Dictionary + Spellcheck system-wide for Gnome?

Hi there,
I’ve been searching for a useful dictionary & spell check solution since I moved to Linux full time a year ago, but haven’t found anything really usable. Does it not exist or am I looking in the wrong places?

I am looking for advice or discussion on this topic. Have you found a good way?

I have some criticisms below which are meant to highlight the problems I’ve noticed. Please dont take this as bashing the apps or Linux, I am just explaining what I find frustrating & I am curious why these things, which seem to me really essential, are not present.

What I currently do is just open a browser & use thesaurus.com or dictionary.com, but it is tedious to not have quick access to spelling & definitions with right-click system wide.

Gnome-Dictionary I have found almost useless since you must spell a word perfectly to find it, & there is no way to browse, such as words starting with B etc

Lots of apps generally have little or no support for dictionary tools - Evince has no way to define words, I would think it really helpful to be able to click words & see a definition in a document reader. That is what makes a computer more useful.

LibreOffice has an archaic spellcheck system, as great an app that is, I’m struggling to enjoy using it with the slow spelling tools - which again = really important for an app where you are writing words.

OpenOffice does better with the spellcheck, but lacks definitions.

EReader Bookworm has a define word option, but unfortunately it doesn’t work at all.

I have found a Firefox plug-in which is quite good for definitions (English popup dictionary) & Firefox has a built in spellchecker & right-click-suggestions, which is exactly what all the other apps are missing.

Why is this area so lacking when the primary way we use computers is to type & read words? The tools should be as effortless as breathing.

I do use Manjaro Xfce, but this should apply to Manjaro GNOME as well.

First check under Manjaro Settings Manager > Local Settings > System Locales which languages are installed on your system. Then install the missing languages by clicking Add.

Then check under Manjaro Settings Manager > Language Packages > Available Language Packages which additional language packages are available for installation. If there are any available language packages, you can install them by clicking Install Packages.

Under Manjaro Settings Manager > Language Packages > Installed Language Packages, you can check which language packages are installed for which programs.

Thanks. I didnt know about this.
I checked your advice & System Locals seems correct for me. I use UK English as my main language, my computer is Japanese & I use Japanese Keyboard layouts. But I am only concerned in my daily life about dictionary/spelling in UK English.

As to the Lang Packages I am unsure…
It looks like I can install some extras, but none of them seem quite relevant to my question. Which is : “What is a decent Dictionary app & system-wide spell-checker?”
It doesn’t seem these updates would provide that. Are they translations for gimp, libre office & firefox?



On Linux, the Firefox and Thunderbird language packs usually include the respective dictionaries in addition to the display languages. In text fields, you can switch between the dictionaries with a right-click.

The LibreOffice language packages also include the respective dictionaries (Hunspell) in addition to the display languages. They are supplemented accordingly by the Hyphen and MyThes packages. Additionally, you can install the LibreOffice extension English dictionaries for OpenOffice/LibreOffice 4.0+ and for the grammar the extension LanguageTool, which by the way is also available as a browser extension.

As far as Gimp and Asian languages are concerned, I can’t help you, since I have no experience in this area.