Interstructure

Print lexicons are generally "stand-alone" works. Rare is the lexicon that routinely refers the user to other works. The chief reason that a mainstream dictionary's entry for, say, "fluoride" doesn't refer the user to works on chemistry, dentistry, or whatnot, is simply because the average user cannot be expected to be able to easily access such works, without having to make a trip to the nearest library.

However, if a lexicon is online and served through the Internet, then other resources can be accessed as easily as the lexicon is accessed. The online lexicon does not then need to be a stand-alone resource; it can freely reference other works, through hyperlinks.

This point has not been lost in producing FOLDOC, the Free Online Dictionary of Computing (Howe 1994). A good number of the entries in FOLDOC refer to important external resources. For example, the FOLDOC entry for "Structured Query Language (SQL)" first defines SQL, then gives a historical analysis of it with notes on current directions in development, and then ends by linking to three resources unaffiliated with FOLDOC: a standards document on SQL, parser program for SQL, and the procedings of a recent conference on SQL.

This general approach of providing links to more detailed information about the concept the headword denotes is a useful one. I forsee it being particularly useful in bilingual online lexicons, for providing extended information about cultural-specific terms. For example, an online lexicon of Navajo could, in the entries for terms having to do with religious ceremonies, link outside the lexicon to an article comparing the various Navajo ceremonies and detailing their significance.

I believe that a rich interstructure is a useful way for online lexicons to refer the reader to relevant encyclopedic resources, which may or may not be at the same site as, or coordinated with, the lexicon itself. Interstructure can also be used to provide users links to entries in other kinds of lexicons. For example, the Hypertext Webster's Interface at http://work.ucsd.edu:5141/cgi-bin/http_webster is a gateway to the Internet webster (Unknown ?1983). However, for every entry retrieved through this interface, a link is provided to search for that same word in an online version of a Roget's Thesaurus which is unrelated to the Internet webster.

Interstructure is used extensively in FOLDOC and is present in the abovementioned interface to the Internet webster, but in other online lexicons it is hardly to be found. Ford (1996:210) evaluates Webster's New World Dictionary, Third Edition, with the American Concise Encyclopedia on Power CD which claims to integrate the two resources named in the title. (Note that this is an electronic lexicon but not an online one.) However, in Ford's evaluation, the integration seems to consist of little more than the two resources coming on the same CD:

When the dictionary is opened by itself, no access to the encyclopedia is provided, and none of the multimedia resources exploited by the encyclopedia are employed in the dictionary. I find it difficult to discover any benefits that result from the integration of these two resources, however loose; and the encyclopedia, in my view, is an embarrassing companion to WNWDCD [this lexicon]. It is flashy, noisy, and distinctly unscholarly. [1996:210]