I know they're not supported, but...

[bscottparker]

Mike-

Love this version of Plecodict, and the additional dictionaries. Have one favor/question to ask:

All of the supplemental flashcard files are all jiantizi. Unfortunately for me, I am in Taiwan, and am testing in fanti in about two weeks. I was hoping to use the flashcard files to test while I'm commuting to and from school, but I can't use the jianti.

Do you know of a way by which I could convert the flashcard libraries en masse to traditional characters? I am willing to do it myself, of course, but don't have the time right now to go through it character by character.

Any help would be appreciated!

Brad Parker

 

[mikelove]

Actually, while the flashcard import files are in GB, once they've been imported you can easily view the resulting flashcards in traditional characters; simply set the dictionary to traditional character mode and the flashcards will come up in that instead of in simplified. This works because the software isn't actually using the words in the flashcard data file, it's simply matching them to entries in the dictionary and linking the flashcards to those.

 

[sfrrr]

Mike--thanks. just in time. I just installed (and uninstalled) the HSK and PCR flashcard files this morning, but the hanzi and the meaning and the pinyin were out of sync--wrong characters for expected pinyin, etc.

Maybe that's because I imported them as Big 5. Maybe if I import them as GB and then view them in B5, everything will match.

BTW, I couldn't find the Chinese word for FLASHCARD in PlecoDict.

Sandra

 

[mikelove]

Yes, importing them as GB should definitely fix that. It would probably be a good idea to delete your User dictionary DB first, though - there are likely hundreds (if not thousands) of entries in there that were created as the result of unmatchable words. You can use a program like Filez (free at http://www.nosleep.net) to go into your Palm's memory and delete the "PlecoDict User DB" file.

 

[bscottparker]

GB files on Zire 72s Work Perfectly

Mike-

Thanks for the tip. I had imported them incorrectly somehow, deleted, reinstalled and reimported, and all work well. Thanks.

Brad Parker

Oh- wanted to make a suggestion on the future plecodict -- don't know if this is possible, but would be very helpful: when in English, looking for a Chinese word or phrase, when one clicks on a Chinese character or word combination included in the English dictionary, the program could immediately switch over to a Chinese dictionary, with the desired character or word in the Chinese dictionary input line. This would enable the user to 1) in the Chinese dictionary interface add the Chinese character word combination into a flashcard database, and 2) avoid having to re-enter the word in the Chinese dictionary if the user wanted to do additional searches in Chinese based on the subject character or word.

Also, if the user could click on any character in the English or Chinese dictionaries, and immediately be able to see that single character's definition, that would be extremely helpful. I.e., I have "fazhan" (develop), but want to know only the definition of the "zhan" portion of the word, I could click on it in "fazhan" and it would take me directly to "zhan" only. This is a feature on old Besta dictionaries that really saved time on re-drawing characters. I don't know how hard either of these suggestions would be to implement, but they're my two cents.

Thanks again for a great program and for the extras.

Brad Parker

 

[mikelove]

Thanks for the suggestion. We're looking at a number of ideas along these lines - possibly turning some parts of entries into hyperlinks (like on a web page), turning the magnify feature (optionally) into a full-fledged "Character Info" screen, letting you assign different actions to highlighting text, tapping on text, highlighting text and then tapping or tap-holding on the highlight, highlighting text and then pressing one of the hardware buttons, and so on.