Custom Selectable Dictionaries

Hello. First of all, thank you for making this wonderful piece of software. It makes my writing a pure joy!

I write sci-fi/fantasy novels. As such, I often have words that I create for my stories. These can be names, places, events, anything. Of course, they are not recognized by any spell checker. I know that, in Scrivener, I can right click on a “misspelled” word and click Learn Spelling. However, I would like to be able to do more.

When using MS Word, I am able to create a custom dictionary (or dictionaries) to use alongside the general dictionary. In this custom dictionary I can add all of my unusual terms in all of their forms (singular, plural, possessive, etc) and thus spell check for them. Because I can create custom dictionaries (naming them) I can assign them to different projects. For example, I wrote a novel called The Dreamshift Chronicles. During its writing, I made a custom dictionary called DSC. All of my words, unique to that novel, including figures of speech used by a particular character, were included and, thus, I could spell check for them. When working on a different book, I could remove the custom dictionary, add a different one, or create a new one if I wanted to.

I would like to be able to do this in Scrivener. Sure, these words are made up, but even the author can mistype them. So being able to spell check our made up words is important. :wink:

Thank you for your consideration.

Really? No one is interested in making separate custom dictionaries for their novels in Scrivener?

I am!

I’m writing in German and English, but Scrivener saves one dictionary for every project. I have to change the dictionary by hand every time I switch language, and if I translate a story from one language to the other I have to add all the invented words and names again. It’s not a major nuisance, but it does take time I’d like to spend writing.
Having the option to save the chosen dictionary for a project would definitely improve usability :slight_smile: