local function dict (args)
    if not args then return nil, "Give me a word, please" end
    -- Be careful as we pass it as an argument to a shell command
    local word = string.match(args, "^(%w+)[%s%?%.%!]*$")
    if not word then return nil, "Can you repeat please?" end

    local cmd = "/usr/bin/dict "..word.." 2> /dev/null"
    local fh = io.popen(cmd)
    result = fh:read("*a")  -- read dict output
    fh:close()
    if result:match("^$") then return nil, "dict: No output" end

    -- Sometimes dict outpur is ugly... Let's filter out whitespace.
    result = result:gsub("[ \t]+\n", "\n"):gsub("\n\n\n+", "\n\n")
    -- Trim trailing newlines
    result = result:gsub("\n+$", "")
    return result
end

mcbot_register_command("dict", dict)