synonym

Purpose

The function synonym() is used to search for synonyms of a given word or phrase.

Note

The main difference between the synonym() and the thesaurus() function is that synonym() uses synonyms dictionaries only, while thesaurus() uses both synonyms and semantics dictionaries.

Syntax

synonym([part_of_speech,] term, …​)

Arguments

The function requires a term which can be any word or phrase present in a dictionary of the Synonyms category. The function takes any number of terms as a comma-separated list.

In order to narrow the search, it is possible to set an optional argument part_ of_speech (POS-tag). In such case the function only returns those matches that have the indicated POS-tag.

Part of speech value

Short Notation

Example

noun

event, sister’s, cats …​

verb

talked, admit, moving, goes …​

adverb

advb

suddenly, more, yet, now …​

adjective

adjc

big, important, hard-working …​

The function also accepts the following optional named parameters:

  • scope — defines the search mode within a phrase.

    1. scope:=text (default value): synonyms of the whole phrase are searched.

    2. scope:=word: synonyms of the words that constitute a phrase are searched, i.e. synonym("a b", scope:=word) = phrase(synonym(a), synonym(b)).

  • pos — allows POS-dependent/independent search on the basis of POS-tags stated in the synonyms dictionary.

    1. pos:=yes (default value): synonyms of the same part of speech as argument.

    2. pos:=no: synonyms of any part of speech.

  • header — defines the header’s form.

    1. header:=form — header is the specified form of a word.

    2. header:=lemma (default value) — header is the dictionary form of a word.

    3. header:=any — header is both the dictionary and the specified form of a word.

If the parameter scope is omitted, synonyms of the whole phrase will be returned.

Returned Value

Documents matching the query.

Examples

synonym(noun, hot) is equivalent to the query "burning or warm or boiling or tropical".

synonym(iddm, niddm) returns the mentions of "IDDM", "NIDDM" and their synonyms, e.g. "type I diabetes" and "type II diabetes".

synonym(verb, brew) returns the mentions of "brew" and its synonyms if they are verbs e.g. "brewed by the Tokyo-based company", but not "a brewage of fraud and deception".

synonym("fee rate", scope:=word) returns "fee rate" and "tax rate" if "fee" and "tax" are synonyms in the synonym dictionary.

synonym(amazing, pos:=no) returns amaze, fascinating and fascinate. synonym(amazing, pos:=yes) returns fascinating.

synonym(cat) = synonym(cat, header:=lemma) returns only synonyms of the header which is the dictionary form of a word.

synonym("cat’s", header:=form) returns only synonyms of the header which is the specified form of a word.

synonym(cat, header:=any) = synonym(cat) or synonym("cat’s", header:=form) returns both synonyms of the header as the dictionary form and the specified form of a word.