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Chinese input
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Oisín
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Mar 30, 2005, 03:31 PM
 
(Wasn't sure whether to put this here or in Software - feel free to move if I chose wrong)

As many of you probably know by now, I'm not a Mac owner yet, though I hope to be very soon. One of the things that's quite important for me is Chinese input, typing Chinese in Word files, etc.

So I tried it out on a PB at the Mac Center here in Copenhagen. I couldn't stand there hogging the machine forever, though, so I didn't get the chance to go through it very thoroughly and play around to get to know it.

On my present Windows box, I type Chinese via Micro$oft Pinyin 3.0, which works on a sentence level (ie. I type in an entire sentence and it tries to figure out what the sentence as a whole is supposed to be, and if it guesses wrong, I go back and change some of the characters), rather than on a character/word level, which, as far as I could tell, the input on the PB did.

My question is whether or not there is an option somewhere to change the character/word-based way it works to a sentence-based one - or if there's some fancy little app or program you can download which gives you this option - 'cause I hate typing by character/word!
     
OreoCookie
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Mar 30, 2005, 03:54 PM
 
Originally posted by Ois�n:
(Wasn't sure whether to put this here or in Software - feel free to move if I chose wrong)

As many of you probably know by now, I'm not a Mac owner yet, though I hope to be very soon. One of the things that's quite important for me is Chinese input, typing Chinese in Word files, etc.

So I tried it out on a PB at the Mac Center here in Copenhagen. I couldn't stand there hogging the machine forever, though, so I didn't get the chance to go through it very thoroughly and play around to get to know it.

On my present Windows box, I type Chinese via Micro$oft Pinyin 3.0, which works on a sentence level (ie. I type in an entire sentence and it tries to figure out what the sentence as a whole is supposed to be, and if it guesses wrong, I go back and change some of the characters), rather than on a character/word level, which, as far as I could tell, the input on the PB did.

My question is whether or not there is an option somewhere to change the character/word-based way it works to a sentence-based one - or if there's some fancy little app or program you can download which gives you this option - 'cause I hate typing by character/word!
I can't say for Chinese, but with Japanese it works like this: you enter everything phonetically (i. e. how you say it) and you can `group' kanji (Chinese characters) and separate the words individually. For instance: I enter `toukyou ni iku' to get `go to Tokyo' where every space separates a word and offers a guess on the kanjis.

My guesstimate is that you can indeed use all standard input methods.
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ginoledesma
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Mar 30, 2005, 04:04 PM
 
I haven't found an equivalent to the sentence-based translation feature on the Mac. Currently, you can only do per-word translation (if memory serves me right).
     
Oisín  (op)
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Mar 30, 2005, 05:09 PM
 
Originally posted by ginoledesma:
I haven't found an equivalent to the sentence-based translation feature on the Mac. Currently, you can only do per-word translation (if memory serves me right).
Damn, that really sucks... I might have to confine my homework to my peecee then.

Just to be completely sure here - when you say 'translation', you're not talking about actual translation, are you? Just Pinyin -> character input.


Oreo - Japanese is a different matter altogether, I think, 'cause with Japanese you (or rather, the computer) has to know more of the complete sentence to know which Kanji to use, and when to not use Kanji, but Hiragana or Katakana instead, etc. With Chinese, if you know the word (one or two characters usually), that's not going to change no matter how the structure of the sentence changes.

So, for instance, if I want to write "I like eating tofu" ('cause I just did ), with M$ Pinyin 3.0 sentence-based input, I'd just type "woxihuanchidoufu", and then go back if some of the characters were wrong (which they probably wouldn't be, given the simplicity of the sentence). With the way it seemed to work on the Mac (and with other input systems), I'd have to split it up into words and type "wo [choose correct character and press enter] xihuan [choose + enter] chi [choose + enter] doufu [choose + enter]", which is a thousand times as bothersome...
     
OreoCookie
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Mar 30, 2005, 05:46 PM
 
Originally posted by Ois�n:
Damn, that really sucks... I might have to confine my homework to my peecee then.

Just to be completely sure here - when you say 'translation', you're not talking about actual translation, are you? Just Pinyin -> character input.


Oreo - Japanese is a different matter altogether, I think, 'cause with Japanese you (or rather, the computer) has to know more of the complete sentence to know which Kanji to use, and when to not use Kanji, but Hiragana or Katakana instead, etc. With Chinese, if you know the word (one or two characters usually), that's not going to change no matter how the structure of the sentence changes.

So, for instance, if I want to write "I like eating tofu" ('cause I just did ), with M$ Pinyin 3.0 sentence-based input, I'd just type "woxihuanchidoufu", and then go back if some of the characters were wrong (which they probably wouldn't be, given the simplicity of the sentence). With the way it seemed to work on the Mac (and with other input systems), I'd have to split it up into words and type "wo [choose correct character and press enter] xihuan [choose + enter] chi [choose + enter] doufu [choose + enter]", which is a thousand times as bothersome...
Maybe this link will help you. From the Chinese department of Yale. In particular, check out the input pages. As I have no idea about Chinese, I can't help you. But it seems as if you can even enter chinese characters via a graphics tablet The Pinyin input method is mentioned as included in the OS.
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CaptainHaddock
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Mar 30, 2005, 06:14 PM
 
"My question is whether or not there is an option somewhere to change the character/word-based way it works to a sentence-based one - or if there's some fancy little app or program you can download which gives you this option - 'cause I hate typing by character/word!"

I'm no expert with Chinese; usually, when I type Japanese, I can type a few words, or even a whole sentence, and then hit spacebar a few times to approve OS X's choice of characters. I did try typing a few things in Chinese, and it seemed to work best if I only did a few words at a time. However, typing an entire sentence and then seeing what the input editor picks for characters is entirely doable.

There are also a pile of input options (for both Pinyin and stroke-based input), and I don't understand most of them. You might be able to make more sense of it. Screenshots below:


http://www.ideogramme.ca/temp/mac-chinese-2.jpg
[ALL inline images must be no wider than 480 pixels. --tooki]


The nice thing about the Mac, of course, is that the entire system is Unicode, and you can type Chinese (or any other language) in any application. I think the hinting is much nicer than Windows' font hinting too.
( Last edited by tooki; Mar 31, 2005 at 04:03 PM. )
     
Oisín  (op)
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Mar 30, 2005, 06:21 PM
 
Originally posted by OreoCookie:
Maybe this link will help you. From the Chinese department of Yale. In particular, check out the input pages. As I have no idea about Chinese, I can't help you. But it seems as if you can even enter chinese characters via a graphics tablet The Pinyin input method is mentioned as included in the OS.
Thanks a bunch! It looks like there are one or two of the programs they mention there that will do the trick (DerYi and UniDoc). Will check it out more specifically once I actually get the computer
     
OreoCookie
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Mar 30, 2005, 06:34 PM
 
Originally posted by Ois�n:
Thanks a bunch! It looks like there are one or two of the programs they mention there that will do the trick (DerYi and UniDoc). Will check it out more specifically once I actually get the computer
It really pays off that most things in OS X understand unicode. All languages are included by default (maybe you have to enable Asian extra fonts during installation).

With windows for instance (I can tell from experience with Japanese windows with Western apps + vice versa), the basic language is hard-coded into the kernel. If you want to install a Japanese Norton AntiVirus (supplied for free by my university there), forget it. All you see is white squares. When you have French characters (e. g. in mp3 tags) in the Japanese version, they are `converted' to kanjis, and the list goes on and on and on.

I'm really glad I can use OS X in German or English, but still have all features of the `Japanese version' (the exception is another app by MS, Office for Mac, but yeah well, there are many alternatives).

Can I ask you a favor? Can you post about your experiences in this forum? Then, we could reference your thread for someone who asks similar questions.
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Oisín  (op)
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Mar 30, 2005, 06:40 PM
 
Originally posted by CaptainHaddock:
I'm no expert with Chinese; usually, when I type Japanese, I can type a few words, or even a whole sentence, and then hit spacebar a few times to approve OS X's choice of characters. I did try typing a few things in Chinese, and it seemed to work best if I only did a few words at a time. However, typing an entire sentence and then seeing what the input editor picks for characters is entirely doable.
Wow, that's really nice to hear! Your Chinese input menu looks somewhat different than on the PB in the store, many more options. When I tried typing on that machine, if I typed more than one word (or with some settings, one character), it just kept beeping insolently at me, as though asking me how I could possibly think I could just keep writing like that. Bottom line, it simply wouldn't write anything more!

You saying that it will do it lifts a small stone from my heart

There are also a pile of input options (for both Pinyin and stroke-based input), and I don't understand most of them. You might be able to make more sense of it. Screenshots below:
Nah, I can't make neither head nor tail of most of those input methods either...

Looks like I just have to enable the 联想 option in that 基本设置 box, and I'm set to go!

I did think it odd that Apple could miss out on something this obvious - glad to be proven wrong.

The nice thing about the Mac, of course, is that the entire system is Unicode, and you can type Chinese (or any other language) in any application. I think the hinting is much nicer than Windows' font hinting too.
Well, Windows works that way too. You have to install complex East-Asian support (or whatever the hell they call it), but once it's installed, you can use it in pretty much any program (with the exception of old 8-bit programs and such, of course, but that goes for Macs too, right?).


(PS.: You've got the wrong sh� in your first sentence - it should be 我是加拿大人, not 我室加拿大人 )
     
Oisín  (op)
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Mar 30, 2005, 06:43 PM
 
Originally posted by OreoCookie:
Can I ask you a favor? Can you post about your experiences in this forum? Then, we could reference your thread for someone who asks similar questions.
Sure, of course! But it seems, according to the Cap'n up there () that I'll be able to do it without 3rd party apps altogether, which is of course by far the best! But I'll be happy to post my experiences about that - when I have experiences to post, of course
     
CaptainHaddock
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Mar 30, 2005, 07:12 PM
 

(PS.: You've got the wrong sh� in your first sentence - it should be 我是加拿大人, not 我室加拿大人 )
Making typos in Chinese! Now I'm really embarrassed!

If my screenshots and the excellent ones at that Yale site are different than the machine you used at the store, that Mac might not have been using a current version of Panther.

Paul
     
Oisín  (op)
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Mar 30, 2005, 08:02 PM
 
Hmm... I dunno, I suppose it should be...

It did have all the menus in Chinese, but not the Simplified Chinese sub-menu in the keyboard drop-down. Or maybe I just didn't look at the right time...
     
Eug Wanker
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Mar 30, 2005, 08:24 PM
 
PS.: You've got the wrong sh� in your first sentence - it should be 我是加拿大人, not 我室加拿大人
Heheh. I was wondering what that sentence was supposed to mean.

PS. I think I've set it up wrong. Every time I hit the space bar the new character appears. I can't type 5 words in a row and then have the computer do the translation then.
( Last edited by Eug Wanker; Mar 30, 2005 at 08:31 PM. )
     
wataru
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Mar 30, 2005, 10:30 PM
 
Just don't hit space. Enter all the pinyin for your sentence or phrase at once. Sometimes you can't do this, though, because it's not smart about instances where it's ambiguous whether "n" is part of the previous or next character's pinyin (sorry, can't think of a good example right now).

I find simplified Chinese input to be very nice on the Mac. Traditional is a bit harder to use because you have to wade through many more characters when in pinyin mode, or you have to know the tone for hanyin mode (I suck at tones, but I can usually remember everything else about a character).

One really nice feature, which may or may not be that useful for native speakers, is that you can type the names of the components of a character, hit return, and find that character among the list of candidates. Example: type yuri, hit return, and you can easily find 鲁, which contains 鱼 (yu) and 日 (ri) but is pronounced lu.

Another great thing about the simplified Chinese input is that it will tell you the pronunciation(s) of characters if you hover over them in the selection box. That's a lifesaver for 不能说中文的白人. Incidentally, I entered that phrase all at once with no problem, but often I find that the characters get messed up if you use too long a string (incorrect characters are inserted in weird places; it's a bug).
     
Sydney Tsai
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Mar 31, 2005, 07:41 AM
 
Originally posted by Ois�n:
Hmm... I dunno, I suppose it should be...

It did have all the menus in Chinese, but not the Simplified Chinese sub-menu in the keyboard drop-down. Or maybe I just didn't look at the right time...
I just tired to enter the sentence: ??????

And it works quite fine, I typed the whole sentence in pinjin, and it just recongize the sentence by verb , like... ? ?? ???

I think it's works like the window mode, but it also allow you to go back and change the word that you want.
sydtsai
     
Oisín  (op)
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Mar 31, 2005, 09:22 AM
 
Originally posted by wataru:
Another great thing about the simplified Chinese input is that it will tell you the pronunciation(s) of characters if you hover over them in the selection box. That's a lifesaver for 不能说中文的白人. Incidentally, I entered that phrase all at once with no problem, but often I find that the characters get messed up if you use too long a string (incorrect characters are inserted in weird places; it's a bug).
Yeah, the Windows variant does that too sometimes... If the sentence is sort of a quirky one, it'll guess at the most amazing combinations of characters, and you don't always catch them, rather annoying...

But actually, I'm a complete nincompoop moron. I somehow managed to completely overlook the fact that I study at the Institute for Asian Studies, and that we have a couple of fully functional (albeit old) Macs running Panther right here! So 我现在用的就是�_��_�的老电脑。我还� �得�_�一点这种输入法,但是好像至少� ��可以用的,没有我以为的那么麻烦和 复杂。�� Actually, it seems to be better at guessing the right characters than the Windows variant, I just have to get used to having to see the Pinyin typed out and then pressing space for converting (on Windows it converts to characters as you go along, which, IMO, is easier).

Edit: Now I just need to get Safari to stop converting my characters into question marks
     
OreoCookie
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Mar 31, 2005, 09:52 AM
 
Originally posted by Ois�n:
Yeah, the Windows variant does that too sometimes... If the sentence is sort of a quirky one, it'll guess at the most amazing combinations of characters, and you don't always catch them, rather annoying...

But actually, I'm a complete nincompoop moron. I somehow managed to completely overlook the fact that I study at the Institute for Asian Studies, and that we have a couple of fully functional (albeit old) Macs running Panther right here! So 我现在用的就是�_��_�的�?电脑。我还� �得�_�一点这�?输入法,但是好�?至少� ���?�以用的,没有我以为的那么麻烦和 �?�?�。�� Actually, it seems to be better at guessing the right characters than the Windows variant, I just have to get used to having to see the Pinyin typed out and then pressing space for converting (on Windows it converts to characters as you go along, which, IMO, is easier).

Edit: Now I just need to get Safari to stop converting my characters into question marks
Try Camino, it can deal with Asian characters better than Safari.
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wataru
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Mar 31, 2005, 12:36 PM
 
Not just Camino; all Gecko-based browsers convert the characters to HTML entities that can be viewed by everyone regardless of the text encoding they choose.

The downside of that is that it's nearly impossible to edit them afterward.
     
CaptainHaddock
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Mar 31, 2005, 08:15 PM
 
I thought the problem was with the MacNN forums. I've tried entering Japanese before and just got question marks after hitting "submit". The page encoding usually has to match the database text encoding for non-Latin text to work in forums.
     
Oisín  (op)
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Apr 1, 2005, 08:45 AM
 
那好吧,我就试一下用Camino打开论坛、用它的输入法发布个帖子看一下效果怎样��

Edit: Much better!
     
Jspeed
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Jul 27, 2005, 08:55 PM
 
Use the Hanin input method. You just keep typing and it will guess the words (that make sense on a sentence level). You can go back to a word and hit space to modify the selection. Hanin works with Zhuyin, Pinyin, etc.
     
   
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