Comparison of 4 CD dictionaries, 2008 version

With a simple search, it is a rare moment that you don’t find what you are looking for thanks to the large number of words that are indexed. We should also mention that the search references all common words and names, but this doesn’t prevent you from adding a filter. The hypertext navigation easily takes you from one word to another. Once you are on your way, the navigation arrows and drop down menus make your searching very easy. When comparing to the Petit Robert 2008, we notice very quickly that the definitions are precise, and less in depth. You simply need to compare the searches of “car” to see that one of the products provides you with three lines of text and the other a lot more! To make up for their lack of information, Larousse has used a trick in their results window, a “@Copilot”. By clicking on this link, the most relevant keywords will be taken and placed into the search engine window of… Google! When using it though, it was unfortunate that the verbs and their conjugation, as well as the synonyms, weren’t always available.

The advanced search is particularly good. It will certainly please school students that want to appear well educated or with a large vocabulary bank. This is split into four sections with the search being done by categories (words, geographic divisions, geopolitical divisions, history periods), disciplines (plastic arts, cinema, religions), by areas (ancient countries and contemporaries, oceans) and by time (prehistoric, Xth century BC).

The third search mode is the Exploration mode. This allows you to look through the multimedia content and to view it, which is a good thing. We discover maps, flags, designs, sounds, photos, grammar, new words and animations all linked to a search.