We stand with Ukraine to help keep people safe. Join us
All Apps
Best AppsReviewsComparisonsHow-To
When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission

Diogenes for Mac

Tool for searching/browsing ancient Latin and Greek texts.

Free
In English
Version 4.6.2
4.2
Based on 3 user rates

Diogenes overview

Diogenes is a tool for searching and browsing the databases of ancient texts, primarily in Latin and Greek, that are published by the Thesaurus Linguae Graecae and the Packard Humanities Institute. It is free software: you are encouraged to modify, improve, and redistribute it under the terms of the GNU General Public license.

General Features

For those who have not used Diogenes before, it has a number of useful features:

It's Free

Diogenes is free, open-source software (GPL v3).

Deep Integration of Morphology and Lexica

Click on any word and get a morphological analysis along with the corresponding entries in the LSJ (Greek) or L-S (Latin) lexicon. In the lexicon entries, click on a citation to jump to the context (where possible). It is also possible to perform morphological searches (i.e. to search for all or selected inflected forms of a given word). Morphological data comes from Perseus.

Powerful Searching

You can create groups of texts to search within (and for the TLG, you can select by date, genre, etc.). You can jump from search results right to the context of each passage. You can search for words in any order within a given scope and delimit that scope by punctuation or number of lines.

Efficient Reading

It's easy to open up a given passage of any Greek or Latin text and start reading with the lexicon a click away, or to browse through the dictionaries to look up a word.

What’s new in version 4.6.2

  • Browser front-end updated to Electon version 20 (from version 5):
    • This should eliminate spurious anti-virus warnings (for now);
    • PDFs are now shown in a new Diogenes window rather than in an external browser; likewise for external web links.
  • Tweaks to the user interface:
    • better keyboard navigation;
    • semi-persistent state for the splash screen;
    • facility to jump to a new passage in the work currently being read.
  • Added support for the the more recent TLL fascicles (from vols. 9.1 and 11.2).
  • Native version for recent Macs with Apple silicon processors.
  • Updated icon for Macs (thanks to Helge Baumann).
  • Very large search output is now split into pages to avoid crashing the browser.
  • Facility to search the headwords of ancient lexica (e.g. the Suda).
  • Better display of editorial notes in PHI texts.
  • Fixed a long-standing bug that prevented accented and non-Latin characters from being used in the names of in user-defined subsets of texts.
  • Fixed (for Windows 10 and later) another long-standing Windows bug that caused problems when non-Latin characters were used in the names of the paths to the folder holding the databases.
  • Removed problematic code that sometimes interfered with finding citations in very short or fragmentary texts.

Diogenes for Mac

Free
In English
Version 4.6.2
Write a detailed review about Diogenes

Write your thoughts in our old-fashioned comment

MacUpdate Comment Policy. We strongly recommend leaving comments, however comments with abusive words, bullying, personal attacks of any type will be moderated.
4.2

(7 Reviews of Diogenes)

  • Comments

  • User Ratings

Dana-Sutton
Dana-Sutton
Jul 11 2018
3.1.6
4.0
Jul 11 2018
4.0
Version: 3.1.6
For now it's fine, I use it in my work on a regular basis. I do worry, however, because as near as I can tell it is a 32-bit program and its developer has evidently ceased supporting it. So what's going to happen when OSX begins supporting only 6 4-bit ones? I can imagine one or two possible workarounds, bu t I don't especially want to be put to the necessity of trying to make one of them work.
MichaelHaeusler
MichaelHaeusler
Oct 16 2015
3.1.6
4.0
Oct 16 2015
4.0
Version: 3.1.6
Current version is 3.2, fully compatible with Yosemite and the current Perl version. Apparently only needs the older proprietary OS X Java distribution, which users should install in addition to the standard Java anyway.
MichaelHaeusler
MichaelHaeusler
Apr 7 2008
3.1.6
4.0
Apr 7 2008
4.0
Version: 3.1.6
This application is really good. I still know the old Pandora software, and it had a few features that are not yet implemented in Diogenes, and it was a bit easier to use. There's another TLG-reader called "Hellespont II", but with Diogenes there's PHI-support and an included dictionary, which makes it the best MacOSX-application for working with the TLG- & PHI-databases at the moment. And it's free! For those who still need a BetaCode converter, you can use the freeware "UniGreek" by Philip Dow, the author of the outstanding Journler application: http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/21443/unigreek PS… for the other reviewers who asked for the location of the databases: the TLG- and PHI-CDRoms have to be bought. They're not included in the Diogenes distribution.
Phaleron
Phaleron
Nov 24 2007
3.1.6
0.0
Nov 24 2007
0.0
Version: 3.1.6
I have the same problem as the previous user. Upon installation of Diogenes on a newly reformatted disk, any word search prompts me to find the tlg database. I assume this database must be located somewhere on my computer, for why else would an open-save dialogue box open as a prompt. But, information on where this database may exist cannot be found anywhere. Questions: Where is this database? (Is it on my computer or on the web?) How do I connect to it? PS: Diogenes was installed and worked (relatively well) on the same disk before it was reformatted (via clean install). I am not sure why it worked then and not now.
Dom21
Dom21
Sep 20 2007
3.1.2
0.0
Sep 20 2007
0.0
Version: 3.1.2
Will someone please tell me how to access the databases Diogenes needs to search? Are they online? Are they free? Where??
Dana-Sutton
Dana-Sutton
Jul 11 2018
4.0
Jul 11 2018
4.0
Version: null
Istra
Istra
Mar 13 2013
4.5
Mar 13 2013
4.5
Version: null
MichaelHaeusler
MichaelHaeusler
Apr 7 2008
4.0
Apr 7 2008
4.0
Version: null