Modern open source alternative to LWT, lingq etc

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languagedev
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Re: Modern open source alternative to LWT, lingq etc

Postby languagedev » Wed Feb 09, 2022 6:36 am

Hey all,

I'm back! It's finally ready (in a very beta kind of way :D)

I'll post the link below! It's completely free and open-source, it works on mobile and on desktop. We don't ever plan on charging for it. On mobile to select phrases, longpress on a word and drag the selector until the phrase is selected.

We currently support most European languages, if a language you want is missing let me know (through GitHub if you know how, otherwise here is fine). Currently we just support Wordreference and Deepl, but we will eventually add the option for users to add their own dictionaries and languages just as LWT does.

If you find any bugs or want to request something (no promises) feel free to let us know! Hope you enjoy it!

https://tryalexandria.com/
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rdearman
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Re: Modern open source alternative to LWT, lingq etc

Postby rdearman » Wed Feb 09, 2022 8:04 am

It would be useful if you put the link to the GitHub page as well. Presumably I can clone the repository and run a copy of this on my own server?
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languagedev
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Re: Modern open source alternative to LWT, lingq etc

Postby languagedev » Wed Feb 09, 2022 8:12 am

rdearman wrote:It would be useful if you put the link to the GitHub page as well. Presumably I can clone the repository and run a copy of this on my own server?


Good idea. There is a link to the GitHub in the page footer, but here it is anyway:

https://github.com/alexandria-reader

And yes, you can :)

Eventually I will probably set it up as a Docker image or an electron app.
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Re: Modern open source alternative to LWT, lingq etc

Postby zenmonkey » Wed Feb 09, 2022 8:46 am

languagedev wrote:If you find any bugs or want to request something (no promises) feel free to let us know! Hope you enjoy it!

https://tryalexandria.com/


Great start, waiting to see how it evolves.
For the text extract, here is a website that would be a great resource for German - https://www.dw.com/de/verwüstungsszenar ... a-60706432

Would like to have the possibility to extract to Anki and TTS.
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languagedev
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Re: Modern open source alternative to LWT, lingq etc

Postby languagedev » Wed Feb 09, 2022 9:02 am

zenmonkey wrote:
languagedev wrote:If you find any bugs or want to request something (no promises) feel free to let us know! Hope you enjoy it!

https://tryalexandria.com/


Great start, waiting to see how it evolves.
For the text extract, here is a website that would be a great resource for German - https://www.dw.com/de/verwüstungsszenar ... a-60706432

Would like to have the possibility to extract to Anki and TTS.


Thanks for the feedback :)

Import from other sites, export and export to Anki are on the todo list. I am starting a new job soon and the other developers are currently looking for work, so progress may be a bit slower, but it will get done eventually :D
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Re: Modern open source alternative to LWT, lingq etc

Postby Vordhosbn » Wed Feb 09, 2022 9:51 am

Strong retro vibes in the color scheme. 8-) Very nice indeed. Once my TypeScript skills are up to snuff, I'd love to contribute to this in some way. I had always fancied building my own such tool, but this looks very promising.

How did you settle on the name?
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languagedev
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Re: Modern open source alternative to LWT, lingq etc

Postby languagedev » Wed Feb 09, 2022 10:37 am

Vordhosbn wrote:Strong retro vibes in the color scheme. 8-) Very nice indeed. Once my TypeScript skills are up to snuff, I'd love to contribute to this in some way. I had always fancied building my own such tool, but this looks very promising.

How did you settle on the name?


We would very much welcome contributions :) One of the devs does graphic design, so he made the logo for us, and we just kind of stuck to that color scheme :D

The name was not easy, we spent weeks brainstorming. In the end we named it after the library of Alexandria, as each user can build up their own "library" of knowledge in the app.
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Re: Modern open source alternative to LWT, lingq etc

Postby aronald » Fri Feb 11, 2022 2:19 pm

languagedev wrote:
TSS42 wrote:Completely cloud-based, no local installation.
Text marking and labelling.
Easy dictionary integration out of the box.
Doesn't go mad and marks everything as new, like 'yes', 'no', 'but',...


I was wondering between using a local version and a cloud version. The cloud version is much more interesting in a lot of ways, e.g. shared translations. The problem I see with it is that if it became very popular in the future, I would have to pay server and database costs. That is a long way off but I would like to have something that is free for everyone to use if possible.

When you say dictionary integration, do you mean that the user can define any dictionary that they want to use, like in LWT?

How would you handle making words as new? What if someone is new to a language and everything is new to them? Or would you prefer that words not be marked as new, only words that you choose to translate are highlighted?

Thanks for your reply.


I love this idea and have thought about doing this myself as well. Do you have any estimation on what the cost would be? I don't know much about online databases, but I'd imagine that we could store our own data/databases locally on our phones/computers unless someone wants to use cloud storage. That should be able to minimize the costs. Also, we could probably raise some money for this effort. I'd be willing to pay a subscription in order to help offset the costs.
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