An offline electronic thesaurus

In 1975 I bought a copy of the Longman edition of Roget’s Thesaurus to replace an abridged Penguin edition, and the Longman’s has been by my desk ever since. As it is a printed book rather than an electronic file it is comparatively unwieldy and time-consuming to consult, especially because it runs to over 1,300 pages and is so exhaustive.

Since 2004 I have been using Apple Macs, and these come with an Oxford dictionary and thesaurus that is more than adequate for an author seeking the best word. But I also use a Linux machine and plan to transition entirely to Linux when my present Mac reaches the end of its days.

Thus I have been looking around for a Linux-friendly thesaurus. Those I have found are too sketchy and/or need an internet connection, and when I’m working I like to be offline.

Roget’s Thesaurus was first published in 1852 and has been revised many times since. The penny has now dropped: I realised that at least one of the better revisions would be out of copyright, and where more obvious to begin looking than Project Gutenberg? The more popular version there dates from 1911 and is available in various formats. The body of the work and the index are held in two different files, both of which I downloaded in Microsoft Word format, speedily converted to Open Document Text (.odt), which is more compact.

The body file, as it is called, is the more useful to me. I use FocusWriter for drafting: the draft goes in the first buffer and the thesaurus body file in the next. To switch between these two all I need to do is press Ctrl-1 or Ctrl-2. Then, with FocusWriter’s search facility, it is easy to find the keyword and see its context.

The Gutenberg edition isn’t as detailed as the Longman’s, which I would not be without, but nine times out of ten it does the job.