Artha - An open cross-platform thesaurus based on WordNet
===============================================================================
Copyright (c) 2009, 2010  Sundaram Ramaswamy, <legends2k@yahoo.com>


Overview
--------
Artha is a cross-platform open-source thesaurus with WordNet as its database.

The main focus of Artha is high usability, with much simplicity. It has 
distinct features like:

	* hotkey press - word look-up (select text and press a hotkey for look-up)
	* regex-based search (find words using wild-cards like *, ?, etc.)
	* passive desktop notifications (of word definitions for uninterrupted 
	  workflow)
	* spelling suggestions (when the exact spelling is vague/not known)

Once launched, Artha sits on the system tray. The user can select text on any 
window, and summon Artha by pressing the user-set hotkey combination, which 
pops up Artha with the word looked up. Should you want passive notifications 
without Artha's window popping up so that your workflow is undisturbed, it can 
be done by enabling the 'Notifications' option. This results in a desktop 
notification (balloon tip) of the selected word's prime definition from 
WordNet, from the system tray, when the hotkey is pressed.

Technically, Artha is written in pure C using the GTK+ widget kit & Glib, 
making it cross-desktop and cross-platform. It uses libnotify for the desktop 
notifications and lienchant for spelling suggestions. It may be used as a 
advanced replacement for WordWeb in GNU/Linux environments. Currently different
flavours of GNU/Linux are targeted, but porting to other UNIX-like systems and 
Mac OS X will commence soon.


Installation
------------
Artha requires the development headers of GTK+-2.12.x, GLib-2.14 and 
WordNet-3.x (minimum required version numbers are specified). If you are 
building for Windows you need to set up MinGW and MSYS with pkg-config.
See 'INSTALL' file for a how-to on this.

Simple install procedure:

  $ tar xvf <package_name>			# unpack the sources
  or
  $ gzip -cd <package_name>			# alternative to above

  $ cd artha-<version>				# change to the top-level directory
  $ ./configure					# run the `configure' script
  $ make					# build artha
  [ Become root by 'su' or 'sudo' ]
  # make install				# install artha

Read the 'INSTALL' file for detailed information.


Bugs & Queries
--------------
Suggestions, bugs and queries are welcome! You can post them at 
http://launchpad.net/artha/+filebug


Licence
-------
Artha is free software. You are free to use, modify and redistribute it 
under certain conditions. See COPYING for a detailed licence.


More Information
----------------
Visit project home at http://artha.sourceforge.net/ for more information.

