Vibecoding a new version of dictionary app Logophile

[Tom Gally]

A search through my Gmail archive of Honyaku discussions suggests that the last time the Mac dictionary app Logophile was mentioned here was in 2020. But in case anyone is still interested:

I have continued to use the app regularly to search through two dozen dictionary files—mostly ripped from CD-ROMs—that I accumulated back in the day. However, development of the app ended several years ago (https://dicwizard.jp/logophile/), and when I launch it now I get a warning from Apple that, because it was designed for Intel CPUs, it will stop working after an upcoming macOS update.

A couple of months ago, I happened to see a blog post by Simon Willison (https://simonwillison.net/2026/Mar/27/vibe-coding-swiftui/) about vibecoding native macOS apps using Claude Code. Since then I have created a couple of such apps for myself, most notably a clipboard manager to replace (with better functionality) a commercial app that I had been using for many years but which had become unstable after a recent OS update.

So I decided to try having Claude Code reverse engineer Logophile. It was a more ambitious project, as Claude had to figure out the various data formats of the dictionary files. It turned out that most of my dictionaries were in either EPWING or EBXZ/EB format, which Claude could access using publicly available tools. So I had it build the app for just those dictionaries for the time being.

It took a few vibecoding sessions to get everything working, but I now have an app ideal for my personal use. It is missing some of the functions of Logophile, particular the ability to add new dictionaries to the database; but since no one (as far as I know) is selling CD-ROM dictionaries anymore, that doesn't really matter to me. I just want an app for my own use with the dictionary files I already have.

Some of the other dictionaries are in proprietary formats that, Claude tells me, it might be able to reverse engineer. If I find that I miss those dictionaries—mostly English-English dictionaries—I might try that later. But for the time being I have what I wanted.

I should note that I would never have attempted creating a native Mac app on my own.

Tom Gally

P.S. I was recently interviewed about my part-time career as a lexicographer:

https://ej-lexicographers.com/lexicographer/tomgally/

In the interview I mention this mailing list and the connections I made it.

[Rolf Giebel]

I still use Logophile every day, and so this interests me greatly. I am using it on a 2017 iMac running Ventura, and one reason that I dread the day when I will need to get a new computer is that Logophile may no longer work. Does your version allow you to add new entries (similar to the User Dictionary in Logophile)?

Rolf Giebel  

[Tom Gally]

Rolf (and all),

I wasn't using the User Dictionary function in Logophile, so I didn't ask Claude to recreate it. I'm sure it could be done without too much extra trouble.

I had Claude create the app just for my own use. The paths to the dictionary files, for example, are currently hard-coded with the file paths on my two Macs. If the app were to be used by others, I (and Claude) would have to make it more flexible and also do a lot of testing to make sure it works in a variety of environments. It would also have be scanned and tested for security issues.

My suggestion to you is to keep using Logophile on your current 2017 iMac as long as you can. When it comes time for you to move to a new Mac where Logophile doesn't work, the vibecoding tools should be both cheaper and more powerful than today, and you should be able to recreate the app for your own purposes on the new OS without too much trouble. (Be sure to keep backups of all of your dictionary and Logophile-related user files.)

For future reference, below is the initial prompt I gave to Claude Code together with some files I had copied to its working folder. There was a lot of back-and-forth after that and there are a lot of things about the software creation process I still don't understand, but by interacting with Claude I was able to solve all of the problems without much difficulty. Note that I didn't actually have Claude reverse-engineer the app binary; while that might be possible, I instead just had it write a new app with similar functionality. (That new app, by the way, is much faster than Logophile, presumably because it is native for the latest OS and is not running in emulation.)

Because I use Claude for so many different tasks and it seems to be the strongest model for such things now, I am currently paying US$200 a month for the Max plan. It might be possible to do this much more cheaply with other tools, particularly Chinese models such as Qwen, Kimi, or Deepseek. 

Tom Gally

=== Initial prompt to Claude Code ===

This folder contains two folders that I have copied from other places on my Mac.

The Logophile/ folder was in Applications, and the folder inside "Folder from Application Support" was in Application Support. There are also some dictionary files that I have not moved here yet.

The folder screenshots/ contains screenshots of the Logophile.app menus and window in various states.

I have been using Logophile.app for many years to read a variety of dictionary files that I have on my hard disk. But support for this app ended at the end of 2022, and when I launch the app now I get a warning that it will not be usable after future updates to macOS. That warning links to the following page: https://support.apple.com/en-us/102527?cid=mc-ols-rosetta-article_102527-macos_finder-52526201

I want to be able to continue accessing the dictionary files, so I would like you to create a new app in Swift that replicates the functionality of Logophile.app.

The dictionary files were added using another app called LogophileDicManager.app. A screenshot of that is also in the screenshots file called "LogophileDicManager.app interface.jpg." I do not anticipate adding more dictionary files in the future, but this screenshot shows the names of the dictionaries and the paths to them on my computer.

Please look through these files, understand how this app works, and develop a plan for creating a Swift app that will allow me to access the dictionary files I already have using an interface similar to that for Logophile.app.

If you have any questions, please ask.

===

On Wed, May 20, 2026 at 4:40 AM Rolf Giebel <glenr...@gmail.com> wrote:

I still use Logophile every day, and so this interests me greatly. I am using it on a 2017 iMac running Ventura, and one reason that I dread the day when I will need to get a new computer is that Logophile may no longer work. Does your version allow you to add new entries (similar to the User Dictionary in Logophile)?

Rolf Giebel  

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[Oroszlany Balazs]

Hi Tom, 

Was there any particular reason to create your own app instead of downloading a modern Logophile alternative (e.g. GoldenDict-ng)?

Best regards,
Balazs

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[Tom Gally]

Balazs,

Was there any particular reason to create your own app instead of downloading a modern Logophile alternative (e.g. GoldenDict-ng)?

Yes. I naively assumed that Logophile had used a proprietary indexing method that Claude would have to crack.

But Claude didn’t use Logophile’s indexes after all; instead, it wrote code to build its own directly from the dictionary files. The first time my app launched, it spent about 20 minutes building those indexes. Once that was done, the app opens quickly.

Thanks for the pointer to GoldenDict-ng. That would have saved me some time. But I had fun vibecoding the app in any case.

Tom Gally

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