Procedures for Testing and Pre-testing Dictionaries

Abstract

This paper describes how dictionaries can be made user-friendly and user-efficient. It first proposes a new requirement for designing dictionary entries. Next it applies the monosemy principle. Circularity is avoided by establishing proper transcoding procedures to obtain "metaterms" or descriptors, used in the substitution test. This test is not only useful in determining the "coherence" ratio of an entry, but also in distinguishing substitutable (homosemic) features from non-substitutable (isosemic) features (that allow context insertion) which are combined in a subsense formula.