Hi Bryan,
Thanks for further explaining what you have in mind. I am interested and
would very much like to contribute to such a project as I have already been
doing some research on a few Pali terms with the idea of eventrually writing
dictionary articles.
Back in the 90s, I tried using an old DOS-based database program called
something like dBase. I was using it for my Pali lexical studies and found
that it presented many problems. The number of characters for each iield are
preset (by you) but what happens when a Pali word is derivable from a number
of different verbal roots? I remember having to constantly change the fields
or add new ones until I finally gave up.
I'll be interested to know what software or format you think will work best.
Best wishes,
Jim
----- Original Message -----
From: "Bryan Levman bryan.levman@... [palistudy]"
<palistudy@yahoogroups.com>
To: <palistudy@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: January 5, 2015 8:00 AM
Subject: Re: [palistudy] Database
Dear Jim,
Thanks for the suggestion; I will look into it.
In my studies I see the need for a Pāli dictionary of expressions,
connective phrases, unusual compounds, rare or difficult words, hapax
legomena, ambiguous words, technical terms, grammatical terms, etc. to
complement existing dictionaries. It would not cover the same territory as
existing dictionaries and would also provide derivations and have room for
notes so that a summary of discussions like the one we had on Buddha, Pāli,
etc. could be included and referenced back to the source. It would also
include translations of the Pāli terms in other languages, Sanskrit, Chinese
and Tibetan, for example.
Ven. Bodhi has published a Glossary of Buddhist Technical Terms compiled by
Ven.Ñāṇamoli which is good, but obviously not complete; there's definitely a
need for such a dictionary as I describe, but it would take years to compile
anything significant.
Once I find a suitable data base format, I would invite members of the group
to submit entries and any that are controversial the group could discuss;
I'm not sure exactly how it would work yet; right now it's just an idea,
Best wishes,
Bryan