French Spanish Word Searches app for desktop

An initial desktop version of Spanish Word Searches is now available. This should definitely be considered a test version and updates will be released shortly!

The app is based on Spanish Word Searches for iPad, which is a complete product available for iPad from the App Store.

New Spanish Word Searches app for iPad

Start the New Year by reinforcing your Spanish vocab with this new iPad app! Spanish Word Searches for iPad was released to the App Store today!

As with its sister app, French Word Searches (also for iPad), the app allows you to take advantage of the full iPad screen size to play Spanish Word Searches according to your chosen topics and difficulty level.

The 1,400 items of basic Spanish vocabulary included in the app are divided into 20 topics and you can play word searches with any combination of topics. As with its French counterpart, the app allows you to choose whether you play with "simple" word searches (in which words run only across or down, and only forwards) or whether words are also allowed to run backwards and/or diagonally.

Whilst much of this core vocabulary is similar across Spanish-speaking countries, there are of course a few differences, just as there are between (say) UK and US English. For this reason, the app allows you to switch between Peninsular (Spain) Spanish and Mexican Spanish. Whether you are currently playing a Peninsular or Mexican Spanish word search is clearly indicated by the flag in the background. (Toggle between Peninsular/Mexican Spanish from the main menu before starting play.)

A new feature added to this Spanish version of the word searches app is that vocabulary is automatically updated over the network when new versions are released. (New words will be added over time, and users' feedback and suggestions are always welcome!)

To celebrate the launch, Spanish Word Searches is currently available half price. Take advantage and grab your copy by clicking the link above or directly from your iPad by searching for "Spanish Word Searches" in the App Store.

Suggestiosn for new Spanish phrases

I am looking for suggestions for new topics for the Spanish vocab and phrases section of the site. At the bottom of the page, I invite users to enter suggestions for new topics to be included.

Update to Spanish dictionary

Following the server move over the weekend, the site's Spanish dictionary has been updated to include the latest additions and corrections. This update also fixes a problem whereby a few entries were previously not appearing.

Español-Inglés moving to a new server

The Español-Inglés site today moves to a new upgraded server. As the move is finalised, there will surely be some gremlins which will be ironed out over the next few days.

The move has been deliberately timed to conincide with when most people should be sipping cava rather than doing Spanish translation and homework, but for those who are accessing the site over these next few days, thank you for your patience!

Further updates to the Spanish dictionary

Today's update to the Spanish dictionary, as well as adding various new entries to the dictionary, improves on various entries for commonly looked up words. Further improvements are planned over the coming weeks -- watch this space!

Update to the Spanish dictionary

Well, it's been a while, but the site's Spanish dictionary was updated today to include various new words and to expand a number of existing entries.

Spanish dictionary update

Today's update to the Spanish dictionary brings additions and improvements to just over 1,100 entries in the dictionary.

Update to the "Vocabularium" software

A small update to the Vocabularium Spanish vocabulary podcast software is now available for free download. For those not familiar with the software, it allows you to create vocabulary learning podcasts, relying on English and Spanish voices being installed on your computer (some free and good quality low-cost options are suggested: see the section on Spanish voice options for more details).

The software runs on Windows, Linux, Solaris and Mac OS. This update adds a new vocabulary topic (on school subjects). A few minor bugs have also been fixed.

Note that to save podcasts in MP3 format, you'll also require a plugin called LAME. See the aforementioned page for details of how to obtain LAME free of charge for your system. On Windows, the Vocabularium software can actually install LAME for you: follow the instructions that appear when you first run the program.

Spanish dictionary update

Today's update adds various new entries to both the Spanish-English and English-Spanish sides of the dictionary. As with many updates, the new entries include both commonly-consulted everyday words, plus a number of technical terms.

Spanish dictionary update

Today's update to the Spanish dictionary adds a number of new entries and improvements to existing entries. Various commonly-referenced entries in the English-Spanish side of the dictionary have also been improved.

Spanish dictionary update

Today's update to the Spanish dictionary adds various new words and terms and improves the definitions of various common words.

Users of the dictionary may also be interested in an article I published a few weeks ago on improving your Spanish reading and dictionary skills.

Spanish chemistry terms

In what will be a new series on Spanish technical vocabulary, a new section has been added to the Spanish vocabulary section of the site giving various instances of Spanish chemistry terminology.

The page starts with Spanish terms for various basic concepts such as atom, molecule, ion, bond. Then the names of different types of chemical and functional groups is given (the Spanish terms for aldehyde, ketone, ester etc).

The section on the Spanish names of chemical elements gives a list of common elements, some of which have traditional names which have undergone sound changes and are thus more difficult to predict (e.g. iron, derived from the Latin ferrum, is nowadays hierro in Spanish; sulphur is azufre). However, the names of many other elements can actually be dervied from a few simple rules, such as the fact that the ending -ium is practically always -io in Spanish.

A final section looks at how to describe chemical reactions in Spanish, including terms for different types of reaction and a few useful terms for describing chemical formulae.

Spanish dictionary update

Well, after a slight hiatus while I caught up on some translation projects, the site's Spanish dictionary has been updated to include various new words and phrases. Notable words include patochada, the official Spanish word for "constructing a duck house at the public's expense", plus various medical terms (yes, I've been watching too many episodes of House recently).

Some new sections to both the Spanish and English grammar sections are also in the pipeline. Watch this space...

Book review: Correct your Spanish Blunders

Beginner to intermediate level Spanish students (or those teaching Spanish at high school level) will be interested in the review of Correct your Spanish Blunders (McGraw-Hill) now available on the Español-Inglés site. As with its French counterpart, the book takes a particularly straightforward, practical approach to Spanish grammar that some students will welcome. It's probably fair to say that the book assumes that the reader has a small amount of previous knowledge of Spanish and basic grammar terms such as verb, tense etc. But with that in mind, the book covers most of the grammar you're likely to need at high school level in a compact, no-nonesense way.

As mentioned in the review, the main caveat is that more advanced students will be looking for something a little more in-depth, such as Butt & Benjamin's New Reference Grammar of Modern Spanish, which covers more advanced topics such as regional and stylistic variation in Spanish, use of literary forms such as the future subjunctive, more detailed treatment of Spanish pronominal verbs, and in general a more "discursive" approach to grammar.

For many students, though, Correct your Spanish Blunders will hit the nail on the head in terms of providing just enough detail in just the right way. See the review for more details.

Spanish pronunciation and rhythm

Users of the Español-Inglés site may be interested in an article I wrote recently entitled Improve your Spanish pronunciation: Getting the rhythm. The article looks in particular at how Spanish speakers divide their speech into syllables. The rhythm of speech can be an important factor in making it easier to understand. The article looks at some subtle cases that you may not have considered, for example, that the Spanish word usual is generally pronounced in two syllables, whereas its English counterpart generally has three.

Grammar section: Spanish object pronouns

You may be interested in a recently added grammar section looking at Spanish object pronouns. As in related languages such as French and Italian, Spanish has a system of so-called clitic pronouns. When the object of a verb is a pronoun (the equivalent of English me, him etc), then that pronoun generally occurs as a kind of prefix to the verb.

For example, the Spanish for he/she saw is vio. To say he saw me (or she...), the Spanish would be me vio. The Spanish for me is coincidentally spelt the same as English. Note that the Spanish word me comes before the verb vio.

For some more examples and practice of these Spanish object pronouns placed before the verb, see the above link.

Coming soon: UK-specific site

A UK-specific version of this site, at http://www.spanish-dictionary.co.uk/, will offer an interface to the Spanish dictionary and certain other UK-targeted versions of the Spanish resources available on the Español-Inglés site. UK-based users may therefore wish to bookmark the UK version of the site.

Spanish dictionary update

Today's update to the Spanish dictionary adds various new words and example translations. And yes, I've you been wondering what is the Spanish for swine flu, now's your chance to find out...

Update to Vocabularium

Version 0.03 of the Vocabularium podcast software now adds MP3 encoding support for Linux and Mac OS. It also adds a new vocabulary topic on The Human Body.

You can download the latest version of the software via the abovementioned link (entry on Freshmeat for this software), or directly via the Vocabularium home page.