New version of zdt flashcard program released

[bogleg]

I've just released version 0.3.1 of my zdt flashcard program. I've fixed several bugs, thanks to the feedback from several people on this forum. It also includes better traditional character support (for annotation and dictionary search) and now works on Windows and Linux.

If you were using the previous version, please read the FAQ before uninstalling so you don't lose any of your data.

Anyway, check it out. It's free and open source. Feedback appreciated and welcome.

Chris

[trusmis]

I have tested it in Linux.

The installation is very easy.

Anyway I recomend to make a script so it can be easier for non-advanced users.

I got and error after the splashscreen. I attach you the log file (taken from workspace/.metadata/.log even when I change the name to log.txt)

[bogleg]

Hi trusmis,

Thanks for the feedback. I'm currently looking into some java based installers to make installation easier on the linux side.

As for your error, it seems like it's a problem with the browser widget. It's trying to use firefox as it's browser. Do you have Mozilla 1.4 or later on your system? Try changing your MOZILLA_FIVE_HOME environment variable to point to /usr/lib/mozilla (or wherever mozilla is installed) and let me know if it works. I can reproduce your error on my system so I will do some further research on getting Firefox to work as well.

Thanks,

Chris

[klortho]

Does the flashcard feature only test individual characters, or can I add multi-character words?

[bogleg]

Yes, it will test individual characters or multiple characters words. If you take a look at entries in the example 'fruits' category, you can see it contains both.

Chris

[trusmis]

Sadly I desinstalled mozilla after installing firefox.

I guess that a lot of users have done the same thing. Firefox have now a wider userbase than mozilla (and any other browser but explorer 6).

Anyway I attach a silly script so the user don't have to write more commands

[fenlan]

I have installed it, and it is a good programme, specially as it is free, but the dictionary behind it contains many, many wrong entries. The hua2 that is in the word China is given in the dictionary as " hua1, flower". that is just one example. In spite of that, the programme is good, and I don't want to discourage trusmis.

How can you import a textfile full of words you want as flashcards. I tried to import a list of the 3500 common characters, but nothing happened. Does the list need to be formatted in a particular way.

[bogleg]

Hi Fenlan,

Thanks for the comments. Yes, the zdt currently uses CEDICT as its dictionary and is limited by how accurated it is. If you have problems with particular entries, I'm sure you can submit your corrections to the CEDICT people. Also on my todo list though is to take a look at David Lancashire's Adso database and see if I can have it as an available option as well.

The zdt import file format looks something like this:

trad_char simpl_char pinyin / def1 / (optional def2) / .../

An alternative is to take your list of characters, copy them, and then paste them into a category editor. I wouldn't recommend, copying all 3500 characters at once though... although it would be a nice stress test. I would do chunks of 20-30 characters and see how it works first.

Chris

[fenlan]

Bogleg, I think the entries in the dictionary window at the bottom seem to be correct, but when I pasted characters into the category window it seemed to run off a different dictionary. For example, in the dictionary window at the bottom 华 is correctly defined as "hua2, China". But if you paste this character into a category window, you get about 4 different options for this character, including "hua1, flower".

Do you mind if I seem ungrateful - I am not - by saying that a pinyin and definitions to character test would be good. What I mean is a test that gave someone the chance to write the character on a piece of paper before the character came on the screen. Also, when entering characters in the category window, you need to pick one and only one pronunciation for the character, eg either "le" or "liao3", with no chance of adding the other pronuncations into the character's definition...

I suppose you know that the 120,000-word Richwin dictionary is available for free on the Internet? It has not definitions however.

[bogleg]

Hi Fenlan,

You're right it shouldn't do that. The options dialog should only popup when it's ambiguous to figure out which entry you want. I'll file that as a bug.

Don't feel bad for making any criticisms or feedback. The software is definately not 1.0 quality yet. If it seemed like no one cared, then I'd probably just lose interest working on the project. So your comments are good motivation! I'm taking note of your suggestions for the flashcard enhancements and I'll take a look at this RichWin dictionary as well.

Chris

[zoli]

Hey Bogleg,

A Big Thank You for making this program from a poor student. I needed to learn vocab to pass an translation exam and your program is going to be a great help.

Some feedback:

1. Are you going to include audio in the future?

2. Can you include Cantonese pronunciation as text too (like how CEDICT does)? It would sure help Cantonese users learning vocab and Mandarin while using your program. Often I know characters by ear in cantonese, but not in writing nor Mandarin. Right now I cut and paste some characters into CEDICT to hear the cantonese pronunciations and learn that way.

Thanks!

[bogleg]

Hi Zoli,

Audio would be a great feature to have but I'm not sure how feasible it would be for me to include it unless there's some free stuff on the net somewhere I could use. I'm not a native speaker myself so its not really something I could do myself.

I'll also look into the Cantonese support. I didn't even realize CEDICT had a Cantonese version. Do they have a flat file you can download as well?

Thanks for the feedback.

Chris

[Xiao Kui]

I've been using zdt with the excel frequency list that was introduced by fenlan in an earlier thread. I've been pasting 100 characters at a time directly into the categories and using the flashcard view to review. I feel like I'm really learning them. Thanks fenlan and bogleg! This was fenlan's attachment- hope i linked it right http://www.chinese-forums.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=81

[Southernjohn]

Bogleg,

I have been using ZDT for almost a year now and it has been invaluable. I have been experimenting with using Supermemo, but I think will go back to ZDT because of its elegance and ease of use.

One reason I considered using Supermemo is that I wanted to be able to annotate my flashcards; put in sample sentences, examples of usage; etc. This doesn't seem to be possible on a ZDT card. Or is it? Sorry if I missed something obvious.

If ZDT had this added functionality, I think it would turn an already great tool into a fantastic one.

Southernjohn.

[bogleg]

Hi Southernjohn

Thanks for the support. Currently the ZDT does not support annotating your flashcards with sample sentences, etc...but I think that's a really cool idea. I'll probably have a new release of the ZDT over the next couple of weeks and one of the things I've been working on is separating the dictionaries (Cedict, Adso) from your user data (categories, stats, etc). With that done it shouldn't be too difficult to add something like what you're suggesting.

Chris

[Southernjohn]

I was just reading a previous post referring to Cantonese implementation.

I am studying Cantonese, too, and it occurred to me that my recent suggestion (being able to annotate a card) is a good first step.

That is how I would use it anyway. On a card, just to be able to type in the jyutping romanization, or whatevr other romanization you are familiar with. I would certainly do that.

[trevelyan]

@southernjohn -- I'd definitely be interested in adding jyutpin to the Adso database. We already have spaces to store sample sentences and more robust definitions for entries, and I imagine that all of this data could be integrated with ZDT fairly trivially. There is definitely a need for a freely downloadable resource with Cantonese pronunciation data anyway, since the only material of the sort I'm aware of is restricted to single characters and does not map pronunciation to actual english definitions.

The problem is that Cantonese also has a large number of duoyinci, and so you can't automate the conversion from mandarin pronunciation. So this is a kind of project that would require a team of self-motivated people familiar with Cantonese to check somewhere around 10-20k of the most common entries. I can't take charge of this because I don't know any Cantonese. If there were a couple of Cantonese learners who could take charge of this though, we could probably put something together fairly rapidly.

[WangYuHong]

I just downloaded this program and tried it out.

I think it's great!

I had a little trouble importing a character list at first, but I figured out what the problem was. I had an excel file full of characters (from John DeFrancis' Chinese Reader series), and pasted those into a notepad file (which automatically tab-delimits, yay!). But when saving the Notepad file, it prompts you for a format (ANSI, Unicode, UTF-8, etc.) so I selected 'Unicode'. When I tried to import that into ZDT, it didn't work. After some playing around, I figured out that ZDT can't recognize Unicode files... Anyway, the way to get around it is to save as a 'UTF-8' file, which ZDT recognizes perfectly.

My only suggestion: The John DeFrancis books teach in Traditional, so I've compiled a list of characters with their Simplified versions so I can use the flashcards to test my Simplified knowledge. However, when you use ZDT, it only shows you Traditional or Simplified on the flashcard. When the correct answer is displayed, it'd be nice if it displayed both Traditional and Simplified characters, so I can create a link between the two.

[bogleg]

WangYuHong - You should be able to import from Excel directly. Just save your Excel worksheet as a tab delimited file. But yeah, the ZDT can only recognize UTF-8 encoded files at the moment.

I'm also adding your feature request to the feature request database. I'll probably make it an option in the preferences.

Chris

[WangYuHong]

I haven't tried importing directly from Excel, but my Excel file has a bunch of extra info (like book, unit, lesson numbers), so copying to a text file seemed easier for me.

Has anybody figured out how to type in a ü for the flashcard test?

I'm trying to study 律, which you type in as lv4 in windows, but when I test it in the flashcard portion of zdt, I haven't been able to get it right yet... I've tried lu4, lv4, even lü4, but nothing works yet... I could just copy it and wait for it to come up, but if there's other characters with a ü in the same test, it won't work... (such as 女 or 綠色)