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Presentation of the New ISO-Standard for the Representation of Entries in Dictionaries: ISO 1951

Times have changed over the last ten years in terms of dictionary production. With the introduction of digital support and networking, the lifespan of dictionaries has been considerably extended. The dictionary manuscript has become a unique data-source that can be reused and manipulated many times by numerous in-house and external experts. The traditional relationship between author, publisher and user has now been extended to include other partners: data-providers - either other publishers or institutions or industry-partners - , software developers, language-tool providers, etc. All these dictionary experts need a basic common language to optimize their work flow and to be able to co-operate in developing new products while avoiding time-consuming and expensive data manipulations. In this paper we will first of all present the ISO standardization for Lexicography which takes these new market needs into account, and then go on to describe the new standard ISO 1951: -“Presentation/Representation” of entries in dictionaries- which was published in March 2007. In conclusion, we will outline the benefits of standardization for the dictionary publishing industry.