I just searched for the meaning of the word “ungrudging” and guess what the dictionary told me?
Not grudging.
Of course, it is an accurate answer. But, I still don’t understand the word “ungrudging” because I don’t understand the word “grudging”. I need to now search for “grudging”, understand its meaning, and then apply its negative to understand “ungrudging”.
I see this problem in almost every dictionary I use. When you search for a negative word, the meaning is simply useless. You need to search again for its opposite and connect the dots yourself.
Print dictionaries having this problem is understandable: Ungrudging will be under the letter “u” and Grudging will be under the letter “g” elsewhere. So, users are forced to physically turn to a different page to understand the meaning of grudging.
But, online dictionaries don’t have this “physical page” problem. Instead of simply saying “Not Grudging”, they can simply pull the meaning of grudging and display it just below, saving one click to the user, making him/her happy.
I hope online dictionary developers listen to this pain point and “undo” the “unnecessary” complication in their apps! When they do, I will happily “unpublish” this article.
