WordNet

WordNet is a lexical database for the English language. It groups English words into sets of synonyms called synsets, provides short definitions and usage examples, and records a number of relations among these synonym sets or their members. WordNet can thus be seen as a combination of dictionary and thesaurus. While it is accessible to human users via a web browser, its primary use is in automatic text analysis and artificial intelligence applications. The database and software tools have been released under a BSD style license and are freely available for download from the WordNet website. Both the lexicographic data (lexicographer files) and the compiler (called grind) for producing the distributed database are available. WordNet is a lexical database for the English language. It groups English words into sets of synonyms called synsets, provides short definitions and usage examples, and records a number of relations among these synonym sets or their members. WordNet can thus be seen as a combination of dictionary and thesaurus. While it is accessible to human users via a web browser, its primary use is in automatic text analysis and artificial intelligence applications. The database and software tools have been released under a BSD style license and are freely available for download from the WordNet website. Both the lexicographic data (lexicographer files) and the compiler (called grind) for producing the distributed database are available. WordNet was created in the Cognitive Science Laboratory of Princeton University under the direction of psychology professor George Armitage Miller starting in 1985 and has been directed in recent years by Christiane Fellbaum. The project was initially funded by the U.S. Office of Naval Research and later also by other U.S. government agencies including the DARPA, the National Science Foundation, the Disruptive Technology Office (formerly the Advanced Research and Development Activity), and REFLEX. George Miller and Christiane Fellbaum were awarded the 2006 Antonio Zampolli Prize for their work with WordNet. As of November 2012 WordNet's latest Online-version is 3.1. The database contains 155 327 words organized in 175 979 synsets for a total of 207 016 word-sense pairs; in compressed form, it is about 12 megabytes in size. WordNet includes the lexical categories nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs but ignores prepositions, determiners and other function words. Words from the same lexical category that are roughly synonymous are grouped into synsets. Synsets include simplex words as well as collocations like 'eat out' and 'car pool.' The different senses of a polysemous word form are assigned to different synsets. The meaning of a synset is further clarified with a short defining gloss and one or more usage examples. An example adjective synset is: