Using swype input for Chinese gets attention

[vellocet]

I've often used swype input for English, but just recently started using it to input Chinese pinyin.  I've had a lot of people perk up and ask me what the heck I was doing.  I guess they only way they know to input on a phone is by typing pinyin, or handwriting.  I was surprised people's iphones don't have swype. I suppose most English-speaking Chinese don't use swype to input English, either.  They just use the English mode of Sougu or QQ or whatever keyboard is already installed. 

 

When they ask how to do it, I tell them install TouchPal keyboard, which is what I use.  It supports swype on both English and Chinese, and is IMO the best keyboard for bilingual input.  Other keyboards are better at English or better at Chinese, but TouchPal is good at both.  I tried all the keyboards. 

[艾墨本]

Would you mind sharing a link to it? I tried looking up touchpal and there seem to be a lot of different inputs with the same name. I'm not sure which is legit and which is a knockoff.

 

Thank you.

[vellocet]

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.cootek.smartinputv5

 

When you can't figure it out, go for the one with far more downloads than everyone else.  You have to spend time setting it up for Chinese, but it's worth the effort.  

[lechuan]

Has anyone had success with the iOS version? I installed it, but when I select 拼音 as an additional language, it starts to download, but never finishes. (I am in North America).

[艾墨本]

Thank you for the Play store link. Based on the version and icon, it's not available to me through any China-based app stores.

[Gharial]

Hi Vellocet, mind me asking what settings you use in the app? I have an old Gingerbread phone and a newer Lollipop one, but haven't used the Lollipop as much (as its phablet-sized screen doesn't render webpages as well, too much scrolling around and pinch resiszing needed, and the newer TouchPal keyboard that I installed on it isn't as good as the pre-installed older version on my Gingerbread, which incidentally also offers Japanese support, something which the newer TouchPal seems to lack). I wasn't aware of or could never get the swiping to work for the Pinyin input on that Gingerbread at least, anyway!

[vellocet]

By settings I just mean downloading Chinese handwriting (it's separate), and then going into the settings to make sure everything is set correctly.  For example, I believe wubi is enabled by default, something that can be turned off.  Or you can disable pinyin if you use bopomofo.  And then set up how you want your Chinese to behave, what kind of prediction you want and handwriting delay (I always set it to 1000ms because my writing is SLOW).  Set a custom keyboard theme if you like, I use Blue Machine because it makes my phone look cool.  For swype in Chinese, I swear there used to be a setting for it.  I went through the entire options tree and there was nothing regarding swype in either language.  It just works in pinyin mode on my Xiaomi 4 running Android 6.  

[Gharial]

Sorry for the belated reply, got rather distracted by Brexit LOL. I'm pleased to report that the Chinese Pinyin swiping works on my Lollipop (but not on my Android...or only to the degree of being able to select single characters at a time rather than anything polysyllabic). Thanks for pointing this stuff out, Vellocet! It'll give me more reason to use the Lollipop now.