Greek-English Lexicon App Reviews

This is an extremely useful app for anyone with an interest in Ancient Greek, and I recommend it very heartily. (When I read Homer on then plane in a couple of days, my follow-travelers will be very glad Im not refering to the hard-copy Great Scott!) Also, kudos and kleos to David for the responsive fixes in this version. The final sigma is much appreciated, as is the standard Greek keyboard option.

Update - the final sigma was added in a recent update, which is great. And Im not having a problem with the keyboard anymore, which is good. I would still like some sort of opening menu or cover page. It just feels unfinished. Im extremely glad to have a Greek Dictionary on my iPhone. I have been waiting for this since the App Store was released! However, I do agree with the earlier reviewers on a couple points. Namely 1) no final sigma. I mean, we have an L&S on our phone and we cant get the alphabet right? 2) a list of abbreviations used would be great for most people. 3) a cover page. It isnt very nice to look at when the opening screen comes up; confused me the first time. 4) fix the bug that doesnt bring up the keyboard. 50% of the time I have to re-launch the app. Ill improve my rating if some of these get addressed. Overall, Im glad to have it.

Trying to translate septuagintal apocrapha took FOREVER flipping through all those pages of LIddel-Scott. But now I have the book in my palm and instantaneously go directly to the word. Thank God for technology.

Thank you for putting the app together. I would like to suggest that the next incarnation of the app include not just a flash screen, but, more importantly, a settings panel so that the font size can be increased or decreased as the user sees fit.

...but please give us the option to turn off the keyboard sounds. Thanks so much.

Good app but it does need a cover page. I thought it did not download. Also needs a help page to get you started since it would have been nice to know to access the iPhone setting page to change the font size.

This app has been useful for learning and reviewing Greek Definitions...for that I am grateful! However, there is much to be desired with user-interface. PLEASE, make an option to turn off the clicking sound when typing on the keyboard! If Im in class, and forget to turn the volume down, it is kind of distracting! PLEASE, add a button at the top of a definition window so that you can go directly back to the search window, instead of having to cycle all the way back through all words you have reviewed. And FINALLY, PLEASE add the little flashing curser mark inside the search window when typing...this helps with user input quite a lot. Thank you for considering these requests David Finucane!

Theres no question that having a portable LSJ is a great boon for reading Greek. Kudos for a fine job of porting this classic work to the iPhone. I would have preferred, however, to see LSJ come to iPhone as, well, more iPhone-ish. Despite the screenshots, the app takes up the whole screen, covering up the status bar at the top; theres really no need for that, and I for one like to keep an eye on the time and the battery meter. The problem with the lack of a splash screen or set of instructions is simply that the app blanks the screen and takes a long time to load, so perhaps what we really need is some indication that that is precisely what is going on. Finally (and I think worst of all), this app, like its Lewis & Short Latin Dictionary counterpart, has a name that is longer than the iPhone can display, which makes it an ugly duckling as it sits next to other apps on the main screen. But the good news is that the developer is obviously responsive to user feedback posted here (to any who have missed it, you can change font size, keyboard click, and keyboard format under "Settings"). Lets hope this app continues to evolve.

UPDATE FOR VERSION 1.3: I now give the app 5 stars. The suggestions I made above are pretty much all implemented: the keyboard now has options for alphabetical or QWERTY style layout. The Greek fonts in the dictionary entries now have excellent accentuation; all the accents and breathings were there before, but they are now much more beautifully rendered. Also has a nice feature for increasing text size, useful for tired eyes! Overall a FANTASTIC app! Ive been able to read Greek better than ever with this aid...even on an airplane where lugging the full LSJ would be impossible! εὐχαριστῶ! ORIGINAL REVIEW FOR VERSION 1.0: A great start for the app. Having LSJ in a form that doesnt weigh 100 pounds is definitely nice. A few minor things that could be improved: 1. The final sigma. 2. Accentuation and breathing marks dont seem to be standard Unicode: they appear a bit too far above letters, or, in the case of breathings, not above the letters at all. 3. The Greek keyboard is really nice, a first in an app to my knowledge. However, the keys are presented in alphabetical order. Itd be nice to have an option of putting them in "keyboard" order like in OS X: Im very used to typing Greek and find it strange for β to be at the top left (even though it is the second letter). Could also add the option to sort by breathings: for example, words that start with ἁ instead of ἀ.

The Lexicon is good, but lacks several features that would make it worth $5, as it is it should be under a dollar. Here are my suggestions to make this a really great app: - While you can adjust the font size, the adjustment is in the Settings not in the app itself, and there is no feedback on the font size. This requires you to go into settings, take a guess at font size, go into the app and judge if the size is right, if not then go back into Settings and try again. While I have no problem with the adjustment in Settings, there should be direct feedback on the font size so you can tell when you get it right, - The lexicon is only one-way (enter Greek, read English), for a good Bible study aid it would be helpful to be able to enter an English word and see the resulting Greek. (ex: angel or messenger would return aggelos). - When entering the app the search box is shown, the rest of the screen is blank. You have to tap into the search box to bring up the keyboard. Since there is nothing else that can be done with the app other that searching, the keyboard should be there as soon as you enter the app. - This brings up another issue, the text box doesnt always respond. You have to tap in the search box several times until the keyboard finally comes up, again, this can be resolved by having the keyboard open automatically. In either case, the difficulty of tapping the search box is a major issue; sometimes you have to exit the app and get back in before the search box will respond.

I sometimes have trouble popping up the keyboard when I want to look up a new word. Quitting and restarting the app seems to clear this. Could there be a "pop up keyboard" button?

This Greek Lexicon does its job but its been replaced by Lexiphanes on my iPhone. This Greek-English Lexicon app doesnt make use of the standard iPhone UI, instead it tries to take over with full-screen and not even using standard UI in full-screen. Also, its pretty slow to open up the app and then search for a word. However, since its using the open-source LSJ Lexicon from Perseus project its got good information in the backbone. The ability to increase and decrease the font size is nice, I suppose, and I guess people like the ability to hear keyboard clicks. However, competing against Lexiphanes which has a much nicer interface, runs faster, two (yes, two) lexicon dictionaries to search (LSJ, Autenrieth) and costs a few dollars less than this one, its not a difficult choice.

Liddell & Scott is THE GOLD STANDARD for Greek Classicists. This App (though, admittedly, unattractive and bare bones) makes this beast of a book easily accessible. What used to take me minutes to look up, I now can look up in seconds. Surprise your stuffy classics prof. Download this app. and you will become his/her teachers pet!

Not impressed. Bought it, synched and got nothing but a blank screen. Went through troubleshooting procedures still get nothing but blank screen. Went to developers website but hes taken his email down. So if you buy this, youre out 5 bucks.

Amazing application, wonderful job! Only major downside is the lack of final sigma like everyone else has said in the reviews. Also could use a cover screen. Cant wait for the updates ;)

I get a lot of use out of this app, but some of its minor glitches become major frustrations when they are encountered again and again. Since the creator doesnt have any sort of contact information on his website I am going to put the two misspelled words (bunch of characters and punctuation added into the lemma) here and hope that he sees them. στρατή and εία both feature this error (there are probably more like this). It turns out that this error is also present in the electronic version of LSJ available with the TLG, indicating that this was a simple cut-and-paste port of that info. The other major pain is the usage of hyperlinking within an entry. It seems to be completely at random and entries that consist entirely of a reference to another lemma, often dont link this word to its entry, despite the obvious benefits of such a practice. In addition, the app sometimes freezes up or takes a long time to register a press of the keyboard, usually after youve pressed the key a few more times just to make sure you didnt press too soft. Then you end up looking up some imaginary word with thee etas in it. I am definitely considering the switch to Lexiphanes.

What in the World is up with the $23.99 price tag. Way out of line!!

This is a "Classic Greek" lexicon and not a "Koine Greek" lexicon. This is important for seminary students who use the Gk. NA27 edition of the New Testament. Most of NT was written in Koine Gk. However, I cant believe its only .99cents for the wealth of info.

Should have listened to some of the reviews. Installed and came to a blank screen with no option but to type in Greek letters. Could not get any other screens no other options no other lookout. Unless you know how to type in Greek letters this is worthless. No way to look at Bible verses and find cross reference to the word. Not sure if its a compatibility problem as some people have actually got information but I am very frustrated to find I spent $1.99 for no reason at all. Although apparently this cost more before. They mustve dropped the price as reviews came in.

I was excited to see an app purporting to be the 1924 Edition of Liddell & Scotts, for only 1.95. The app, however, is not named Liddel and Scott but merely "Greek-English Lexicon". When I opened it, I got a blank screen. When I clicked in the search box I got a crude Greek keyboard. I then entered a Greek word and received a message against a blank background, "No results". This app is a scam and I will be contacting Apple to void the purchase.