424442 - add dictionaries UI now seems to be missing.

Status: VERIFIED INVALID

(Firefox :: General, defect)

Description

[chris hofmann]

polvi and I saw this while testing out some dictionaries on amo.

formerly there was an add dictionaries option when you right clicked inside a text box.

see: http://support.mozilla.com/en-U/kb/Using+the+spell+checker#Adding_dictionaries

clicking on the context menu item sent you to: 
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3

using Build identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; Intel Mac OS X 10.5; en-US; rv:1.9b4) Gecko/2008030317 Firefox/3.0b4 or recent nighlies that context menu item for adding dictionaries seems to be missing

Comment 1

[chris hofmann]

Attachment: screen shot of missing "add dictionaries" context menu option

Comment 2

[Dave Townsend [:mossop]]

We cannot add dictionaries on OSX, there we use the OSX system dictionary, not an add-on like everywhere else. The option should still be there on other platforms.

Comment 3

[chris hofmann]

mossop, ok, thanks.  confirmed that things are still working on vista, etc..

heir tenser, how can we flag this for an update to the support page?

Comment 4

[David Tenser [:djst]]

Does this mean you can't add dictionaries in OSX, or does it just mean you have to get the dictionaries elsewhere (but still free)?

Comment 5

[Dave Townsend [:mossop]]

(In reply to comment #4)
> Does this mean you can't add dictionaries in OSX, or does it just mean you have
> to get the dictionaries elsewhere (but still free)?

The dictionaries come installed as part of OSX. I'm not sure if you can add new dictionaries for the OS or not.

Comment 6

[David Tenser [:djst]]

(In reply to comment #5)
> (In reply to comment #4)
> > Does this mean you can't add dictionaries in OSX, or does it just mean you have
> > to get the dictionaries elsewhere (but still free)?
> 
> The dictionaries come installed as part of OSX. I'm not sure if you can add new
> dictionaries for the OS or not.
> 

Thanks. Just so I understand fully, why is OSX treated differently in this regard? It sounds to me like you are offered more flexibility in Windows/Linux, since you can get other dictionaries for free. What's the benefit for OSX users?

Comment 7

[Dave Townsend [:mossop]]

(In reply to comment #6)
> Thanks. Just so I understand fully, why is OSX treated differently in this
> regard? It sounds to me like you are offered more flexibility in Windows/Linux,
> since you can get other dictionaries for free. What's the benefit for OSX
> users?

I guess because Windows and Linux do not come with dictionaries and spellchecking as part of the OS (to my knowledge). In those cases we have to do something to get the right dictionary for the user (certainly in Firefox 2 there were licensing issues with distributing some of the localised dictionaries with the app).

When the OS has a spellchecking service it is presumably using the dictionary appropriate to the user so I guess there is little use it letting users add more.

Also see bug 339980 and bug 151040.

Comment 8

[David Tenser [:djst]]

If you're e.g. Swedish and is running Mac OS X (en-US), it's nice to be able to get a Swedish dictionary in addition to an English one. But thanks for the clarification; I'll figure out how to get dictionaries and will update the SUMO article! :)

Comment 9

[Dave Townsend [:mossop]]

(In reply to comment #8)
> If you're e.g. Swedish and is running Mac OS X (en-US), it's nice to be able to
> get a Swedish dictionary in addition to an English one. But thanks for the
> clarification; I'll figure out how to get dictionaries and will update the SUMO
> article! :)

FWIW the OS doesn't just come with one Language. My British version of OSX comes with dictionaries for Australia, Britain, Canada, Danish, German, Spanish, French, Italian, Netherlands, Portuguese, Brazilian, Swedish and I think Russian.

Comment 10

[David Tenser [:djst]]

While poking around here, I made that discovery too. Thanks for the info and sorry about the bugspam!

Comment 11

[Chris Ilias [:cilias]]

Removing user-doc-needed keyword.
This looks fixed as a result of bug 422760.