vfttitA / vfttitva issue in MW

[drdhaval2785]

A report by Caujolle is worth exploration in detail.

Case 24368: 02/25/2019 dict=MW, L= ID=204528, hw=vRttitA, user=Caujolle
old = vṛtti—tā f.
new = vṛtti—tā f. (= vṛtti—tva n.) state of existence, mode of subsistence, profession, conduct, Mn. ; MBh. &c.  
comment = ?, there are probably other cases of such "error"

Entry in mw.txt

<L>204528<pc>1010,1<k1>vfttitA<k2>vftti—tA<e>3
<s>vftti—tA</s> ¦ <lex>f.</lex><info lex="f"/>
<LEND>
<L>204529<pc>1010,1<k1>vfttitva<k2>vftti—tva<e>3
<s>vftti—tva</s> ¦ <lex>n.</lex> state of existence, mode of subsistence, profession, conduct, <ls>Mn.</ls>; <ls>MBh. &c.</ls><info lex="n"/>
<LEND>

Scan of image
https://www.sanskrit-lexicon.uni-koeln.de/scans/MWScan/2014/web/webtc/servepdf.php?page=1010 first row.

[funderburkjim]

Sometimes I have handled such cases by inserting (in this case) the sense as given in vftti-tva into vftti-tA:

old: <s>vftti—tA</s> ¦ <lex>f.</lex><info lex="f"/>
new: <s>vftti—tA</s> ¦ <lex>f.</lex>state of existence, mode of subsistence, profession, conduct, <ls>Mn.</ls>; <ls>MBh. &c.</ls><info lex="f"/>

[gasyoun]

worth exploration in detail.

Meanings totally lost?

[funderburkjim]

As the scanned image shows, these are sort of like alternate headwords, where MW shows two headwords, but provides meaning (gloss, sense) for only one of the two. The solution above looks right to me.

[funderburkjim]

probably other cases

We could probably find other similar cases by filtering on the text of an entry being empty. One way to specify empty would be to remove <lex>..</lex> and <info.../> and the initial part (up through ¦ in mw.txt); if the result is just space characters, then count record as empty.

The scans of these cases would need to be examined individually to derive solutions.

[gasyoun]

The scans of these cases would need to be examined individually to derive solutions.

Can you prepare such basis, please?

[SergeA]

Similar but opposite case is when MW gives reference to the previous word with "id." which one also produces meaningless output for the reader.
E.g.
anu-kampā f. id.

(Also there is a print error in the case of anukampā, I think. The preceding word is an adjective anukampanīya, but anukampā must be "id." with the pre-preceding word anukampana, so the usage of "id." is wrong here.)