--- Brion Vibber brion@pobox.com wrote:
On Apr 3, 2004, at 18:55, Karl Eichwalder wrote:
fabiform fabiform_wikipedian@yahoo.com writes:
I'm comfortable with using the IPA, but many people do find all the symbols off-putting. In fact, very few dictionaries use it, presumably for that reason. Perhaps SAMPA is a bit friendlier?
What I meant by this was that at least all the symbols used in SAMPA are recognisable. Like in the IPA you have the upsidedown e (schwa), or the E which is like a rotated 3, or the long s. These can be off-putting. It's true that X-SAMPA is just as complicated though (in fact more so, it has a few extra symbols).
All printed dictionary I am own use the IPA. Maybe, online ditionaries are different? If yes, they might be different because editor don't know how to enter IPA symbols.
IPA seems to be fairly uncommon in monolingual English-language dictionaries, which tend to use their own idiosyncratic systems. My bilingual dictionaries are pretty much all IPA, though.
I don't own any printed dictionaries which use it. None of my printed English dictionaries even offer pronunciation guides for words they assume you know how to pronounce. Even my bilingual French/English and monolingual French dictionaries don't use the IPA, although at first glance they appear to (they've changed at least one symbol). So, the full OED on CD is the only dictionary I own which actually uses it (much to my annoyance, I wish they all would).
Fabi.
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