Wiktionary:Feedback
This page is for collecting feedback from Wiktionary readers. It should be cleaned out on a three-month basis, as new comments are constantly being added. Feel free to reply to and discuss comments here, though bear in mind that the people who leave the feedback may never come back to read replies. By convention, the feedback is not archived.
- Links: Wiki Javascript (for adding to your WMF Wiki.)
- Q. X isn’t a real word! Why do you have an entry for it?
- A. Like most dictionaries, Wiktionary describes and records how people use languages, and does not try to prescribe what is supposedly right or wrong. In some cases, labels are added to warn people that certain usages may be regarded as, for example, derogatory to some people or regarded by some people as proscribed (generally recommended not to be used). If you really feel that an entry should not in Wiktionary, discuss the matter with other editors at Wiktionary:Tea room. Alternatively, if you have done a search at websites such as Google Books and the Internet Archive and cannot find uses of the term, you can request for the entry to be verified at Wiktionary:Requests for verification (see that page for instructions).
- Q. Why don’t you provide audio files giving the pronunciations of all entries?
- A. The recording of audio files requires volunteer editors who have the right equipment and software, and who know how to upload these files to the Wikimedia Commons. All this is somewhat time-consuming, and it seems that at the moment we simply don’t have editors who are able to do this for us regularly. We suggest that you learn how to read the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) transcriptions of pronunciations. For English entries, you can visit Appendix:English pronunciation, which you can also reach by clicking on the “(key)” link next to the word IPA on entry pages.
- Q. How do I propose that a Wiktionary for another language be started?
- A. See incubator:Help:Manual.
May 2025
Hey everyone, I'm a big fan :) I think I use the website daily, so much so that I created a shortcut on my android "desktop". I should probably create an account as well. :) In the meantime, one suggestion: how come there is no dark mode in the settings for unauthenticated users? I also tried the desktop mode, hoping it was hidden there, but no such luck. :-/ Sorry for the noise if I missed it, but I think it's safe to say that I am an advanced IT user. :) And while we are at it, how come there is no android app for wiktionary? it would help with the integration, like searching directly from the browser, or other apps, via the "share" function, for example? Thanks to the team, and thevcommunity as a whole! 2001:9E8:A243:2100:4DF7:F9EF:F58C:409F 10:07, 3 May 2025 (UTC)
- I can only comment on the dark mode; it'll probably be on the builtin settings page (sidebar > Settings), but the developers haven't enabled it yet. — SURJECTION / T / C / L / 12:18, 3 May 2025 (UTC)
Where does Wiktionary source its dialectal synonyms for Chinese words?
I'm curious as some of the entries might be incorrect or are missing synonyms for other cities. Is there a dictionary that Wiktionary has been sourcing these from, or are these all orginal research? LittleCuteSuit (talk) 18:00, 3 May 2025 (UTC)
- You may get more responses at Wiktionary:Tea room. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 19:17, 3 May 2025 (UTC)
- Ok, I will ask there. Thank you for letting me know. LittleCuteSuit (talk) 19:19, 3 May 2025 (UTC)
Change "Negerhollands" to "Virgin Islands Dutch Creole"
Would it be possible to change the language name for ISO 639-3: dcr from Negerhollands to Virgin Islands Dutch Creole? The former term is rather contentious, as it contains the Dutch N-word. The latter is also just a better description of the language and is the term used by Glottolog. 92.254.93.189 19:07, 7 May 2025 (UTC)
- Moving this to the Wiktionary:Beer Parlour. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 19:10, 7 May 2025 (UTC)
No need to be protected Vilipender (talk) 21:52, 8 May 2025 (UTC)
- Agreed. I think 15 years is long enough. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 22:04, 8 May 2025 (UTC)
Word of the day feeds negative margin
I notice that the word of the day feeds (both RSS and Atom) have a margin-top:-47px styling on the .wotd-container element. This causes it to render incorrect in every feed app I've tried (Feedbro Firefox extension, among others), overlapping the preceeding UI elements. I've fixed this locally with a userContent.css which overrides the margin but a better solution would be nice. — This unsigned comment was added by ~palediver (talk • contribs) at 10:39, 12 May 2025 (UTC).
- @~palediver: I've copied your comment to "Wiktionary:Grease pit", where it is more likely to get attention. Please comment further there. — Sgconlaw (talk) 18:11, 12 May 2025 (UTC)
Probably doesn't need protection any longer Vilipender (talk) 06:49, 15 May 2025 (UTC)
Done —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 11:47, 16 May 2025 (UTC)
Probably doesn't need protection any longer, like the following:
Vilipender (talk) 23:49, 16 May 2025 (UTC)
I think 大馬 is pronounced Da Ma not "ma la xi ya" Blue roller (talk) 12:03, 17 May 2025 (UTC)
I think you should add pisspot as an adjective. I suggest the definitions: Of negilgeable worth Of low value
I believe this declension is wrong for adjective form of white. Please see https://en.openrussian.org/ru/%d0%b1%d0%b5%d0%bb%d1%8b%d0%b9 which I believe is correct
The Mongolian spelling of this word is wrong, missing a letter, the correct spelling should be "ᠭᠤᠤᠯᠮᠤᠳ". Please help me correct the error in the English Wiktionary and Malagasy Wiktionary. The correct Mongolian spelling is here http://burgud.net/Mgl/View/?burgudID=4EBC-CFB3-E317C778-9F04F7A5-58DF4537
- @Manilano12: I see your spelling in the relevant articles at the two Wikipedias I checked (English and Mongolian), so I suspect you may be right, though I don't know Mongolian well at all. I have no reason to believe that @LlywelynII has any special knowledge of Mongolian, either (I wasn't aware he had even edited in the language), so a simple mistake wouldn't surprise me. @Theknightwho. Chuck Entz (talk) 00:50, 26 May 2025 (UTC)
- @Chuck Entz This is just G-O-L-M-U-D in Mongolian letters. I don't know if this one is correct specifically, but these kinds of direct transliterations into Mongolian are generally a major red flag, since the Mongolian script tends to use a lot more silent letters than the Cyrillic one (e.g. imagine some naive non-English speaker spelling light as *layt). Theknightwho (talk) 08:23, 26 May 2025 (UTC)
I would be pleased to help you all with the many errors that this module has as a native spanish speaker.
Hello i've seen many errors in transcriptions, speacially with "ct" and "pt" since most galician speakers would ommit the first sound and pronounce a geminated t instead or some dialectal variation. But no galician speaker would pronounce "actor" as /ak.'tor/ but /at.'tor/ or even /aθ.'tor/. It would be great that if I could help you improve the module and i am in close contact with many galician speakers.
June 2025
Word of the day: quark
It's Finnegans Wake, not Ulysses, that used the word quark. Smurrayinchester (talk) 10:22, 16 June 2025 (UTC)
- @Smurrayinchester: thanks, I’ve fixed it. It was correctly stated in the entry but I mistyped it in the WOTD. — Sgconlaw (talk) 12:00, 16 June 2025 (UTC)
Foreign word of the day: बिगड़ना
Thanks & keep it up! Your wiktionary word of the day feature is very educative & enlighting, especially that the world is now a one big diverse global village consisting of different races & cultures but uniquely one people. Congratulations & Keep your Good works up. — This unsigned comment was added by 105.161.139.44 (talk).
Questions about Mandarin Chinese coverage on Wiktionary.
Hi. So I am looking through Wiktionary, and I have some questions.
1: How come the tonal change for 一 and 不 not reflected in words? For instance: yīyàng when the tonal change should be second tone. Is this because of a standard difference between Mainland China and other regions I don't know?
2: Why is it default in Traditional Chinese? Simplified Chinese is the national language of the People's Republic of China, which is now recognized practically universally as the true representative of China worldwide. The sole outliers hanging on to Traditional Chinese would be Hong Kong and Taiwan, but even in other sovereign states not disputed that have Chinese as one of their official language, Malaysia and Singapore, these countries still use Simplified characters currently! Therefore it really astonishes and shocks me to see that Traditional characters are still artificially prolonged as the standard here.
3: I really appreciate the dialect coverage here. How come Meixian is listed last however under Hakka, behind Sixian and Hailu dialects, though? In China, Meixian dialect is considered the national standard of Hakka, similar to how Xiamen dialect might be for Min Nan, Fuzhou dialect for Min Dong, Nanchang dialect for Gan, etc.
4: Some dialects have both literary and vernacular variants, which is common. However, these are only noted within pronunciation tables, and in the definitions it is not elaborated on when the specific pronunciations are used. Mandarin seems better though. For example this is what 色 says:
sè - all senses except “die”;
shǎi - “die; colour”;
shǎir - “colour”;
shè - “lust”.
And this is how 給 (traditional) says it:
Pronunciation 1: colloquial.
Pronunciation 2: literary.
However some dialects are unclear for this. For instance, in Xiamen dialect, 八 has 2 different pronounciations of "poeh" and "pat". The first is the more common vernacular, the second is a literary reading for saying out loud, similar to 幺 for 一 in Mandarin. However in the definitions, it doesn't say.
I would appreciate some clarity, thank you all. Even with flaws, this dictionary is really useful and practical. Solomon Wu (talk) 21:39, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
- @Solomon Wu: have you seen Wiktionary:About Chinese? —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 22:23, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
- I just did, but it doesn't answer every question I've got. Solomon Wu (talk) 02:50, 26 June 2025 (UTC)
- You can also post to its talk page. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 02:56, 26 June 2025 (UTC)
- I just did, but it doesn't answer every question I've got. Solomon Wu (talk) 02:50, 26 June 2025 (UTC)
July 2025
Hi, nice too meet you all. I'm a latin learner and came across this verb. In a nutshell its usage is pretty messed up, here, entry 801, it is described as semi-deponent but reversed, and the early usage of the active form here shows that this is essentially correct.
I believe that this fact should be reflected on the word page, like, the verb should have an perfect active reverti, but I'm new here and can't really edit pages very well. So if anybody feels enthusiastic about this I'd be very thankful for the edit. — This unsigned comment was added by IvBtz (talk • contribs).
- I will copy this to the talk page of the entry. I am somewhat knowledgeable about Latin, but don't feel confident to make the change. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 19:49, 2 July 2025 (UTC)
Foreign word of the day: Xジェンダー
Why did it change from tonsi??? What??
It is incredibly disappointing that they changed the WOTD mid-day. GiggyMantis (talk) 17:21, 14 July 2025 (UTC)
- @GiggyMantis: there was no consensus to feature terms from constructed languages which are only in the Appendix space as FWOTDs: see "Appendix talk:Toki Pona/tonsi". — Sgconlaw (talk) 22:03, 14 July 2025 (UTC)
- I understand, why was this word allowed to be the FWOTD in the first place then? Changing it on the day of is incredibly unprofessional, and defeats the point of the FWOTD (which is to share interesting words in non-English languages) GiggyMantis (talk) 22:49, 14 July 2025 (UTC)
- @GiggyMantis: an editor had set it as FWOTD before the discussion took place, and no one changed it before it appeared. FWOTD does not currently have volunteers regularly setting entries, so it has to be expected that there will be some lapses. Also, sometimes FWOTDs and WOTDs need to be changed due to errors which are unfortunately not spotted earlier. — Sgconlaw (talk) 23:15, 14 July 2025 (UTC)
- I understand, why was this word allowed to be the FWOTD in the first place then? Changing it on the day of is incredibly unprofessional, and defeats the point of the FWOTD (which is to share interesting words in non-English languages) GiggyMantis (talk) 22:49, 14 July 2025 (UTC)
Etymology for Yakut word доҕор ‘friend’
It came to my attention that the etymology of the word доҕор (friend) was changed from Mongolic to Tungusic. It was previously stated that it originated from proto-mongolic *nökür. Now it says that it descended from proto-tungusic *dagu-r. I checked the reference material and it does not provide the etymology. All it says: dowor Hingan dialect; … |yak dogor|. In Evenki language words anda and girki are used for ‘friend’ and ‘mate’ respectively, and dowor is a loanword from Yakut. There are bunch of loanwords from Evenki, however they are mostly related to reindeer husbandry, hunting, names of animal and birds, etc. While borrowings from Mongolic sources are related to culture, administration, law, abstract concepts. So, for Yakuts, Mongolian language was like French to English. By this logic it is reasonable to expect that the word for ‘friend’ was borrowed from Mongolic language as a counterpart to the Turkic-derived атас (atas). So I wanted to know what is the basis for this change? Where did the provided etymology came from? Which works? 2A00:1FA3:523:CF80:FCAE:A3F2:7081:989 02:50, 17 July 2025 (UTC)