NAME

Lingua::ZH::CEDICT - Interface for CEDICT, a Chinese-English dictionary

SYNOPSIS

  use Lingua::ZH::CEDICT;

  my $dict = Lingua::ZH::CEDICT->new();
  $dict->init();

  $dict->startMatch('house');
  while (my $e = $dict->match()) {
      #      trad    simp    pinyin pinyin w/o tones  english
      print "$e->[0] $e->[1] [$e->[2] / $e->[3]] $e->[4]\n";
  }

DESCRIPTION

Lingua::ZH::CEDICT is an interface for CEDICT.b5, a Chinese-English dictionary file that may be freely used for non-commercial purposes. This is an alpha release; API and features are not finalized. If you intend to use this package, please contact me so I can acommodate your needs.

The dictionary is included as a Storable v2.4 file. Please see the bin/ directory in the distribution to see how to import a new version of the dictionary.

CONSTRUCTOR

new

new(%hash) will create a new dictionary object. It accepts the following keys:

source

(Default: Storable) Type of input for the module. Currently available interfaces are Textfile, Storable and MySQL. See the POD for these modules for details on their configuration.

HanConvert

(Default: Lingua::ZH::CEDICT::HanConvert) The module used for the conversion of simple to traditional characters and vice versa.

METHODS

numEntries()

Returns the number of entries in the dictionary. One entry is a unique (characters, pinyin) pair with english translations.

version()

Returns the version string from the dictionary file used.

RETRIEVING DATA

entry($number)

Returns the $number entry in the dictionary (0-based, of course).

startMatch($key)

Starts an inexact search using the searchkey $key.

match()

Returns a reference to the next matching entry.

startFind($key)

Starts an exact search using the searchkey $key.

find()

Returns a reference to the next exactly matching entry.

exportData()

Returns a list of hashes of all the data in the dictionary.

MANIPULATING DATA AND FORMATTING

addSimpChar

Call the simple method of the HanConvert module specified to add a conversion to simplified characters to each entry.

addTradChar

Call the trad method of the HanConvert module specified to add a conversion to traditional characters to each entry.

applyPinyinFormat($coderef)

Formats the pinyin for all entries. If no code ref is supplied, uses utf8Pinyin.

applyEnglishFormat($coderef)

Formats the English translation for all entries. If no code ref is supplied, uses formatEnglish.

utf8Pinyin($text)

Changes tone numbers to UTF-8-encoded tone marks.

removePinyinTones

Removes the (numeric, not UTF-8) tone marks from a pinyin string.

formatEnglish($text)

Changes '/' to a dot as delimiter and HTML-italicizes comments in brackets.

englishToKeywords

Attempts to create a keyword list out of the English definition.

KEYWORD METHODS

For some applications, a concept of keywords is useful. A keyword is a unique entry in the dictionary. For example, for the pinyin keywords the tonemarks are removed. The keyword "zi" encompasses all translations of a character with the pronunciation zi[1-5].

generateKeywords()

Generate the keywords hashes. Use before you apply formatting.

keysEn()

Return a hash with the keys being the english keywords and the values references to an array of indizes of the entries where the keyword is mentioned.

keysPinyin()

Return a hash with the keys being the pinyin keywords and the values references to an array of indizes of the entries where the same pronunciation is used (without tones).

keysZh()

Return a hash with the keys being the Chinese character keywords and the values references to an array of indizes of the entries where this term is translated. If the data contains both traditional and simplified characters, this hash will include both forms.

AUTHOR

Christian Renz, <crenz@web42.com>

LICENSE

Copyright (C) 2002-2005 Christian Renz. This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.

SEE ALSO

Lingua::ZH::CEDICT::Textfile Lingua::ZH::CEDICT::Storable Lingua::ZH::CEDICT::MySQL Lingua::ZH::CEDICT::HanConvert http://www.mandarintools.com/cedict.html. http://www.web42.com/zidian/.