Re: [dict-beta] Perl interface to DICT?

[Rik F. <fa...@cs...>]

On Thu 16 Jul 1998 20:43:09 -0500,
   Bob Parks <bo...@li...> wrote:
> Dmitri,
> I plan to dictionary-enable the text on thousands of web pages, so that the
> browser can click on a word and get a dictionary entry.  I have a
> dictionary online (http://www.lightlink.com/bobp/wedt), and I need to have
> a dictionary server that will process a hundred or more request per minute.
> Might the server you are working on be suitable?
> Bob Parks
> Elmira College

This wasn't sent to the dict-beta list, but I assume it was supposed to be.

The DICT server can serve 100-200 "exact match" (i.e., not regular
expressions) requests per _second_ across all installed databases on a
P5/133.  This does not count network latency.

Performance can be improved by uncompressing the databases and/or by using
a faster machine.

> >On Thu 16 Jul 1998 01:55:37 -0400,
> >   Bret Martin <bam...@di...> wrote:
> >> On Wed, 08 Jul 1998 20:52:18 +0300 Rubinstein Dmitry wrote:
> >> > The reason for that is here:
> >> >
> >> > http://www.wisdom.weizmann.ac.il/dict/cgi-bin/dict.pl
> >> >
> >> > This system acts like a filter, getting documents from the WWW and
> >> > serving them to the client, but in a way, that allows the client to
> >> > get an instant translation of any word in the document.
> >
> >That's slick.  Do you plan to make the code freely redistributable?
> >
> >> > The only thing that
> >> > stands in my way - an absence of Perl interface. I need a fast one,
> >> > able of retrieving hundreds of words in a single transaction. I
> >> > suppose I'll have to write one. Any input you can provide me with in
> >> > this regard will be highly appreciated.
> >
> >What OS platform are you using?  The C client should run on most any
> >unix-like system, and would be easy to modify to make 100's of requests at
> >a time.  Are the definitions so snappy because you _prefetch_ all of them
> >for every work on the page?  Could you do it on a per-request basis,
> >assuming a fast backend (i.e., DICT)?
> >
> >> > Also I'm looking for a home for this project. I plan to move it from
> >> > it's current location ASAP. Is there a possibility of www.dict.org
> >> > hosting it?
> >>
> >> Rik would have to answer this question or refer it to the person who
> >> maintains the machine on which www.dict.org is located.
> >
> >We will happily redistribute any freely distributable sources (i.e., GPL or
> >Open Source).  Actual Web site access and CPU cycles are restricted by our
> >sponsors (since they are running an unrelated production environment), and
> >we'd have to talk off-list about what resources are needed and how we might
> >be able to help.