

3.1 How do I find a word?

3.1.1 Quick search

The quickest way to look for a word is to type it into the input box in the top left corner of the main window. The entry list moves to the closest matching entry, which is displayed in the entry area. You can also click on any entry in the list to display it.

A quick search finds main Dictionary entries, such as alphabet, break, xylophone.

3.1.2 Find Word search

What is a Find Word search?

In addition to main entries, the OED contains subordinate entries, such as the phrase in alphabet, or compounds such as alphabet book. A Find Word search is a search of main and subordinate entries.

How do I run a Find Word search?

  • 1. Type your term into the input box above the entry area.
  • 2. Click Find.
  • 3. If there is a single match, the entry will be displayed. If there are multiple matches, they are given in the Results list.
  • 4. To view any of the results in the list, click on it.

Note:

  • • You can use the wildcards ? and * in your search.
  • • It is not necessary to type punctuation or worry about capital letters or hyphens. See also Special characters, hyphens, and case.
  • • If you do not find the word you are looking for, try an Advanced search, as your word may be covered by variant spellings or be found in a quotation.

3.1.3 Advanced search

This is a full search of the entire Dictionary text. It finds your term wherever it occurs in the Dictionary. This could be in the form of an entry name, part of another word's definition, in a quotation, etc. An Advanced search also allows you to confine your search to a particular area of text (e.g. definition or quotation text) and to search for words that occur near one another (e.g. Dickens before Drood). To go to the Advanced search pane, click the Advanced search button.

For more help on Advanced searching, see Section 4.

3.2 How do I use the Results list?

The results of a Find Word or Advanced search are displayed in the Results list whenever more than one result is produced by a search. To choose an entry from the list to view, click on it.

The number of results is displayed in the bottom left-hand corner of the screen. Use the scroll bar to scroll through the full list.

4. Advanced searching

An Advanced search allows you to search the entire Dictionary text. It finds your term wherever it occurs in the Dictionary. This could be in the form of an entry name, part of another word's definition, in a quotation, etc.

You can refine your search in several ways:

  • • By confining it to a particular type of text (e.g. lemmas, quotations)
  • • By confining it to a particular part of speech (e.g. adverb)
  • • By searching for special and/or accented characters
  • • By using the wildcards * and ?
  • • By using the Boolean operators AND, OR, and NOT to search for two or more terms at once.

 

4.1 How can I run an Advanced search?

Here's how to run the basic type of search:

  • 1. Switch to Advanced search mode by clicking the Advanced search button. The Advanced search pane is displayed.
  • 2. Choose the area you wish to search, either whole Entries or Quotations.
  • 3. Type the word or phrase you want to find into the first input box. (You may use the wildcards ? and *, if you wish.)
  • 4. Choose the type of text you want to search (e.g. quotations) from the drop-down list.
  • 5. Refine your search using filter options if you wish.
  • 6. Click the Start search button or press ↵.
  • 7. The results are displayed in the Results list.
  • 8. To view any of the results in the list, click on it.

4.2 Choosing the search area

What is a search area?

This is the type of Dictionary text you choose to search in an Advanced search.

When you look at a typical entry you will see that it is divided into different sections. In addition to the main definition text for each of the senses of the entry, there is often information on spellings, etymology, and quotations, etc. By default, an Advanced search searches the entire text of the entries, but you can confine your search area to any text area or to items such as dates and language names.

How can I choose a search area?

    Choose your search area from the list box which shows full text as a default.

More about the search areas

Full text is the entire text of all the entries in the Dictionary. It includes the entry names as well as spellings, definitions, etymologies, and quotations, etc. A search on the full text of the Dictionary is the broadest possible search.

Earliest date is the date of the earliest quotations recorded in the Dictionary entries. Searching for a year as an earliest date will retrieve all the words whose first recorded use in English was in that year.

Note: Dates can be typed as a single date (e.g. 1340), or in the form of a closed range (e.g. 1340-1345), an open range (e.g. 1340-), or the end of a range (e.g. -1340). Wildcards cannot be used in date searches. For further details on date searching, see Searching for quotations by date.

Lemmas are the terms defined in the Dictionary. A search in this area is equivalent to a Find Word search, but with the additional options offered by Advanced searching.

Definitions is the text which contains all the defined senses or meanings of the entry. There is a definition for every sense of the entry. For example, the definition of the entry marble n., sense 1.a is:

Etymologies is the text which contains information on the origin of the word.

Language names enables a single search to retrieve all the different forms in which a language name occurs in the Dictionary's etymologies.

For example, Sanskrit is referred to in full and also in the abbreviated forms Sk., Skr., and Skt. The variation reflects the long publication history of the original OED. When the search area language names is selected, the search box offers a list of standardized forms which will actually retrieve occurrences of all the variants as well.

Quotations are the examples from print and manuscript sources which illustrate each sense of an entry. Quotation text is displayed in purple. (Quotations are shown by default but you have the option to hide them.) There are usually quotations for every sense of the headword.

You can choose to search the entire quotations or confine your search to any text area or to items such as dates and language names. Choose the appropriate option from the list.

Examples of content are:

  • • quotation date 1653
  • • quotation authorr J. H. Newman
  • • quotation work Tom Sawyer
  • • quotation text Alas poore Yorick

 

Pronunciations: see Special Characters, Hyphens, and Case

4.3 Wildcards

What is a wildcard?

A wildcard is a character which stands for any letter. You can include wildcards in a Find Word or Advanced search to make your search more flexible.

There are two wildcards available in the OED:

  • • The question mark ? represents the occurrence of any one single character
  • • The asterisk * represents the occurrence of any number of characters (or no character at all)

A search with a wildcard retrieves all results which contain matching terms. For example

  • • c?t finds cat, cot, cut
  • • c*t finds cat, caught, commencement, conflict, consent, cot, cut, etc.

 

How can wildcards help me in a search?

Wildcards are useful if you do not know how to spell a word, if you are not sure in what form the term you want appears in the Dictionary, or if you want to find several terms beginning with the same root.

  • • The search term *sychok?n?s?s finds psychokinesis
  • • The term colo*r matches color and colour
  • • The term chorograph* finds chorographer, chorographic, chorographical, chorographically

 

4.4 Special characters, hyphens, and case

Special characters

If you want to use any kind of search to look for a word with an accented letter (e.g. café) simply type a plain letter in place of the accented one (e.g. cafe).

The most common special characters (e.g. the Old English thorn and Middle English yogh) are treated as equivalent to the nearest plain alphabet characters (e.g. th or y). If in doubt, use a wildcard in place of the special character.

These and other special characters, such as Greek, can also be searched on the Advanced search page by entering the names of the characters. See Exact character searching.

Pronunciations are shown in the standard characters of the International Phonetic Alphabet. These can be searched by using keyboard equivalents when the Advanced search area pronunciations is selected. The Key to the pronunciation describes the symbols and lists the keyboard equivalents.

Some special characters which appear very infrequently are not displayed, but are represented by a code name in angle brackets.

Hyphens

Both Find Word and Advanced searches ignore hyphens and do not distinguish hyphens and spaces.

Case

In a Find Word or Advanced search you can use upper- or lower-case letters to type your search term. For example, dickens will find Dickens and dickens.

An option to do case-sensitive searches is available on the Advanced search pane.

4.4.1 Exact character searching

A standard Find Word or Advanced search treats accented letters as their equivalent plain letter. For example, typing cafe will find both cafe and café.

To find the exact form of a word, whether it incorporates a special character or not, select exact character searching. Enter your search terms in the boxes in the usual way, except that if the word you are looking for contains an accented letter or other special character, enter its name instead of its plain letter equivalent, e.g. type caf#eacu# to find café.

Note:

  • • Exact character searching will also allow exclusion of accented characters. For example, typing cafe with exact character searching selected will find only cafe and not café.
  • • Exact character searching will not, however, allow hyphens to be searched. For example, typing north west with exact character searching selected will find both north west and north-west.

 

Names of special characters are always contained between hashes (#). To find the name of a special character, consult one of the following lists:

4.5 Searching for more than one term using Boolean operators

When you use more than one input box in an Advanced search, you need to combine them with AND, OR, or NOT. AND is selected by default. This means that the search will find results which contain both of your search terms.

AND Retrieves entries or quotations containing both terms.
OR Retrieves entries or quotations containing either of the terms.
NOT Retrieves entries or quotations containing the first term but not the second.

When searching for two or more terms in the same text area, e.g. definitions, you can choose whether the matches should occur in the same section, or in different sections of the same type elsewhere in the entry.

When more than one Boolean operator is used, you can reverse the order of the operations. For example, the search bird OR mammal AND Australia with operation A first is effectively bracketed as (bird OR mammal) AND Australia, whereas with operation B first it becomes bird OR (mammal AND Australia).

4.6 Restricting searches

You can restrict your search to entries with particular parts of speech by using the filter options.

5. Viewing Dictionary entries

When you first open the Dictionary you are taken to the entry for the Word of the Day. From here you can select an alternative word from the list on the left, or conduct a search. You can also use the Lost for Words button at the bottom of the entry pane to display a word at random. You can create your own list of interesting words to revisit, by using the Bookmarks button.

Entries from the second edition, 1989, are not labelled, but entries from the later Additions series, and draft entries from the revision programme, are clearly labelled and dated in red. Some of these entries are partial entries, appended to the bottom of second edition entries.

5.1 How can I see all the parts of an entry?

5.1.1 Pronunciation, Etymology, and Quotations

You have some choices about how an entry is displayed.

Use the Pronunciation, Spellings, Etymology, and Quotations buttons to toggle between displaying and hiding these parts of an entry.

Pronunciation: information about how the word is pronounced
Spellings: historical and alternative spellings
Etymology: information on the linguistic origins of a word
Quotations: dated quotations illustrating the word in context

5.2 How can I make the most of the entry list?

What is the entry list?

The entry list is the list of all the main entries in the Dictionary. The entry you are currently looking at is highlighted in the list.

Browsing the list

Scroll through the list using the scroll bar. To open any of the entries in the list, click on it. This is a quick way of browsing entries either side of the one you are looking at.

Reordering the list

By default, the list is ordered alphabetically, from A to Z. You can also list the entries chronologically by the date of the earliest quotation they contain: click the sorted by date button. Click it again to revert back to the alphabetical list.

5.3 How do I follow cross-references?

What is a cross-reference?

A cross-reference is a link from one Dictionary entry to another for purposes of comparison or explanation. Cross-reference links are displayed in blue small capitals.

Following cross-references

Click on the cross-reference to follow the hyperlink.

If there are several possible links for a cross-reference, you may in some cases be taken to the first matching word in the list, from where you can navigate to the others.

Example

Open the entry crooked. Move to sense 5 and click on the cross-reference to AVOCET .

 

5.4 How do I find a word in an entry?

To look for a term within the text of the entry on display, type it into the Find in entry box at the bottom of the Dictionary window. The term is highlighted in the entry text. Use the arrow buttons to move to the next or previous occurrence in the entry.

5.5. How do I look up a word from another application?

If you are using Windows, double click on the word you want. If you are working on a Macintosh, copy your word to the Clipboard. The Dictionary automatically searches for your word in the entry list.

5.6 How can I see a list of the entries I have viewed or searches I have run?

You can move backwards through the entries you have viewed in the current session by clicking the Back button. Click the History button to display a list of the searches you have run most recently.

6. Outputting text

6.1 Copying an entry

To copy the text of the currently displayed entry to the Clipboard, click the Copy button.

6.2 Printing an entry or results list

To print the text of the currently displayed entry or results list, click the Print button.

7. Options

Certain aspects of the OED display and setup can be configured according to personal preference. Click the Options button to reveal the following choices.

Font size. Use this option to set the font size of all text (text typed by the user as well as Dictionary text.

Colour scheme. Configures the colours of the text and background.

Enable look-up from other applications. By default you can look up a word from most other applications by double clicking on it (Windows) or copying it to the Clipbaord (Macintosh). You can switch off this function here.

Bypass homepage on start-up. Choose this option if you want to skip the homepage on startup and instead open the Dictionary at the Word of the Day.

8. Accessibility

The OED software is designed to be accessible to as many users as possible. It can be navigated solely with the keyboard if it is difficult to use a mouse, and offers a number of display configurations for those with visual impairment.

8.1 Keyboard navigation

Moving around the window

  • • Tab moves in order through the different parts of the OED window, from the input box through each of the buttons and fields in turn.
  • • Shift+Tab moves backwards through the different parts of the OED window.
  • • Use Tab to move one step forward, Shift+Tab to move one step back. When a button or input box is selected, it is highlighted.

Pressing a button

  • • Use Tab and/or Shift+Tab to highlight the button, then press Space or ↵.

Typing text in an input box

  • • Use Tab and/or Shift+Tab to highlight the input box, then type in your text.

Moving around an entry

  • • Page Up and Page Down move up or down a page at a time.
  • • Home and End move to the start or end of the entry.

Using the entry and results lists

  • • Page Up and Page Down move up or down a page at a time.
  • • Home and End move to the start or end of the list.

9. Understanding the OED

Copyright © Oxford University Press 2009