Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd Edition, Version 4.0 (Windows & Mac) (CD-ROM)

~ John Simpson (Editor)

Editorial Reviews

Review

"OED 4.0 is undoubtedly the best incarnation of the OED to appear on CD-Rom ... It's so useful - not to mention addictive - that you will probably want to set it to launch automatically when you switch your computer on." --John Garth, Daily Mail

Product Description

The Oxford English Dictionary is the internationally recognized authority on the English Language, defining more than 500,000 words and tracing their usage through 2.5 million quotations from a wide range of literary and other sources. The text on the CD-ROM comprises the full text of the OED 2nd Edition , plus the three Additions volumes, as well as 7,000 new entries from the OED's continuing research.

Most importantly, OED v4.0 on CD-ROM boasts superb search-and-retrieval software, designed specifically for the electronic version, enabling you to investigate the Dictionary in ways not possible with the print edition. Questions which might have taken years of patient research can now be answered in seconds.

Existing functionality retained from earlier versions includes:

Installation to the hard drive, so the CD is not required during use of the Dictionary
Options to customize the entry display and show or hide pronunciations, spellings, etymology, and quotation text
Flexible full text search options, with search filters and an option to rank entries and search results alphabetically or by date

New to this version:

Now compatible for Mac users as well as PC users
Flash-base
Smoother and faster performance providing instantaneous search results
New word-wheel which supports incremental letter-by-letter browsing
7,000 new words and meanings

System Requirements
Windows: Intel Pentium 4 1.6GHz processor or equivalent (2GHz recommended); Microsoft Windows Vista, Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows 2000.
Macintosh: Power PC G4 867MHz or faster processor; Intel Core Duo 2.13GHz or faster processor; Mac OS X v.10.4x or 10.5x.
All platforms: 512MB of RAM; 1Gb free hard disk space; minimum monitor capability: 1024 x 768 pixels and high color (16 bits per pixel, ie 65,536 colors); local CD-ROM/DVD drive (for installation); runs from hard drive only.

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Product Details

• CD-ROM: 12 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA; 2 Cdr edition (June 4, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0199563837
• ISBN-13: 978-0199563838
• Product Dimensions: 7.5 x 5.6 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #182,445 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

35 of 37 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Oxford English Dictionary - technical review, June 29, 2009

By	Nathan Ramella "dictionary pimp" (Santa Cruz, CA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

There have been many reviews of the literary content of the OED, this review doesn't approach that subject, rather as this is a software product my review discusses the technical implementation and the updates since the previous 3.1 release of this software.

Version 4.0 is the first version of the OED CD-ROM that supports the Macintosh operating system, having previously been available as a Windows application only. This review is written from the perspective of a Macintosh owner.

This release as stated on the packaging, is a hybrid CD-ROM, both Windows and Macintosh versions. The CD-ROMs themselves state that it uses 'SecureROM' copy protection, however from what I can tell this copy protection is missing on the Macintosh entirely.

The install process involved copying two parts of a compressed disk image (DMG) from the CD-ROMs onto my hard-drive, then simply opening the DMG and copying out the 'OED v4.0.app' into my Applications folder. There was no activation required, it simply ran after I extracted it from the install media. While I can't promise a similar user experience for Windows users, having had to deal with the Windows copy-protection in older versions I can say this is a welcome feature.

The user interface has been updated a bit, but still feels fairly clunky. For the gear-heads out there It's based on 'haXe' and 'nekoVM' so there's little if any customization available. On the Mac it hooks cut/paste to do automatic word lookup, but there is no integration with the Macintosh dictionary framework which is a bit of a disappointment, although clearly stated on OED's website.

There are roughly 300,000 words on the CD-ROM version, vs. the Oxford American English Dictionary which ships with Macintosh computers which has less than a third of that -- so there is a difference if you're wondering.

Dictionary lookups are fairly quick and the content if you've read a printed OED will be unsurprisingly similar for obvious reasons.

All in all, I consider this a great step forward for OED in that Macintosh is supported, as well that the draconian copy-protection of 3.1 appears to not be inflicted on Macintosh users.

I consider this worth the money simply in having it at my fingertips and not having to endure the ad-spam of[..]. I would have rated it 5 stars had there been integration with Macintosh's dictionary framework so that the data would be available through the OS supported search/lookup mechanisms, for lack of that feature I felt it worthy of dinging a star off.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The ultimate resource for the Enlish language, August 23, 2009

By	Jerry Saperstein (Evanston, IL USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 100 REVIEWER)

If you love words, there is no equal

At least Oxford University Press keeps trying. This is the 4th electronic version of the venerable Oxford English Dictionary. Each of the earlier versions had problems galore that Oxford was very lax in resolving or sometimes even admitting. Among the many small cruelties, you had to reinsert the data disk every 90 days. Or the failure to adapt to Windows Vista. Ah, well, if you want all those words at your fingertips, such suffering is a price to be paid.

Happily, 4.0 seems pretty stable. Gone is the insanity of needing to reinsert the data disk. OED 4.0 runs smoothly on Vista. Still missing are synonyms. Oxford is missing a profit opportunity by not including a thesaurus add-on. They have a print version: why not make it electronic?

The user interface is cleaned up from earlier versions.

Spelling errors still result in no match rather than presenting you with a list of possibilities. Using the two wildcards is your own option.

The advanced Search is a relatively primitive Boolean mechanism that provides you three terms to match in either the word entries or quotations using AND/OR/NOT operators. Frankly, it isn't all that advanced, but it will do.

When the OED is open, you can double-click on any word and the OED will display the definition. (Windows-only feature.) Mac users need to copy the word to the clipboard.

Speaking of copying, you can only copy the entire OED entry, which can be huge in many cases. Thus, you transfer it to a note application and then extract what you need. Cumbersome to say the least, but as paranoid as Oxford is about illegal copying, it keeps people from easily creating their own dictionaries.

The help function is browser based and reasonably thorough. There is, happily, a list for all the abbreviations used in the OED and any serious word hunter will be using it.

The joy of the OED, of course, is the words. More than 500,000 words defined and 2.5 million quotations demonstrating their use. Paradise for a writer or anyone entranced with the English language. Although, in terms of use, there are other electronic dictionaries that I prefer for ease of use and online references as well, the OED remains the absolute authority and I treasure it. Warts and all, I have grown up with it in print (the tiny print version with the magnifying glass) and all its electronic versions.

The OED is and remains the superlative resource for the English language.

Jerry

20 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars WARNING: Lacks functionality present in prior versions!, July 3, 2009

By	The Gold Tooth "TGT" (Pennsylvania, USA) - See all my reviews

Be aware that Version 4.0 of the OED on CD-ROM lacks certain functionality present in prior versions. The most crippling of these changes is that you can no longer save the results of a search to a file for later analysis. I found this feature most useful in analyzing the use the OED makes of quotations from certain authors, so for me Version 4.0 is useless. I'll be returning it and resuming my use of the prior version. Perhaps there's a kludge you can do by printing the result set to a file, but why should we have to go to the trouble?

In case I'd missed something I e-mailed the OED some days ago asking them to confirm that they've removed the save functionality, but no reply so far.