Action Commands: “Add”, “Merge”, “Replace” and “Delete Left”

you have deleted an existing lemma from the Kiswahili.tldict file, or Sarah has added a new lemma to her Sarah.tldict file. These are displayed in green (see e.g. “-pokea”, “polepole” or “pona” in the screenshot).

Figure 22: “Action” tab in the dictionary Compare/Merge dialog, here comparing/merging two versions of a bilingual Kiswahili – English dictionary database [Data online at: http://africanlanguages.com/kdp/]

Action Commands: “Add”, “Merge”, “Replace” and “Delete Left”

At this point you might then want to inspect Sarah’s changes in each case where there are differences, and use the “Add”, “Merge”, “Replace” or “Delete left” commands, which are available on the “Action” tab, to then transfer her changes to the main database. Keep in mind that these commands will always make changes to Kiswahili.tldict (i.e. the file opened first), and never to Sarah.tldict. The four commands work as follows:

Add: The article on the right is added to the main database, in its entirety, as a new lemma. Use this if the lemma is a new one or a new homonym added by Sarah. Merge: All senses and other child elements of the article on the right are added to the existing article on the left (i.e. the existing article in the main database). This option only applies to lemmas that exist in both databases, but are different. Replace: The version of the article on the right replaces the version of the article on the left (i.e. the existing article in the main database). This option only applies to articles that exist in both