The main purpose of the Lexicon Component in ELAN is to support the (semi-automated) interlinearization process. It is not intended as a full-fledged lexicon tool, though the data model supports a bit more than strictly necessary for its main purpose. The data model and XML-based data format are similar to the LIFT format (Lexicon Interchange Format)), but simplified. These are the main fields of a lexical entry:

The main field is lexical-unit (equivalent to lemma, headword, the primary lexical form). morph-type indicates the word part (e.g. stem, prefix, suffix), analyzers can use this information when processing the input text. The grammatical-category field is the category of the lexical item, the part of speech. The Edit Entry window shows which other fields can be added at the moment. (The data model defines more fields than visible in the entry window, but support and documentation hereof is still pending.) The user can add custom fields at the level of the entry and at the level of sense, these will be visible as field: name.

In the lexicon panel of the interlinearization mode the contents of lexicons can be displayed, one lexicon at the time. But it is possible to store and manage multiple lexicons on disc and choose which one to display. The leftmost drop-down box above the table lists all lexicons that have created or imported.

Figure 351. The list of available lexicons

If a lexicon has been selected and is displayed in the panel, lexical entries can be added, edited or removed.

Figure 352. Lexicon overview

The lexicon overview can be adjusted to display or hide certain columns. To do so, you have to right-click on a lexical entry to display the context-menu. From there, you can show or hide columns of the lexicon. Some fields can occur more than once in an entry (like variant or gloss), these will be displayed in a single cell, each value surrounded by square brackets. The context menu also has Add, Remove and Edit items, which have the same function as the buttons below the table (see the section called “Editing lexical entries”).

Figure 353. Lexicon context-menu

The order of the entries in the table can be changed by clicking on any of the column headers, a little arrow indicates whether the items are sorted in ascending or descending order.