Archive for the ‘english chinese dictionary’ Category
Thursday, September 18th, 2008
During the Beijing Olympics, I provided a limited re-release of Primezero Chinese Tools 2008, a Large Type English Chinese Dictionary search tool.
Feedback from users showed me that I need to maintain more versions of the dictionary tools for more users.
So, I plan to release several types of dictionaries in the next few months, including re-designs of Primezero Aulenti and Primezero Soleri Picture Dictionary systems.
For now you only have two choices: Primezero Chinese Tools 2008 and Primezero i18n Terminal
Posted in china, chinese, chinese dictionary, english, english chinese dictionary | No Comments »
Saturday, September 13th, 2008
Primezero Chinese Tools 2008 is being tweaked here and there.
I am trying to provide a more complete learning experience for users. Here is a complete list of features.
Posted in chinese tools, english chinese dictionary, primezero | No Comments »
Tuesday, September 2nd, 2008
English-Chinese Talking Dictionary Working in Google Chrome. So, JavaScript sound support maybe not too shabby …too early to say …
Posted in chinese, chrome, english, english chinese dictionary, google, javascript, primezero, sound, talking dictionary, user experience, ux | No Comments »
Monday, June 30th, 2008
Investors have been rushing into China to catch the social networking boom. How do you say it? Learn how on the Primezero i18n Terminal, where you can see the simplified and traditional Chinese and actually hear a tutor pronounce the words for you. Example Search: social networking
Posted in china, chinese, chinese english dictionary, english chinese dictionary, english-chinese, learning chinese, social networking | No Comments »
Saturday, June 28th, 2008
Everyone is looking for the next big thing in English-Chinese Dictionary design and development.
Unfortunately, I don’t have it. 
Instead, I have a good idea about which companies will do well in the next 6 months with the Beijing Olympics approaching and the huge interest in Chinese languages this entails.
My two favorite companies right now are Nokia and Apple. They are attempting to penetrate the enterprise market where Blackberry dominates, so they are really taking some bold steps.
One area I am sure will grow is translation. Two people in two different timezones in two different languages should be able to communicate basic protocols and business objectives without fancy software. Nokia and Apple both provide new exciting opportunities for software developers, as the phones are bringing human machine interaction to a whole new level.
Personalized English-Chinese Dictionaries will help individuals build vocabulary. Combined with digital language tutors, the dictionaries will provide a new channel of interoperability and understanding.
Maybe.
Posted in apple, business, china, chinese, developers, english chinese dictionary, english-chinese, enterprise, from dual, iphone, language, learning, learning chinese, mandarin, mandarin chinese, n72, n73, n80, nokia, phone | No Comments »
Wednesday, June 25th, 2008
If you are learning Chinese before you go overseas to cover the Olympics or just want a quick reference for words you find in translation here are 5 Primezero Chinese Tools for you:
Posted in chinese, chinese dictionary, chinese english dictionary, chops, dictionary, english chinese dictionary, practice paper, seal | No Comments »
Monday, April 21st, 2008
Hey! Now, you can download your Chinese Dictionary results from the Primezero i18n Terminal to your Microsoft Excel Spreadsheet, CSV or CEDICT-compatible offline application.
Sample URL:
Developing ….
Posted in chinese dictionary, chinese english dictionary, download, english chinese dictionary, export results, learning chinese, pinyin dictionary | No Comments »
Saturday, April 12th, 2008
Here is a frequently asked question:
Eric, which direction are you going with the mobile version of the Chinese dictionary lookup: 1. Primezero Mobile Chinese Tools that depends on user interest per entry OR 2. Primezero Mobile i18n Terminal that uses semantics-centered information retrieval?
The answer is: Yes.
Posted in chinese dictionary for your mobile phone, english chinese dictionary, from dual, mobile chinese dicitonary | No Comments »
Saturday, March 29th, 2008
Posted in black blackground, bloomberg terminal, earth hour, english chinese dictionary, google, i18n terminal, lights out, primezero, primezero terminal | No Comments »
Saturday, March 22nd, 2008
If you want to say Easter in Mandarin Chinese, say fù huó jié. (復活節)
This Easter, pray for world peace and quiet.
Posted in chinese, chinese language, easter, english chinese dictionary, prayer | No Comments »
Saturday, March 22nd, 2008
When I started studying Mandarin, I was frustrated.
I needed to carry several heavy dictionaries because each one provided a certain lookup method. One was a good English-Chinese dictionary. Another was a good Hanyu Pinyin dictionary. I really liked the Hanyu Pinyin dictionaries because they allowed to hear a word and look up it up.
The Primezero i18n Terminal takes several Hanyu Pinyin lookup methods from various dictionaries and makes them usuable from a single search box. These features (many also available in Primezero Chinese Tools) are still in the testing phase:
- Multiple Inputs OK: Yale Mandarin, Tongyong Pinyin, Bopomofo, and Hanyu Pinyin
- Hanyu Pinyin Input with or without tone marks
- Hanyu Pinyin Input with or without tone number (results not yet sensitive to numbers)
- Smashed Hanyu Pinyin … Examples: zhong1guo2, yingguo
- English queries along side Hanyu Pinyin (where word order matters) … Example: kuai happy
Posted in english chinese dictionary, english to chinese dictionary, hanyu pinyin dictionary | No Comments »
Thursday, March 20th, 2008
Still working on some new features for the Primezero English to Chinese Dictionary. One of the things I really love working on is immediately improving information retrieval for you.One recent improvement is the umulat pinyin input (ü = v = uu = u:)
There are more features available that are not quite ready for showtime, but there is a plethora of words for engineering, finance, and healthcare available.
Posted in english chinese dictionary, english to chinese dictionary, hanyu pinyin dictionary | No Comments »
Tuesday, March 18th, 2008
Happy St. Patrick’s Day is easy to say in Chinese.
Logon to the Primezero Terminal and learn:
- how to say it
- how to write it
Posted in chinese, english chinese dictionary, language | No Comments »
Monday, February 18th, 2008
Today is the President’s Day holiday.
Markets are closed, but that doesn’t mean it is time to completely relax. You can take some time today to find some translations using the Primezero i18n Terminal.
Today you can learn how to say a few words for your next business meeting in Hong Kong or Shanghai. I’ll show you how: jump on the Primezero i18n Terminal and type away.
That’s it.
When you first arrive at the terminal home page, you will notice that there are no instructions yet. This is because I am still designing the terminals features around you.
I want this tool to be so easy to use that you can FIND the translation you need WHEN you need on your desktop or (soon) your mobile terminal.
Here are a few features some users have discovered:
- Smart Hanyu Pinyin Dictionary results
- Contemporary results, with names and places in the news
- Fast and clickable Chinese dictionary results
- Powerful Chinese Number Conversions (e.g., time, money, dates, fractions, etc)
- Some words that are ‘not found’ today are available the next day
Posted in chinese, chinese dictionary, chinese-english, english chinese dictionary, english-chinese, hanyu pinyin dictionary, hanyu pinyin lookup, primezero, product development, terminal, translation | No Comments »
Saturday, February 16th, 2008
Good question.
I am not really focusing on English to Chinese, actually I am focusing on Chinese as the pivot language and allow translators from all over the world to use this application for hopefully better understanding of language and culture.
If we understand each other, then we can have some world peace and quiet.
I am trying to develop a completely new way to provide translation to non-speakers and students learning of Chinese. There is a lot of scribble on the paper so please be patient whilst I bring the ideas from paper to production.
The concept is called the Primezero i18n Terminal. The platform is based on years of user feedback. You can start creating your own translation engine if you want using PrimezeroTools, freely available open source code at my Google Code Site, pzphp.
More details about Primezero i18n Terminal coming soon…
Posted in characters, china, chinese, english chinese dictionary, english to chinese dictionary, hanzi, primezero i18n terminal, primezero terminal | No Comments »
Wednesday, February 13th, 2008
Posted in character, characters, chinese, chinese dictionary, chinese translation, dictionary, english chinese dictionary, information architecture, language, product development, quality function deployment, search, semantic web, semantics | No Comments »
Sunday, February 10th, 2008
Adsotrans makes it easy to annotate Chinese articles and read them inline with context.
David’s new engine is faster and click-friendly.
I have added the new link on Primezero Chinese Tools search results.
Sample Query: Happy New Year
Click Adsotrans link to get your annotation.
Click on the characters to reveal an edit window. Neat!
Posted in character, china, chinese, chinese dictionary, chinese translation, english chinese dictionary, from dual, product development | 1 Comment »
Friday, February 8th, 2008
As a capstone to my milestones, I like to create PowerPoint presentations.
(Geez, what a geek).
There is something quite Zen-like when developing with PowerPoint on Google Docs. Simple yet just what I need.
They give me a chance to reflect on the product description and whether I met the basic requirements of a project. Under 10 slides of course — 9 to be exact. I just wanted to explain PrimezeroTools and cast it as a Chinese dictionary plugin. I was going to say “helper class”, but that is not as smooth as “plugin” … however plugin is WAY overused today like FRAMEWORK … *shivers down my spine *brrrr
Here is the GoogleDocs PowerPoint presentation:
Posted in character, china, chinese, chinese dictionary, chinese translation, english chinese dictionary, goffice, google, product development | No Comments »
Tuesday, February 5th, 2008
I am happy to introduce my boring, drab and underwhelming Chinese Character Block API. Yes, there is more coming, but I thought I would just kick this off. Ｉcalled it HanziBlox.
Start Using It Right Now
Just type the following URI into your URL Bar in your browser and get going!
http://www.primezero.com/labs/hanziblox/build?h=我
HanziBlox? Why HanziBlox?
Because I Googled HanziBlox and came up with Zero Results. That’s why.
The following names are finalists for naming this new API:
- Something On Rails
- PyBlocks
- JBlockaroo
- Poof
Ok, not really. but you get my point.
I’m not funny.
I’ll get back to work.
Posted in api, blogging, character, china, chinese, chinese dictionary, english chinese dictionary, from dual, iGoogle | 1 Comment »
Tuesday, February 5th, 2008
Primezero Chinese Tools Completed at Version 1.10. Here is a complete list of features. This information architecture experiment has concluded.
I want to clarify:
- Primezero is not a Chinese dictionary. It is a dictionary tool. It searches community-submitted content.
- The idea of decentralized Chinese translation is not completed — just the testbed.
From Developer’s Notebook
Now, for a quick core dump…
The primary goal of this project was to test what a “Chinese dictionary” is supposed to be. Let us first look at the somewhat traditional archetype this book.
A Chinese dictionary is a bound volume that contains insurmountable amounts of information related to one or more dialects of Chinese that can be readily accessed when needed.
Large volumes make wonderful doorstops and also are useful for propping up windows. Smaller volumes are often called “pocket dictionaries”, most likely designed for portability but with limited content.
Some Chinese dictionaries are neither large nor small, so they a provided topic-specific title, where you can find vocabulary that eludes that pocket dictionary without dragging a 5 pound dictionary around.
Things you find in traditional paper dictionaries:
- definitions — (define by whoooooo … from whooooose perspective?)
- parts of speech
- single source that is already outdated information by the time the book is published
- lack of cultural understanding and context
- no links to websites and media content (video, images, audio, etc.)
- closed source
Things you find in Primezero Chinese Tools (not a dictionary… a dictionary tool):
- live human translation
- ability to add your own definitions using Google Docs (and other Google Apps)
- search from multiple sources of information
- aggregation of definitions from multiple editors with equal voice (unlike wikipedia where one or two people can pick a pet rock definition and sit on it forever without allowing others a chance to add their perspective) — more later about Wikipedia’s failure
- rich media content
- open source
Posted in china, chinese, chinese dictionary, chinese translation, english chinese dictionary, from dual, goffice, google, open source, product development, web 2.0 | No Comments »
Sunday, February 3rd, 2008
It has been brought to my attention that the pzphp is in wider use than expected. As such, I have no choice but start working on this in earnest.
Wow! Class Design Is Difficult
Developing PZHanziReader, PZCEDICTReader and other classes has taught me about class design in general. It SHOULD be very abstract. It does give you headaches. It truly is fun.
Class has very little to do with programming. It is an understand about how we psychologically organize objects (physical or otherwise) in our mind. I am so lucky that I network in different disciplines: a designer, a dog trainer and a teacher all have different perspectives when it comes to “developing” software.
Lessons Learned So Far (Ya, I Made Mistakes)
I thought that using a superclass called PZPinyinReader would provide flexibility for novice developers (where they can add PZHanziReader or PZCEDICTReader as needed), but it has actually caused MORE confusion. Thus, I need to build an application that uses a single PHP class if possible. TODO.
I failed to visually represent the class diagrams and dependencies and this was another mistake. TODO.
I did not provide a PowerPoint or brief introduction to the technology and what it was supposed to do because I was focusing on my specific application of the technology. TODO.
I have not provided mainstream applications for Chinese translation or Chinese language study or math and science education. TODO.
There is more to say, but I better get back to work before the SuperBowl starts…
Posted in chinese, chinese dictionary, chinese translation, english chinese dictionary, product development | No Comments »
Tuesday, January 29th, 2008
Harmonizing Sausage and Stomach … which has a negative connotation, as to say, our bodies are ingredients for food. Oops.
… they meant to say “Soothing your digestive system” …
Embellishing your looks … the word “embellishing” is has a negative meaning. It means falsely creating an illusion that does not really exist.
… should be “improving your complexion” …
Posted in chinese, chinese translation, english chinese dictionary | No Comments »
Monday, January 21st, 2008
Like MandarinTools, the CJK Institute was one of the first online resources for learning Chinese and other Asian languages. Jack Halpern has just released a bigger and better version of this tremendous resource with a fresh new web site. He is a professional lexicographer. I consider his writings essential for proper dictionary development.
URL: http://www.cjk.org/
Posted in china, chinese, cjkv, english chinese dictionary | 1 Comment »
