Introducing the International Edition Beta Program

For the new release of Visual Thesaurus 3, we're providing access to the beta version of the upcoming Visual Thesaurus International Edition free to all of our online subscribers. By providing it to our subscribers, free of charge, we feel we can learn more about the utility of this feature.

International Edition Features

  • Search and browse in five new languages. With the International Edition, you can choose to search in Dutch, French, German, Italian, and Spanish. You also can display words in these languages connected to meanings which are displayed in English.
  • Search in one language; see results in another. You can search in one language and see word results in another. This is especially useful if you are learning a second language, as it allows you to initiate an exploration from a word that you know well.
  • Over 125,000 New Words, The International Edition of the Visual Thesaurus adds thousands of Dutch, French, German Italian, and Spanish words.

Potential Uses for the International Edition

The International Edition is designed primarily for our customers learning English as a second language. You can use the International Edition to search in another language, and then see the results presented in English. You can then hear these words pronounced correctly, and navigate through meanings and other words to expand your knowledge.

Signing up for the Beta Program

If you are already a subscriber, you automatically have access to the International Edition. To seach for a word in another language, simply select the language from the pulldown menu before launching the Visual Thesaurus. Once the application has opened, you can change the display language of the Visual Thesaurus by clicking the "Edit" button to the right of the "Look It Up" button in the toolbar at the top of the window.

Subscribers can disable/re-enable the International Edition features by visiting the My Account section of the Subscriber website. If you subscribe to the Visual Thesaurus as part of an institution, you will need to ask your administrator to enable International Edition support. Subscribers who enable the International edition Beta may be asked to participate in surveys from time to time to help us improve our international support.

Current Limitations of the International Edition

While we are improving multiple-language support, there are a number of limitations:

  1. Certain parts of speech (specifically adjectives and adverbs) are under-represented in many of the languages.
  2. Content filtering is not currently available. Offensive words and meanings in the international dictionaries have not yet been fully tagged. This means that even though you may have your content filtering level set to a very restrictive level, you may see words in other languages that are offensive to you.
  3. While we have made every effort to ensure that the translations are accurate, there may be inaccuracies or mis-matches.