Leave your printed phrasebooks at home!

On my last trip to Europe, I took the Lonely Planet Western Europe and Eastern Europe phrasebooks with me. Together, they covered about 12 languages, but they also added a couple of pounds to my backpack and cost twenty bucks.

After you spend weeks trekking around Europe, you start to resent every extra pound in your pack.

So this app is a welcome arrival. 44 languages from all over the world, and only 10 bucks. Compared to printed phrasebooks, its a steal. Im about to embark on a months-long global trip, and this little gem will enable me to leave the paper books at home.

My only complaint is that it doesnt have phonetic spellings in addition to the actual text. The audio pronunciations are great - try doing THAT with your printed phrasebook! - but there are situations in life when using the audio is not practical or polite. Having phonetic spellings would be very advantageous in those situations.

Yes, there are some things this app doesnt do. It doesnt translate ad-hoc phrases you type in...but neither does a printed phrasebook. It doesnt systematically teach you a new language...but neither does a printed phrasebook. It is what it is - a resource to help you survive common everyday situations in a variety of countries worldwide.

Judged by that standard, this app is a valuable and well-implemented tool. It does exactly what it claims to do, and it does it with style. Well done!

Mies van der Robot about LINGOPAL 44