Publex

As part of the ELEXIS - “European Lexicographic Infrastructure” initiative, TCDH developed the Publex tool, a browser-based publishing software for XML-annotated dictionaries.

With the help of the software and an intuitive user interface, users can upload their dictionary data marked in XML and define the desired formatting for the dictionary by configuring the individual components. With these settings and the attached metadata, the dictionary can finally be published online on a platform provided by ELEXIS. Publex, thus, also enables users who do not have the appropriate infrastructure or technical knowledge to make their dictionaries accessible on the Internet.

Step by step dictionary publishing with Publex

A user manual guides you in detail and step by step through the application process (Publication on DARIAH Campus). This can be roughly divided into three steps:

1. uploading the data
2. defining the representation
3. publishing the dictionary

Users can import their XML dictionary data from a Git repository into Publex and submit metadata about the dictionary. The core of the tool is the definition of styling rules, which define how the individual elements of the dictionary articles should be displayed in the published online version. Upon import, Publex parses the data and captures all tags, attributes, and associated attribute values with which the resource has been tagged. For each of these elements and specific combinations, properties such as font style, font size, color, letterspacing, or text indent can now be specified. In addition, elements can be defined as search categories and added to the lemma list.

Special characters can be included and displayed via the KompLett font. For this purpose, the TCDH provides a file with all the non-Unicode characters defined for the Trier dictionaries.

In parallel to the creation of the display rules, the user can look at the Dictionary Preview at any time to see how the defined styling rules are implemented and how the dictionary will look in the publication version. Publex provides different accesses to the dictionary: a lemma list and different search options. The items in the lemma list are sorted alphabetically and can be searched using a search box. Clicking on them displays the linked dictionary item on the screen. The general search can be used to search the dictionary contents in full text, the advanced search offers an AND-linked search over the full text and any number of information fields previously defined as search categories in the styling rules.

Once published, the dictionary receives its own URI and also appears, along with its metadata, on the "PUBLEX Dictionaries" page with all previously published dictionaries. It is also possible to set up and use the entire Publex infrastructure on your own server.