Pleco 4.0: Ability to Include Photos with a Flashcard

Shun

状元
Hello Mike,

since in Pleco 4.0, flashcards will support a much richer set of metadata and customizable fields, and since smartphones and tablets almost always come with built-in cameras, are you planning to allow users to take photographs to add to new flashcards, perhaps even with OCR post-processing to make any Chinese text inside them searchable? This could be something on a PC/Mac screen (e.g. a movie with Chinese subtitles), a book or even Chinese text I see on the street. The user could also use OCR to add text from the photo to a "context field", verify the OCR'ed text and then discard the photo at the end.

In Pleco 3.2, adding flashcards is always immediate, and it works by tapping the "+" button without any option to alter the flashcard except for the category it is added to. For Pleco 4.0, are you perhaps already planning to use an "Add Flashcard" screen that comes up each time the user taps the "+" button, where the user can enter extra information and edit settings for a flashcard? In this screen, it would be nice to have a photo field that, when tapped, allows the user to take a photo to associate with the flashcard.

Possible downsides:
- Requires a lot of extra storage space
- Sharing and syncing of flashcards may take a lot longer because of the space requirements. (So a setting to disable photos would be needed there.)

I think I’ve read that images in flashcards are already planned, so my suggestion perhaps is only an extension. Other ideas are welcomed.

Thanks & Regards,

Shun
 
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mikelove

皇帝
Staff member
We are supporting images on flashcards, yes - can capture directly, insert from a file / photo library, insert a photo from an existing card, or even link them in an import file.

Photos do not need to be stored in a specific field, but can be linked from any field, or at least any field that's configured to use Markdown - in the card text they appear as Markdown embed links ![](link-to-photo) with a Pleco-specific URL scheme. We also support Pandoc-style curly bracket attributes, so you can customize the image size with a ![](link-to-photo){width=X height=Y}.

We aren't currently planning to do any OCR on photos, though that's certainly something we can consider for a later update.

As far as adding flashcards, we're not having a screen pop up every time you tap + - that could get annoying - but the "Card Info" screen now has card editing integrated as another tab (along with a third tab that gives you a definition screen, so no more of that awkward Tapping On 'Change Dictionary' To See A Definition Screen business), and accessible even if a card links to a dictionary entry, so after creating a card, you can tap on the + button again and go to Card Info to edit / add details as you see fit.
 

Shun

状元
Incredible, many thanks! I also think the "+" button behavior is better as you have it.
 

rustifer

秀才
We are supporting images on flashcards, yes - can capture directly, insert from a file / photo library, insert a photo from an existing card, or even link them in an import file.

Photos do not need to be stored in a specific field, but can be linked from any field, or at least any field that's configured to use Markdown - in the card text they appear as Markdown embed links ![](link-to-photo) with a Pleco-specific URL scheme. We also support Pandoc-style curly bracket attributes, so you can customize the image size with a ![](link-to-photo){width=X height=Y}.

We aren't currently planning to do any OCR on photos, though that's certainly something we can consider for a later update.

As far as adding flashcards, we're not having a screen pop up every time you tap + - that could get annoying - but the "Card Info" screen now has card editing integrated as another tab (along with a third tab that gives you a definition screen, so no more of that awkward Tapping On 'Change Dictionary' To See A Definition Screen business), and accessible even if a card links to a dictionary entry, so after creating a card, you can tap on the + button again and go to Card Info to edit / add details as you see fit.
Is there a Pleco info page detailing how to add or link images to flashcards?
 

mikelove

皇帝
Staff member
No, it's a smaller update, but one that's using a new Android development kit version and that makes changes to one particularly bug-prone part of Pleco (the screen reader function - specifically the way it computes the edges of the screen) so we wanted to put it out in beta a bit before releasing it officially.
 
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