dictionary as an argument instead of attribute

[drdhaval2785]

• Python Interface to Cologne Digital Sanskrit Lexicon (CDSL) version: 0.2.1
• Python version: 3.9.1
• Operating System: Bodhi linux 6

Description

Instead of results = CDSL.MW.search("राम")
Kindly provide a functionality like results = CDSL.search(query="राम", dictionary="MW")

This would be required because I can easily pass 'MW' string I got from CLI, without much hassle.
Otherwise it gives me CDSL."MW" instead of CDSL.MW required in present state of affairs.

What I Did

Feature request.

[drdhaval2785]

Similarly require the same functionality for entry.
entry = CDSL.entry('12352', dictionary="MW")

[drdhaval2785]

Also see #13 for transliteration preferences to be added in the search and entry functionalities.

[hrishikeshrt]

Current CDSL.MW etc usage is a QoL feature.
The dictionary access actually happens through CDSL.dicts['MW'] etc.
Under the hood, when CDSL.MW is called, it calls CDSL.dicts['MW'] if the dictionary is installed.

[hrishikeshrt]

We can discuss the addition of search and entry commands to CDSLCorpus as well.
Currently, they are part of CDSLDict class.

I am in favour of search functionality, but not of entry functionality. Tracking this in #15

[drdhaval2785]

You mean to say that I can use CDSL.dicts["MW"].search("राम") to achieve results similar to CDSL.MW.search("राम") ?

[drdhaval2785]

If so, Kind request to document it in the docs, please.

[hrishikeshrt]

You mean to say that I can use CDSL.dicts["MW"].search("राम") to achieve results similar to CDSL.MW.search("राम") ?

That is correct.
Doing CDSL.dicts["MW"] would in fact be faster, as CDSL.MW first has to pass through a __getattr__ call.

If so, Kind request to document it in the docs, please.

Documentation added in fec3de7

[drdhaval2785]

thanks

[hrishikeshrt]

I would like to add that since version 0.6.0+, use of [] operator is supported on CDSLCorpus and CDSLDict objects (introduced in commits 554fa7c and 4efce8f)

What this means is, we can now do CDSL["MW"] (in addition to the other two methods, CDSL.dicts["MW"] and CDSL.MW for CDSLCorpus instance.
Similarly, we can also use it on CDSLDict isntance to get entry by ID, i.e. CDSL["MW"]["263938"] (which is (mostly) equivalent with CDSL.entry("263938")

The documentation mentions these features as well. Also, it should be noted that while [] on CDSLCorpus is completely equivalent with . access and .dicts[] access, there is a minor difference between CDSLDict[] and CDSLDict.entry().
The difference being, in case an entry_id is absent, call based on [] will raise a KeyError while a call to CDSLDict.entry will return None and log a logging.ERROR level message