Reading French books on Android

EhBenDisDonc

E-readers are a Godsend for language learners. It’s an absolute pleasure to tap on a word and have instant access to a fully featured dictionary translation. I really enjoyed this in the days of Mobireader on PDA, but I’ve struggled to get the same functionality on Android.

Anyway, now that I’ve arrived at a solution I can live with, I thought I’d share it.

The simplest solution is simply to install the Kindle app, as the integrated dictionary is really excellent. The problem is that it requires you to buy your books on Amazon, and the selection of French language books there is poor. Still, it’s a great place to start.

It is apparently possible to get the Kindle app to read non-Kindle or DRM free books using Calibre, but that’s not the route I chose.

There are a lots of great Android readers out there that work with a range of dictionary apps, such as Moon+ and FB Reader. I use Moon+, but have struggled to match it up with a French dictionary with full functionality such as recognition of verb forms.

For French only, a great solution is to install the Livio French dictionary App that integrates perfectly with Moon+. Another option is Offline Dictionaries Pro that comes with the French Littre 1877 and the French Academy 8th Ed; however it doesn’t recognise verb forms.

For French-English, I found a superb solution with the help of this link and this link. Colordict dictionary app works well, and can use any Stardict dictionary (these are widely available on the web). However, I found that installing these is a serious head-wrecker. Now that I’ve figured it out, here is what worked for me:

- From this link, download the StarDict .tar.bz2 data files for Larousse (one each for Eng-Fr and Fr-Eng) to your PC.
- Uncompress the .tar.bz2 files. I used 7-Zip (a free download).
- The extracted files for each dictionary contain a file with extension .dz. Change the extension to .gz.
- Uncompress each .gz file. You should end up with a .dict file, among others.
- Copy all uncompressed files to the /dictdata folder in your Android devices sdcard. Note: When I transferred these files using Dropbox, the .dict files got changed to .txt, so I renamed them back to .dict (can’t explain that).
- Run ColorDict. In theory, it should recognise the new dictionaries. In my case it didn’t go so well. I simply uninstalled and re-installed Colordict so it could re-index the dictionaries, and it worked perfectly thereafter.

If you got this far, you now have a very powerful reading solution. From there, you can look around for other dictionaries if you like. I installed a few more Babylon ones; some were too basic, and the Littre gummed up Colordict so I removed it and re-installed Colordict.

I’d be pleased to know if any of you find this post useful, and I would also love to hear whether any of you have other tips, suggestions or solutions. For anyone who enjoys reading in French but isn’t using some kind of ‘liseuse’, I highly recommend that you give it a go.

ConFurioso

I was thinking about getting the new Nexus 7 to aid with my French (and Japanese) reading. Just getting to annoying reading stuff on my laptop. Never had an e-reader before. Had no idea you could tap words for dictionary use......almost a 100% purchase for me now! Sounds like you have to jump through a few hoops though! Worth it?

EhBenDisDonc

ConFurioso, I wouldn't hesitate if I were you. I have the original Nexus 7, and I can hardly put it down. I absolutely love reading on it. Don't worry if the above instructions look complicated; they're not really.
I'd also recommend buying the Larousse French-English and French dictionaries from the Google Play store.
And I can't get over how easy it is to write in French using the Swype keyboard (set to French).
I could go on :-) But I think I can guarantee that you wouldn't be disappointed by the Nexus 7.