Feature Requests

[mfc]

re Search History

1. I think pleco did it as a down arrow within the search box,
(can't be sure - a few years ago).
Firefox also does this - a down arrow in the search box.
That takes up much less room than a separate icon.

2. An alternative approach is:
Below the text entry box, when one clicks on it to enter text,
the screen below becomes white and empty.
The history could be put here.
This is what the search box on Market does:
when you press the search box,
the most recent searches appear on the screen below.

3. The favorite system really is very very nice,
but is more for long term storage:
the difference between bookmarks and history in a browser.
Also it requires more clicks to get a word onto the list
and then call up the list.
A history feature is automatic, no clicks needed.

Re : Reverse Lookup
You are right - hanzi is probably better in most cases.
The problem is it requires so many steps:
Using the above example,
you have to click sixiang on the first screen,
then on the 2nd screen, add it to the clipboard,
then return to the first screen
then long press the text entry area
then paste.

The way pleco did it was just one step:
on the first screen, long press sixiang
and it then does a lookup of sixiang.

Hope this is helpful.

[mfc]

Another idea re History: add it as a menu item.
Not so elegant as 1 or 2 above, but certainly clean and clear.

[hanping]

@mfc - I'm still not clear why someone would want to search for 思想 (sixiang) when they have already found that dictionary entry????

Thanks for the History (number 2) suggestion - that looks like the best way to me...

[mfc]

The reason one would want to do a Reverse Lookup:

the problem is English <-> Chinese is not one to one.

One English word may map into many Chinese words, each with a slightly different usage and shade of meaning.
To ensure you have the exact word you want,
the best way is to go backward ans see which English words that Chinese word maps onto.
And the same in reverse.

As I said above, this functionality is not quite as important with this dictionary because you put several english words underneath each trnaslation
but would still be a useful feature.

[tristate]

Hi,

Im living in Taiwan so I bought the Pro version and am delighted with it.

Would it be possible to add the option of showing BoPoMoFo symbols above the pinyin, you can see some of them in the entry for zhu4yin1.

Thanks

[hanping]

Thanks for the suggestion. I'll look into the technical possibility. Can't make any promises but if it's technically easy to do, then I don't see any reason why not...

[c00lbr33z3]

first off, kudos on your app!!
my son loves it!! it helps him a great deal.. finding chinese characters in a dictionary is nearly impossible for him (it takes him hours!!!), but with hanping app on my LG-Ally, it's like a game to him...
any plans on supporting windows/PC platform?
i have a tablet pad that i use only for acrobat/gimp/photoshop, but that's about it.
i've been searching for something like this for quite some time.

thanks!!!

[hanping]

Thanks!

No plans to support other platforms yet. As long as Android continues to go from strength to strength, I'd prefer to spend time improving the existing apps (and writing new ones) rather than porting to other platforms. If Windows Phone 7 becomes HUGE, then that might change!

[MarcSpitz]

Hi,

first I'd like to tell you how much I love using you app. It helps me a lot for my studies in chinese.
I bought it some days ago and am very pleased with it.

Still, as I asked you in the mail I sent you (concerning Market problems (that are partially solved now - blame it on Google!)), I may have some ideas to help increase software quality.
I ordered them on two categories because I think some were more easily doable than others and also numbered them so we can easily discuss about them.

Quick fixes :
Q1 - export lists option available from option menu (when you actually selected the list you want to use and then press the option key) instead of the list selection menu. I find it a better place to such an option.
Q2 - the number of items a list contains could be written next to the list name from the list selection screen and also next to the list's name when you are inside a list. So if my list is "myList" there could be written "myList (200)" where 200 is the number of hanzi (or hanzi combination (word/expression)).
Currently, I couldn't find a way to count how many items I had in my lists.
Q3 - when you are watching a list, I think ideograms should be ordered somehow (using radical?/number of traits?). Maybe it should be mono hanzi first ordered by radical and then hanzi combinations ordered by number. At first, you could already put mono hanzi items first so it gets easier to search the list.
Q4 - When I select Simpl[Trad] display and then select a hanzi, I would expect to see the hanzi with its traditional form. Instead, I get only the Simplified Hanzi (also only getting traditional when using Trad[Simpl] display mode).

Longer-time-taking fixes :
L1 : Add radicals for hanzi when they are alone. I find the screen so empty. I would like to easily retrieve which radical(s) the hanzi came from.
L2 : Add the number of traits used to write the hanzi (very useful to learn the language)

I don't know if CC-CEDICT gives you those informations (radical + number of traits) so I don't know if it can easily be implemented. Maybe that's the reason why it is not there already.

I hope I wrote enough details to make you understand what I meant to say.
If you ever need more informations just let me know.

Please keep us informed as I would be very pleased to know how the software is evolving.

Thanks

[hanping]

Thanks for so many great tips!

Q1 - export lists option available from option menu (when you actually selected the list you want to use and then press the option key) instead of the list selection menu. I find it a better place to such an option.

Yes, I agree it would be easier to access if it was an option menu item, but I think it's an extremely seldom used function and we don't want to complicate the options menu more than necessary.

Q2 - the number of items a list contains could be written next to the list name from the list selection screen and also next to the list's name when you are inside a list. So if my list is "myList" there could be written "myList (200)" where 200 is the number of hanzi (or hanzi combination (word/expression)).
Currently, I couldn't find a way to count how many items I had in my lists.

The way user lists are currently stored, makes this a problem from an efficiency perspective. However, in an upcoming release the user lists will be stored differently, making this feature pretty easy to do (and I agree it would be nice to have).

Q3 - when you are watching a list, I think ideograms should be ordered somehow (using radical?/number of traits?). Maybe it should be mono hanzi first ordered by radical and then hanzi combinations ordered by number. At first, you could already put mono hanzi items first so it gets easier to search the list.

CC-CEDICT does not have any radical etc information so this is not currently possible. Adding in such information is a lot of work so would require a major update. It would be useful to allow the user to choose how to sort search results (and lists). Other examples of sort order would be:

• Dictionary order
• Word frequency
• Pinyin
• Order added to list (this is how it's done now)

Q4 - When I select Simpl[Trad] display and then select a hanzi, I would expect to see the hanzi with its traditional form. Instead, I get only the Simplified Hanzi (also only getting traditional when using Trad[Simpl] display mode).

This is currently not supported on the single-word screen. Still trying to find a way to show this cleanly.

L1 : Add radicals for hanzi when they are alone. I find the screen so empty. I would like to easily retrieve which radical(s) the hanzi came from.

Yes, would be good to hook into a Character dictionary for single character words. A character dictionary is certainly a possibility.

L2 : Add the number of traits used to write the hanzi (very useful to learn the language)

Again, this is not supported in CC-CEDICT and really is the functionality of Character dictionary.

Thanks again for the suggestions and please post more as you think of them.