Hey,
Taking my very first formal chinese classes, and giving Pleco a beating. As I'm rapidly adding words for review during class I really wish there was some way to organize what I've noted down at the end of the day. Will post some bugs too, but was more interested in posting some thoughts on the desktop/web based versions of Pleco. Hoping some other users can chime in and agree/disagree for some useful discussion.
I've been looking forward to a desktop version of Pleco generally speaking, but this class has made me re-think what is important along with some other problems I've had over the years using Pleco. Here are the things I consider most important for a companion to Pleco:
As I thought about this I realized that a dedicated desktop app isn't necessarily the best way to fulfill the reqs, in fact for some, like automatically backing up my data, it's got some major downsides. One would still need to back up the desktop data, and Pleco Desktop would need to develop a syncing function for three different device types across two platforms for it to work ideally. Beyond that it's very likely that someone could be studying or traveling in China without a PC, and those are the times that the most data would be input into Pleco, and those are the times where the data is most vulnerable. At the moment I'm taking this class and my pc is with me, but following that I'm leaving the pc behind in shanghai to travel a bit more lightly.
My phone was just stolen by a pickpocket yesterday, so it's now the second time this year I've lost all the new data in Pleco, and the fourth or fifth time since purchasing Pleco 3+ years ago that I've lost most of my data. So the ability to back up easily has come to be a bit near and dear for me. One could argue that it's my fault for not backing up, which to some degree is true, but the fact is that windows mobile is hideous for backups. (iphone is much better, not sure about Palm)
Beyond that, when I thought about the other items listed above it became apparent that all of them could easily be done through a web based application. Organizing and tagging/categorizing lists is all easily done with the web, and it's possible using AJAX, etc to create some very effective interfaces to do that. Doing this stuff via web would often be much more useful for the student/traveler, as they may not have a laptop with them, but 'net cafes are extremely common. And of course being web based the syncing problem goes aways as the mobile could sync directly to the cloud. Not sure what it would take to do differential syncing to make sure the data costs weren't too high, but that was the only major stumbling block.
All that said, I know there are contractual obligations to put out a full desktop version. I'm not sure how easy it will be for a desktop version to do all the above, since it's inherently a port of the mobile app. Would I still buy it if it didn't do all that? Probably, but it depends on the costs - I wouldn't want to have to re-acquire all my dictionary licenses. The biggest advantage I see for the full desktop version is that I don't know of anything else out there that can do a pinyin search like Pleco. It would also need to support mac, as I've pretty much abandoned windows.
Taking my very first formal chinese classes, and giving Pleco a beating. As I'm rapidly adding words for review during class I really wish there was some way to organize what I've noted down at the end of the day. Will post some bugs too, but was more interested in posting some thoughts on the desktop/web based versions of Pleco. Hoping some other users can chime in and agree/disagree for some useful discussion.
I've been looking forward to a desktop version of Pleco generally speaking, but this class has made me re-think what is important along with some other problems I've had over the years using Pleco. Here are the things I consider most important for a companion to Pleco:
- I want a tool to organize my flashcards using a desktop-like environment
- Flashcards need to be backed up off of my phone automatically (daily changes, etc without user intervention) - IMPORTANT
- My user dictionary should be backed up in the same way - Equally important
- flashcard changes done on the desktop (categories, entry changes, etc) should be synced back to the phone
- I'd love to have a better interface to create user dictionary entries (but not critical)
- I'd love to be able to automatically add flashcards from other services like Chinesepod (also not critical)
- I don't particularly care about reviewing flashcards anywhere except on Pleco mobile
- I don't particularly care about reviewing dictionary entries on the desktop
As I thought about this I realized that a dedicated desktop app isn't necessarily the best way to fulfill the reqs, in fact for some, like automatically backing up my data, it's got some major downsides. One would still need to back up the desktop data, and Pleco Desktop would need to develop a syncing function for three different device types across two platforms for it to work ideally. Beyond that it's very likely that someone could be studying or traveling in China without a PC, and those are the times that the most data would be input into Pleco, and those are the times where the data is most vulnerable. At the moment I'm taking this class and my pc is with me, but following that I'm leaving the pc behind in shanghai to travel a bit more lightly.
My phone was just stolen by a pickpocket yesterday, so it's now the second time this year I've lost all the new data in Pleco, and the fourth or fifth time since purchasing Pleco 3+ years ago that I've lost most of my data. So the ability to back up easily has come to be a bit near and dear for me. One could argue that it's my fault for not backing up, which to some degree is true, but the fact is that windows mobile is hideous for backups. (iphone is much better, not sure about Palm)
Beyond that, when I thought about the other items listed above it became apparent that all of them could easily be done through a web based application. Organizing and tagging/categorizing lists is all easily done with the web, and it's possible using AJAX, etc to create some very effective interfaces to do that. Doing this stuff via web would often be much more useful for the student/traveler, as they may not have a laptop with them, but 'net cafes are extremely common. And of course being web based the syncing problem goes aways as the mobile could sync directly to the cloud. Not sure what it would take to do differential syncing to make sure the data costs weren't too high, but that was the only major stumbling block.
All that said, I know there are contractual obligations to put out a full desktop version. I'm not sure how easy it will be for a desktop version to do all the above, since it's inherently a port of the mobile app. Would I still buy it if it didn't do all that? Probably, but it depends on the costs - I wouldn't want to have to re-acquire all my dictionary licenses. The biggest advantage I see for the full desktop version is that I don't know of anything else out there that can do a pinyin search like Pleco. It would also need to support mac, as I've pretty much abandoned windows.