Short answers, pulled from the story.
The Collins COBUILD Advanced Dictionary arrived in 1987 with a radical approach to defining words. HarperCollins released the first edition as the Collins COBUILD English Language Dictionary in 1987.
Instead of short phrases, it used full sentences to explain meanings. This method aimed to show how words functioned within actual language use by drawing example sentences from a large corpus of real-world usage data.
The sixth edition stands out as an exception that omitted these transcriptions from its pages. All other print versions maintained the International Phonetic Alphabet system throughout their entries.
Publishers began including digital versions on CD-ROM alongside traditional book formats during certain publication periods. Some buyers received both the paper volume and the software disc together while others obtained only the printed text depending on the version available at the time.
This new title first appeared in 2006 to serve American learners specifically. A second edition followed in 2016 while the third edition arrived in 2023.