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Created: 13-06-2026 · Last updated: 05-09-2026

Troubleshooting

Most lookup problems have the same handful of causes. Work down this list in order.

"My word returns no results"​

  1. Wrong input scheme — by far the most common cause. The search box matches against a specific transliteration. An IAST word (rāma) typed while the box expects Harvard-Kyoto will not match. Re-check the selected input scheme and retype. See Encoding & Transliteration for the scheme table and a worked śiva / kṛṣṇa example.
  2. You typed an inflected or sandhi'd form. Dictionaries are keyed by stem/headword, not by inflected forms. Look up the stem (e.g. gaccha-, not gacchati). For Monier-Williams, the Inflected forms resource maps a form back to its headword.
  3. Spelling, homonyms, or long vs short vowels. Switch to the L (List) display to browse neighbouring headwords and confirm the exact spelling and any homonym number.
  4. Wrong dictionary for the word. A Vedic term may be absent from a classical dictionary and vice-versa. See Choosing a dictionary.
  5. Accents (Vedic). Some Vedic dictionaries (e.g. Grassmann) carry accent marks. If an accented search fails, retry without the accent, or check whether the display offers an accent: no option.

"It matches, but the characters render wrong"​

That is the output scheme, set independently of input. Switch the output menu to deva (Devanāgarī), roman (IAST), or whichever you want to read. Storage is always SLP1; display is converted on the fly — see Encoding & Transliteration.

"A citation link doesn't open a scanned page"​

Not every literary-source citation (<ls>) has been linked to its scan yet — that linking ("Dictionary to Book") is ongoing editorial work. An unlinked citation is expected, not a bug. See Scans & Print and the Issue Taxonomy.

"A scan page is blurry, skewed, or missing"​

That is worth reporting as a scan-quality issue. See Scans & Print and Contributing → Overview.

Still stuck?​

Check the FAQ, or open an issue on the dictionary's GitHub repository — see Contributing.

Dr. Mārcis Gasūns