One of the best things about using an Android based mobile phone is that, unlike the iPhone, you can install your own keyboards. Recently, I came across the TouchPal keyboard, which is not only an amazing ‘swipe’ style keyboard, but … Continue reading
Ideographer is a Taipei-based developer of small but useful Max OS X apps with a heavy focus on the Chinese language. I use their apps a lot during my day-to-day Chinese studies and writing here on ChineseHacks so I’d like … Continue reading
I wish I had this to hand when starting out learning Chinese, a Pinyin pronunciation soundboard that features all pronunciation combinations and for each tone! This is extremely useful if you’re just starting out or even want to brush up … Continue reading
We talk a lot of varied and diverse study plans and about not wasting time by writing line after line of words in repetition, but maybe at the earlier stages of learning Chinese this kind of practice is necessary. Like … Continue reading
There’s one thing that Chinese isn’t short of and that’s idioms 成語（成语 chéng yŭ）, so much so that we can even break them down into sub categories. For the moment, though, we’ll have a look at one category of idioms … Continue reading
The first few weeks or months of learning Chinese is inevitably spent studying a phonetic alphabet that will enable you to pronounce the new words you will be learning. This process isn’t easy and presents a barrier to entry to … Continue reading
When you’re learning Chinese in school or university, you will most likely first learn some form of Pinyin for a period of time before progressing on to learning and reading the Chinese characters themselves. While learning a phonetic alphabet is … Continue reading
Pinyin Dictionary for Max OSX is a simple application that does one thing well – output the pinyin for any chinese character or phrase. Depending on your learning style or needs, you should be able to work this into your … Continue reading
Finding a Chinese Input Method that is right for you isn’t easy. They all have their unique features or problems, the symbols are all in different places or they react differently based on your input. While the built-in input methods … Continue reading
