make a simple thesaurus

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Hey there, ive finished all the basic courses in python, and as a project i want to make a simple thesaurus, how should i go about making this?

This is what ive done so far to get a feel....

Python

import random

sentence = raw_input("sentence: ")
a = sentence.split()
for n,i in enumerate(a):
   if i=='hi':
      a[n]='hello'
   if i == 'dumb':
      a[n] =random.choice(['idiot', 'stupid'])
print a

my main problem is how do i use a dictionary to make it shorter?

Posted 8-Mar-14 17:58pm

Vidhu Shah

Updated 8-Mar-14 23:56pm

v2

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AspDotNetDev 9-Mar-14 0:33am

You'd want to gather some data (words/synonyms) and build an application that uses that data. Did you have a particular question in mind that you might update your current question to reflect?

Vidhu Shah 9-Mar-14 1:15am

actually now that i think of it, the problem i really have is how do i change each word in a sentence..

AspDotNetDev 9-Mar-14 1:17am

Could you update your question with some further info regarding what you've tried and some sample code? Basically, you'd have to split the sentence into words, lookup each word in the thesaurus, then use the replacement rather than the original word.

Vidhu Shah 9-Mar-14 1:18am

also i'd have to make a dictionary, wouldn't i... is there an easier way because it'd be pretty big ( all the words)...

AspDotNetDev 9-Mar-14 1:20am

So, that's a second issue... acquiring the data. I've tried this in the past and it's a pain, but there are sources out there, though none that are up to date and that you'd be able to use for free. Again, please update your question with exactly the obstacles you are encountering and any details regarding what you've tried or where you're stuck.

Vidhu Shah 9-Mar-14 5:57am

ive updated the question

Richard MacCutchan 9-Mar-14 8:21am

You would not do it by hard coding the alternative words. The first thing you need to do is to build your thesaurus with the words and phrases that you can handle. Then for each word in the sentence you would search the thesaurus. If the word is not found then leave it alone. If the word is found then you can change it. The problem is that you can only have a 1 to 1 correspondence unless you add some intelligence to the program to examine and parse the syntax, i.e. the 'sense' of the question. This is not a simple task.

Vidhu Shah 9-Mar-14 9:18am

thanks alot :) that helps.

Vidhu Shah 12-Mar-14 8:28am

hey again, do you know if its possible to use a thesaurus api?

Richard MacCutchan 12-Mar-14 8:36am

Yes, if you know of a thesaurus product that comes with one.

Vidhu Shah 12-Mar-14 8:44am

how about nltk: http://www.nltk.org/

Vidhu Shah 12-Mar-14 8:49am

or wordnet: http://osteele.com/projects/pywordnet/

Richard MacCutchan 12-Mar-14 9:35am

How about what? Go and study them and see if they meet your needs; I cannot tell you if they are the right products for what you want to do.

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AspDotNetDev · Accepted Answer · 2014-03-09T08:36:00

I don't know Python, but looking at the documentation, it'd go something like this (probably contains a few syntax errors):

Python

thesaurus = dict()
dataFile = open('somefile.dat', 'r')
for line in dataFile:
    parts = line.split('=')
    word = parts[0]
    synonyms = parts[1].split(',')
    thesaurus[word] = synonyms
sentence = raw_input("sentence: ")
originals = sentence.split()
replacements = []
for i,word in enumerate(originals):
    replacements[i] = random.choice(thesaurus[word])
print replacements

Keep in mind that is probably not good code. You'll want to add checks to see if the word exists in the thesaurus and such. Also, that code assumes the file is in this format:

jump=hop,skip
sound=audio,noise,racket

If you wanted to avoid using up lots of memory, you could store the thesaurus in a database rather than in an in-memory dict.