mornin' kids,

gran's been on the quest for The Perfect Dictionary Site since
Discovery School's "Dictionary Plus" went off the radar.
http://school.discovery.com/dcso/dp_notfound.html  

I tried to get a sample of the information contained therein but
couldn't pull it up through the cached page or Alexa.  it was a
dictionary-thesaurus combination with an unbelievably amount of
lexicological description and everything arranged neatly on a single
one-click page.  I have not found anything to replace it since and,
believe me, I've looked.  it is one of my many missions in life.

my question is what meaty dictionary program did Discovery School use
and is it available under another name/form online -- free or fee --
doesn't matter.  my backup dictionary is
http://www.hyperdictionary.com but it's for sale so it might also
disappear.

my unabridged thanks for checking into this for me,
GB

Hiya granny!

I managed to come up with a cached page on the Internet Archive:

Cache of Discovery School's Dictionary Plus
Internet Archive
http://web.archive.org/web/20011217230445/school.discovery.com/dictionaryplus/

It says "Powered by Wordsmyth", and has a link to the Wordsmyth page. 
And, thankfully, Wordsmyth still exists!

Wordsmyth
http://www.wordsmyth.net/

For some reason, Wordsmyth changed its logo.  I hope that it didn't
change the content -- or changed it only for the better!

- justaskscott


Search strategy - 

Searched on Google for:

discovery "dictionary plus"

Searched on Internet Archive for:

http://school.discovery.com/dictionaryplus/

---

Clarification of Answer by justaskscott-ga on 25 Jun 2003 11:11 PDT

Thanks for the ratin' and tip, GB.

The program appears to be called the Wordsmyth Dictionary-Thesaurus
(WDT), or some variation thereon.  The shop sells a version entitled
the Wordsmyth Children's Dictionary-Thesaurus.

"Origin and Development of The Wordsmyth English Dictionary-Thesaurus"
Wordsmyth
http://www.wordsmyth.net/live/home.php?content=history&nr=1

"Product List"
Wordsmyth
http://store.wordsmyth.net/

Incidentally, you may be interested to know that you can submit
"feebafubble" as a word for possible inclusion in the WDT.

"Wordsmyth Frequently Asked Questions - Your dictionary doesn't
contain the word 'feebafubble.' Can you please add it?"
Wordsmyth
http://www.wordsmyth.net/live/home.php?content=faq&nr=1#2q1

SUPER!  and all you have to do is register at Wordsmyth to get those
clickable goodies.  I'm thrilled!  gran was thinking the URL was
http://school.discovery.com/dcso.  no wonder she couldn't find it.  I
think I need lessons in how to stroke that Alexawoman just so.  very
glad you found this for me, ScottieBoy.  so am I right in assuming the
name of the program is Dictionary Plus?

I prefer the Merriam-Webster dictionary. You can find them at

http://www.m-w.com

They even have a toolbar that you can add to your browser that is
similar to the Google toobar. You can even highlight a word on a web
page and click the dictionary or thesauus button and it will pop up a
window with your definition or synonyms.

Additionally, it will pronounce each word for you. I highly recommend
it.

And of course there's the American Heritage Dictionary with its
not-so-intuitive URL:
http://www.bartleby.com/61/