access freedict or other servers using the dict protocol

[Jens Grivolla]

Hi,

since babelfish.altavista.com is not available using SOAP anymore, I am
looking for a way to access other translation services, such as
freedict. Single word translation would be sufficient.

I am surprised to find that it seems non-trivial to talk to DICT
servers, there don't seem to be any readily useable Java classes out
there. I know about jfdc, but it seems a bit on the heavy side.

I couldn't find any DICT->SOAP interfaces or SOAP access to freedict
either.

Thanks for any pointers.

Ciao,
Jens