Favorite Popup Translator - Lingoes, Powerword, Wakan, Stardict, NJStar, Wenlin et al

[Yorin]

I've been using Pablo. ( http://ehaton.blogsp...y-personal.html )

It's a dictionary with mouseover popups. It works in most apps (you just first need to tell it in which apps it should display popups). Works in MS Office, also works in Firefox (no plugin needed), although for some reason it really slows down the browser. And sadly it always crashes my Thunderbird. It's also free, uses CEDICT and shows Pinyin.

This has always served my needs, and I usually don't experiment a lot with different software. If some of you know Pablo and can tell me if the other Apps mentioned here are better, I'd be happy.

[Manuel]

I have just checked out Pablo. I instantly liked some of its features, such as hand writing input and character animations, but within five minutes it's crashed on me 10 times, and I couldn't get it to work with Anki or QQ. I also found the pop-up stayed visible too briefly to read. I'll stick with Lingoes for now. Another thing I like about Lingoes is the fact that it's not only a Chinese-English dictionary, in fact I can look up words in English and Spanish and get the Chinese translation, which is very useful. In addition, it is a portable app, which is always nice.

Mi "rig" is as follows:

• For character animations I use Chinese Writing Master or eStroke.
  
• For character recognition I use Sogou Pinyin's character recognition tool, which is just small portable app needing no installation.
  
• For popup translation I use Lingoes.
  
• Failing any of the above, I still have Pleco on my Palm PDA.
  

[Kev]

I use pera-kun. It's big problem is that it doesn't work offline.

[Manuel]

Lingoes works off-line

[StormerJack]

for me lingoes doesn't work it shows this message No matches were found for "" ect on every word

[Manuel]

Could it be that you don't have any dictionaries installed? Also, you will get that message if you haven't enabled any of the installed dictionaries in the Text Capture Group tab in the Options, so check it. Once you get it working I am sure you will agree it's a very useful tool.

[jbradfor]

Anyone know of a pop-up dictionary for WinRT?  I'm pretty sure the answer is "no", but just thought I'd ask....

[skylee]

Where have you been jbradfor? I think about you sometimes.

[skylee]

Not sure if this is good -> http://sidebardict.wordpress.com/

[jbradfor]

Changing jobs, moving to a new state, having my life in chaos (but good chaos), and losing motivation....  Glad to see many of the old crowd are still here, missed y'all, and hoping to regain some motivation

 

One technical issue that is impeding this is that I've moved from using my laptop to my tablet for evening relaxation.  This forum does not work well on a tablet.  Buttons too small for touch, web site a bit weird with WinRT. / IE 10.  I miss my popup translator.  Stupid keyboard is a Pita to use.  Whine whine whine.  I might have to go back to the laptop.

[skylee]

I have a windows 8.1 tablet. And I have not turned it on for over a month now. I am very happy with my windows 7 laptop.

[jbradfor]

Hey, that works!  Thanks skylee.  It's not as good as peraperakun, it doesn't seem to pop up the def.  I need to do split screen, and copy / tap, but it's 90% of the way there.

[CleverClogs]

The pop-up translator iCE from Loqu8.com might be of interest. It's works across all Windows desktop programs and is under active development. Highly recommended.

[jbradfor]

From what I can tell, Loqu8.com does not support winRT.  I'm not surprised, honestly.

[jimhsia]

According to www.loqu8.com/download.htm

Loqu8 iCE runs on Windows 8 desktop (not RT or Metro), 7, Vista and XP.

[icebear]

I've slowly moved away from relying on a popup, but when I do, and previously when I did all the time, Pleco. I Instapaper or Pocket everything I encounter throughout the day that looks interesting but isn't urgent, and then read the next morning. Anything that is pressing (e.g. for work) I will read on the spot and lookup using Pleco on my phone or Zhongwen on Chrome.