Iphone/iPad Apps for Learning Chinese

[m3ntol]

Hello,

I'm an individual iPhone developer and I'm also learning chinese so I wish to present my own Chinese Writing Application for iPhone.

Chinese Writing

Te application contains more than 5200 chinese characters with full animation, sound and search capabilities. The characters are organized in groups and ordered by frequency of use.

If anyone wish to test the application I can give some free codes to download the application, please ask for a code and I send by private message. The only thing I wish is get a feedback of your impression of the application and what do you improve to make it more useful.

Some screen caps of the application.

[Prodigal Son]

The app is too expensive. I've bought half a dozen iPhone apps for studying Chinese but I wouldn't buy this because the price is too high. There are other apps that do the same thing for free or much cheaper (check out MiaoHong) although admittedly, they don't offer nearly as many characters.

[jeromeuy]

Hello m3ntol. I'm happy that people like you are developing iphone apps to help people learn Chinese. We really do need more of them. I'd be interested to try out your app and can guarantee you fairly detailed feedback. You can email me at jerome_uy(at)yahoo.com if you can't PM me. Looking forward to hearing from you.

[m3ntol]

Hello jeromeuy,

the code has been sent.

Thanks

[m3ntol]

Hello 'prodigal son',

I've follow your advise and reduce the price drastically to 2.99$

The application takes me a lot of effort but, you are right there are similar applications really cheaper, so I decided to match the price.

Thanks for the idea.

[tehkatt]

m3ntol, your app looks really cool! I would love to try it, I'm currently looking around for some good chinese writing programs.

[m3ntol]

Hi tehkatt,

I'm not able to send private messages, please give me any other method to send you the promo code.

[gato]

开心听 is a Pandora radio-like free app for Chinese music. Lyrics are displayed while the music is playing. An excellent way to get exposed to more Chinese music.

Some useful apps for Chinese learning and/or living in China:

DICTIONARIES

Pleco

金山词霸

ChineseIdiom

ChengyuLite

READERS (NEWSPAPER / GENERAL)

南方周末

21财经阅读器

南都报系阅读器

蘋果日報

台灣報好你知

Stanza

MobileRSS (Google Reader app, from a Chengdu software company)

MISC UTILITIES

Pocket Tune (listen to radio stations from around the world, including mainland China and Taiwan)

万年历 (lunar calendar)

全国影讯 (schedules of movies playing in China)

中国天气 (weather forecast for Chinese cities))

[Munchkins]

Hi everyone, I am new to this forum but wanted to share news about the launch of my iPhone app: Chinese for Munchkins. It's a fantastic little app for kids to learn Mandarin and Cantonese numbers and animals. I hope you like it! Check it out here: http://tinyurl.com/282qu7t

Would love to hear your feedback and suggestions for new content! Kids love the animal sounds and will repeat words on the memory game. This is the first ever Cantonese iPhone app for kids with games so go check it out! Thanks. Heidy.

[Wince - I love Chinese]

Hi All,

My name is Wince and I work for a company called I love Chinese. I noticed that you have quite an active community here on chinese-forums.com and seem to be very willing to help out the iPhone developer community.

I love Chinese is an incredibly young start up out of London - we just got up and running at the end of last year. Our goal is to build a compelling set of mobile apps for students of Chinese anywhere in the world.

Our first iPhone apps have been flashcard programs to help with character memorization. We have also released an iPad app that is a Virtual Language Lab. Currently, the iPad app has the same flash card program as well as classic chinese stories. There are plans to grow the iPad app to include a writing module, games module and other quizzes and tests.

There are definitely areas that need to be improved, but we think our apps really have potential. We're looking to grow and develop, but we realize that we are nothing without our customers - So we're reaching out to you.

We were wondering if you could check out our apps and tell us what you think?

To make it a little more interesting, we're awarding PRIZES on 2-July-2010 for $20 (or equivalent) gift certificates to the iTunes store.

It's incredibly simple to enter - just give us some feedback for our our apps. We're looking for ideas around usability, modules you'd like to see on the iPhone/iPad, etc.

Tell us what you want to see when you're learning Chinese on your mobile device.

As a special case for chinese-forums.com, we will accept any replies on this thread with feedback for our app into the prize drawing.

You can also send your feedback to feedback@ilovechinese.co.uk to be entered.

We're awarding 2 prizes - one gift certificate for what we deem as the most constructive feedback, the other as a random draw from all the replies we receive.

Send us as much feedback as you'd like, please tell your friends about this as well - we'd like to hear from everyone we possibly can.

Links to the apps on the iTunes store can be found here:

I love Chinese (free) - iPhone/iPod app:

http://bit.ly/ILC-free

I love Chinese - iPhone/iPod app: http://bit.ly/ILC-paid

Virtual Language Lab - iPad app: http://bit.ly/ILC-iPad

Thank you for your time and we look forward to hearing from you soon!

Wince - I Love Chinese (http://ilovechinese.co.uk)

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[valikor]

Has anyone tried the new Anki iPhone app?

It seems like they finally released a proper one.

I've been using ankimini, which is pretty good, and wondering if I should buy the new one. (It's expensive, but according to the Anki website, the developer basically says he needs money right now and is hoping that dedicated users will buy it despite the high price (25 USD))

[Wince - I love Chinese]

Valikor,

The Anki app looks pretty cool and incredibly customizable.

Just wondering what features in anki do you find you use the most?

Cheers,

Wince

[LaoZhang]

I'm surprised no one has mentioned KTDICT.

My 3 favorite and most used apps are:

KTDICT is a free dictionary that's based on CEDICT. The interface is simple, easy and fast to use. Traditional/Simplified, measure words, chengyu. You can upgrade to get flashcards etc. I haven't done that myself. My only complaint is that the icon is brown like the calculator.

The other app is eStroke. This is a paid app, about $4.99 if I remember correctly. There are some characters I have trouble remembering the stroke order and this app is great. You can also use it as a Chinese to English dictionary, but it's best for practicing writing. There are regular updates, which gives me confidence that what's in its database is current.

Finally I'll second the mention about CCTV Mobile. It's great and you can watch pre-recorded stuff as well as stream live. Best over wifi, of course.

I don't see much need for any other app unless you're looking for a flashcard trainer, which I believe may already be integrated in the upgraded KTDict and/or eStroke.

[valikor]

I do like all the plugins and shared decks that are available for download.. such as the pinyin-toolkit (I think?) which basically allows me to make large numbers of cards very, very quickly.

Honestly though, I think that the idea behind most flashcard apps is basically the same, and any of them could work well if you use them. I don't even use any of the fancy multimedia stuff that anki supports. Thus, the reason I choose anki is that it is cross-platform, and I can sync my iPod and my computer (as well as being able to study online using any computer in the world... if I ever want to )

[Wince - I love Chinese]

Valikor - That's cool, so the ability to customize and have cross-platform cards is important to you. Do you find that the price for Anki mobile is a bit steep though? I know it's for diehard flashcard users - I know I'm definitely not one of those... What do you normally base the flashcards you make on? Do you follow a curriculum for learning chinese?

LaoZhang - Sounds like content and style are important to you. Would you be interested if there were a dictionary that was complete like KDICT, but more stylishly implemented? What type of things do you watch on CCTV mobile?

Cheers,

Wince

[trevelyan]

I'm pleased to announce that Popup Chinese has released some new and free iPhone software. Call the Chinese Writer, this neat little application teaches the basic rules of how to write Chinese characters through a simple twenty-five character tutorial. For more advanced users, it has an expert mode that cycles through hundreds of Chinese characters in both simplified and traditional Chinese:

http://itunes.apple.com/app/chinese-writer/id374152537?mt=8

We're planning to continually improve it, adding support for new characters, etc. So if you have any feedback, suggestions on how to make it more useful, please let us know. You can either message me through Chinese-Forums, or grab our contact information off Popup Chinese. And if you find it useful? Please don't forget to rate the software highly and leave a quick review encouraging others to check it out.

Best,

--david

[trevelyan]

Just announced this in another thread, and then caught sight of this one.

I'd recommend anyone studying Chinese check out the Popup Chinese Chinese Writer application. This is an interactive and fun tool designed to help develop good handwriting. Its expert mode lets you practice writing hundreds of characters on-the-go, and it also comes includes a tutorial mode that teaches all of the basic rules for learning to write characters.

Feedback and suggestions for further improvements are always welcome.

[LaoZhang]

Valikor - That's cool, so the ability to customize and have cross-platform cards is important to you. Do you find that the price for Anki mobile is a bit steep though? I know it's for diehard flashcard users - I know I'm definitely not one of those... What do you normally base the flashcards you make on? Do you follow a curriculum for learning chinese?

LaoZhang - Sounds like content and style are important to you. Would you be interested if there were a dictionary that was complete like KDICT, but more stylishly implemented? What type of things do you watch on CCTV mobile?

Cheers,

Wince

Hi Wince,

For me it's more about usability than finish or style. I like the simplicity of KTDICT. It's quick and useful "in the field." At this time, I don't feel I have any reason to need any more dictionaries. I have tried a few others, ICED, I think it was called, but it wasn't simple enough to use. i have used flash card apps, but never got into them For CCTV I like to watch some current news and music videos. I supposed if I had to stretch and ask for functionality, it would be for 1. lots of sample sentences 2. phrases, rather then just words/compound words 3. audio of sentences read by native speakers who are from different regions of China.

I'm pleased to announce that Popup Chinese has released some new and free iPhone software. Call the Chinese Writer, this neat little application teaches the basic rules of how to write Chinese characters through a simple twenty-five character tutorial. For more advanced users, it has an expert mode that cycles through hundreds of Chinese characters in both simplified and traditional Chinese:

http://itunes.apple.com/app/chinese-writer/id374152537?mt=8

We're planning to continually improve it, adding support for new characters, etc. So if you have any feedback, suggestions on how to make it more useful, please let us know. You can either message me through Chinese-Forums, or grab our contact information off Popup Chinese. And if you find it useful? Please don't forget to rate the software highly and leave a quick review encouraging others to check it out.

Best,

--david

Hi David,

I'll check it out. One feature missing from other writing tools, even like Skritter, is "useful" feedback. For example, if I write 二 with the top stroke a little longer than the bottom, most (all?) programs will count it as being correct. Useful feedback would spot this "common error" and remind that learned that the bottom stroke should be longer. Personally, I need some good tips for handwriting 弓!

[valikor]

That would be nice, but do you really think the iPhone/iTouch is an especially suitable platform for improving handwriting?

If I cared about my handwriting, I would grab a pen and spend some time with my 字帖 (costs one US dollar in China), and copy beautiful characters over and over again until mine look more like they're supposed to

Maybe some software might surprise me, though.

[HerrPetersen]

The ankimobile app is supersmooth, and easy to use. Highly recommended.