iPad for Studying Chinese

[feihong]

Yeah, I really like Anki but for Chinese flashcards I think Pleco is the best. Although making writing flashcards in Pleco is not automatic, it's still worth it because you can purchase the Stroke Order add-on and see an animated stroke diagram of the character after you flip the card.

[bande]

I finally downloaded the camera OCR app for Pleco. It's great. I should have downloaded it months ago. Anyway, I've had the best success using it on websites that I've taken a screen shot of. However, I've had less success with taking pictures of books. Has anyone taken pictures with an SLR and got the pages to decode? Even if I had to get a macro lens it might be worthwhile.

[hackinger]

As a follow up to #14 http://www.chinese-f...post__p__260604 and a few other posts later. I also use the bookmarklet from mandarinsport on the iPad for web browsing. I use the Atomic web browser instead of Safari because it allows resizing text with automatic reformatting to fit on the screen. That does not work with Safari. iCabMobile also allows resizing of text with reformatting. The two browsers are not free, but fairly cheap.

I posted in the iPhone thread in response to a post, for completeness I also mention the same thing in the iPad thread because that is what I use for browsing.

http://www.chinese-f...post__p__269715

Cheers

hackinger

[lukoktonos]

Seems like you already got your iPad set up with the mobile internet, but I thought i'd throw out there for anyone else reading this that you can use both China Unicom and China Mobile for the ipad's mobile internet. China Unicom has 3G, but China Mobile only has the 2g/edge speed internet. That's what I use though because it's cheaper and doesn't drain the battery of my iphone as much.

[Flare]

Can anyone provide a comparison between Anki and Pleco in terms of flashcards?

I moved from Anki to Pleco flashcards recently and it works like a charm on the iPad. Some interesting points:

- it's possible to move your Anki decks to Pleco (check Pleco forum community for how-tos)

- in Pleco you can make flashcards directly out of dictionary lookups

- in addition to the dictionaries available for Pleco it is not difficult to make your own dictionary for dedicated flashcard sets (eg HSK prep or certain textbooks)

- very active and responsive developer. Expect new features to be added as time progresses. For example there is talk of iCloud flashcard sync for iPhone-iPad and an extra mnemonics notes section for people using methods such as Heisig or Matthews & Matthews

- the flashcards are much more versatile and tweakable than Anki. But it does take some time to come to grips with all the options (well worth it though)

[zacharywang]

We just launched Small Talk Chinese, a dialogue-based Chinese learning app specifically for the iPad. The focus is on fun punchy interactive dialogues and exercises around real everyday topics like first dates, job promotions, and fashion styles. Our target is Chinese learners with an existing foundation who want a more challanging learning tool. We're just getting started, so feedback would be much appreciated.

It's totally free http://itunes.apple....520400313?mt=8.

You can learn more about us at www.smalltalkchinese.com (we're a 2 man team in Beijing)

~ Zac Wang (ABC from Mass. Ex-lawyer, living in Beijing for 4 years)

[Flying Pigeon]

I downloaded your app and now you're following me on Twitter. What's up with that? Never gave you my info, nor did I ask you to follow me.