eReader User's Guide

[Pro only]

Looking up Words

For the purposes of this manual, the term "dictionary" refers to any eReader-integrated reference title. It's convenient to think of them as dictionaries, but they may also be other reference documents such as a thesaurus.

There are two main ways to look up words from an integrated eReader dictionary (and a shortcut for looking up random words that's a combination of the two).

Selecting a Word from Within a Book That You're Reading

To look up a word in the dictionary that's in a book that you are reading, select the word by tapping and dragging across the word. Alternatively, just tap and hold on the word that you wish to look up. If the current selection action is “Look Up,” or you select the “Look Up” item from the Selection menu, the Reference view will be shown. You can change the current selection action in the Selection Preferences dialog.

You'll now see the word that you selected along with its definition and any other information that the dictionary has for this word. The information that you will see will depend on the dictionary that you have selected as your default. In this example, the dictionary is the Vest Pocket Dictionary.

Once you have the dictionary displayed, you can browse the dictionary using the selection list in the lower right of the display. You can also edit the word in the display to look up another word. In this example, just edit the word “read” and replace it with a word of your choosing.

Furthermore, you can also directly select and look up any word that appears in the upper definition portion of the dictionary display.

Direct Lookup Using the Stylus

To directly look up a word in the dictionary that does not appear on the current page, select “Reference” from the Book menu. This will show the reference book that you have selected as your default dictionary.

You can also open a particular dictionary (if you have more than one installed on your handheld) by choosing “Open” from the File menu and choosing the desired dictionary from the installed book list.

The last word that you looked up will be shown. You can enter a new word using Graffiti or a keyboard. The dictionary will automatically look up the word as you enter it.

Looking up Arbitrary Words - A Shortcut

To look up words that don't appear on the current page, you may find it faster to select any random word from your current book that you’re reading. Once you have the dictionary up, you can edit the word in the display to look up another word.

Looking up Previous Words

eReader keeps track of previous words as you look up new ones. To return to a word that was looked up earlier, tap on the “Word” popup button, located above the word field.

A short list of previous words will be displayed. To return to one of these words, tap the word in the list.

Setting Your Default Dictionary

The default dictionary is the dictionary that is used to look up words when selecting them from a book that you are reading. If you only have one dictionary-style reference book installed, then you can ignore this section because your dictionary will be selected automatically.

In simple terms, dictionary choices are “sticky.” That is, whatever dictionary that you use becomes the default dictionary until you change it. There are two ways to choose and therefore set your default dictionary.

The first way to set a default dictionary is to open the particular dictionary by choosing “Open” from the File menu and choosing the desired dictionary from the installed book list.

The second way to set the default dictionary (while in the dictionary view) is to select the desired dictionary from the popup list of installed dictionaries in the upper right corner of the screen.