Kuma Software
£49.95
For many
years I have had by my desk both a dictionary and a thesaurus for
when I am writing. Every so often, I find myself thinking 'is that
really how it is spelt?', but even more often, 'there must be a
better word'. A thesaurus is a dictionary of synonyms –words with
similar meanings. The thesaurus I have is small, never seems to have
the word I require and it takes time to search for more
alternatives. I have always thought that this was an obvious task
for my computer.
K-Roget, by Kuma, is designed to provide just such a
facility. I started eagerly by reading the 18 page manual but soon
became lost as it switched from topic to topic so let me try and
give you an idea of the program without the manual. K-Roget is
installed as a Desk Accessory. To select a word, you select the
K-Roget option in the desk menu and then type in your word. If you
have K-Word 2, you can use a menu option to send the current word to
K-Roget automatically but this option is not available with other
software. K-Roget will search its files, and produce a list of
similar words. Three slider bars allow access to more words, the top
bar selecting alternative references (e.g. broadside is in with
synonyms like flank, salvo and great gun), another bar selecting
different paragraphs about the current reference, and the third
selecting new 'heads'. The 'heads' next to that located for you are
generally related to the subject. For instance the 'heads' next to
'untruth' are 'truth' and 'maxim', followed by 'absurdity' and
'ignoramus'.
You can move around in the subject you are interested in quite
easily. Another nice feature is that some of the suggestions are
multiple words, e.g. 'scholar' has the suggestion 'man or woman of
letters' and 'academic circles'. If K-Roget cannot find the word you
are looking for, it lists words that are spelt similarly, so you do
not have to know the precise spelling to use it.
Once you find a word, you can find more alternatives
by clicking on it in the window to select it. Also available is an
history feature, which allows you to see all the words you have
looked at in this session. If you are using K-Word 2, then you also
have the option to send the current word to replace the existing one
but with other applications you will have to note the word and
insert it manually.
I have recently used the new Wordstar Professional 4
which comes with Word Finder and is, to my mind, very much easier to
use than K-Roget, but is harder to look around similar subjects. I
find the controls of K-Roget frustrating, as the slider bars are not
fully implemented (you can drag, and click on arrows at the end, but
not click on the shaded part) and you cannot double click to select
and find a new word.
The manual is adequate but a bit of a struggle –
everything you need is there but it seems very disorganised – but
once you have the program installed and can understand the
terminology, use is intuitive. K-Roget needs two 1 megabyte disks or
a hard disk, or a RAM disk, (though it is supplied on three single
sided disks).
Overall, K-Roget provides some good alternatives to
most words, and if you do any writing, it is well worth looking at.
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