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I suspect it’s more likely they have a bunch of internal frameworks for creating, accessing, and distributing simple databases (something akin to SQLite). So t
by avianlyric 5y ago
I suspect it’s more likely they have a bunch of internal frameworks for creating, accessing, and distributing simple databases (something akin to SQLite).
So the difficulty we’re seeing here isn’t deliberate obfuscation, but rather just an dev using a database structure to make app design and word lookup easier.
If there really was licensing concerns I would expect there to at-least be some basic encryption, not just some basic compression.
- simonw 5y agoApple use regular SQLite for a whole bunch of other applications, such as Apple Photos. I wonder why they didn't use it here?
- spitfire 5y agoThe dictionary app (and hence its database) may go all the way back to NeXTStep/Openstep. Maybe not all of it. But I wouldn't doubt if bits of it went all the way back to the early days where a fancy dictionary was one of the star features of NeXTStep.
- simondotau 5y agoThe underlying file format and associated libraries are probably largely unchanged from the NeXTStep era. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. http://toastytech.com/guis/ns20mail.png http://toastytech.com/guis/ns20mail.png (Edit: beaten by 30 seconds!)