Ascendo's French English Dictionary + app for Android includes a variety of language tools to help you understand, pronounce, and practice French or English vocabulary and verbs. It's equally useful for speakers of either language.
You look up words in the dictionary by typing in the search box - each letter refines the list of words underneath, so you can find the word even if you're not sure about its spelling. The word list is bilingual with a little flag next to each word to let you know whether it's French or English. One thing I don't like is that there is no "enter" button - even if you do know the exact spelling, you have to tap the word in the list, which sometimes leads clumsier people like me to the page for the word just above or below the one I wanted. In the entry itself, the app provides the part of speech and translation(s). A very interesting option here is to add personal notes and/or an image to any entry.
The phrasebook includes more than 500 French and English expressions divided into 20 categories, including greetings, eating out, flirting, and emergencies, while the verb conjugator provides simple and compound conjugations for more than 6,000 French and English verbs.
The translation tool, which requires an internet connection, offers a paid, in-app version or your choice of in-browser tools, for example, Google Translate. Regardless of which one you choose, this feature suffers from the same issues as any automatic translation tool.
All of the above feature a button for text-to-speech pronunciation. The quality of any given pronunciation varies, but generally speaking, individual words are usually ok, while anything longer sounds mechanical and oddly singsong. Again, this is a flaw inherent in text-to-speech software.
The simple quiz tool can help you improve your vocabulary with multiple choice questions and automatic scoring.
All in all, Ascendo's French English Dictionary + is a handy Android app for native speakers of either French or English who are looking for quick translations and conjugations. There are also apps for iOS, BlackBerry, and Mac, but according to the website, some of the features are different.
Also see my lists of free French apps and software for learning French.
You look up words in the dictionary by typing in the search box - each letter refines the list of words underneath, so you can find the word even if you're not sure about its spelling. The word list is bilingual with a little flag next to each word to let you know whether it's French or English. One thing I don't like is that there is no "enter" button - even if you do know the exact spelling, you have to tap the word in the list, which sometimes leads clumsier people like me to the page for the word just above or below the one I wanted. In the entry itself, the app provides the part of speech and translation(s). A very interesting option here is to add personal notes and/or an image to any entry.
The phrasebook includes more than 500 French and English expressions divided into 20 categories, including greetings, eating out, flirting, and emergencies, while the verb conjugator provides simple and compound conjugations for more than 6,000 French and English verbs.
The translation tool, which requires an internet connection, offers a paid, in-app version or your choice of in-browser tools, for example, Google Translate. Regardless of which one you choose, this feature suffers from the same issues as any automatic translation tool.
All of the above feature a button for text-to-speech pronunciation. The quality of any given pronunciation varies, but generally speaking, individual words are usually ok, while anything longer sounds mechanical and oddly singsong. Again, this is a flaw inherent in text-to-speech software.
The simple quiz tool can help you improve your vocabulary with multiple choice questions and automatic scoring.
All in all, Ascendo's French English Dictionary + is a handy Android app for native speakers of either French or English who are looking for quick translations and conjugations. There are also apps for iOS, BlackBerry, and Mac, but according to the website, some of the features are different.
Also see my lists of free French apps and software for learning French.
