Why is Pleco so popular?

[Guest realmayo]

Is there any way Pleco can be configured to control my brain?

[imron]

If you've purchased pleco add-ons on a mobile phone, is there any way of transferring it to a new one? I'm about to change phones and would not like to pay for the software again.

Just to add to the things listed in my earlier post, free upgrades across hardware and OSes is another thing I love about Pleco.

[GotJack]

Can i use pleco on my macbook?

Im keen on buying the flashcard feature, as Im finding creating my own on Anki takes too long. But I'd consider not making the purchase if I was limited to only using the flashcards on my iphone!

* Ok so I had a little google, and although Im not confident it seems as if you cannot get pleco on macbook (bummer! why?) so is it possible to run some sort of ipda emulator on my mac?

[imron]

I used to think the same until I realised (thanks to a post by gato somewhere) that it's actually more convenient to just do everything on my phone.

Obviously this won't be true for everyone, but it was for me.

Is there any particular reason you need/want them specifically on the desktop?

[GotJack]

No, it was simply a convenience thing. I always sit with my laptop, never really use my iphone for anything other than phoning/being a camera.

I might give it a whirl on your advice.

Can i ask if I purchase the flashcards will that include a spoken pronunciation of the word? or should i pay for this addon as well

[imron]

I think pronunciation is a separate addon. Whether it's worth it depends on how confident you are in reproducing accurate mandarin from pinyin, and whether or not you want audio with flashcards.

The major points of convenience of doing everything on the phone is never needing to worry about synching, and that you'll generally always have your phone available when you have your laptop around, but the opposite is not true - there are plenty of times when you'll be able to use your phone but not a laptop.

Once you accept it's fine to use the phone in those circumstances, you realise it doesn't really make any difference to use it in other circumstances too.

[bluetortilla]

Pleco is a great study-dictionary for looking up words in texts and so on, but it's weak in examples and idiomatic language. I can't really comment on the flashcards as I'm burning StickyStudy right now, but building your own bookmarked set of cards seems great. I never found the OCR useful. Maybe i just didn't have the patience, but it seem you can only capture one character at a time, not a whole line (much lesson a phrase translation). Pleco does have a nice interface.

I use Pleco on the go when studying, I use Google or Baidu Translate more for communicative stuff, and I use a number of dictionaries at home especially online dictionaries like nciku and my favorite now, iCIBA (geared more for Chinese users I think), but Dictionary with the CC-Edict module on OSX has an awesome interface and is great for quick vocabulary lookups.

[imron]

Pleco is a great study-dictionary for looking up words in texts and so on, but it's weak in examples and idiomatic language

Which dictionary are you referring to?

I find the Guifan Chinese-Chinese dictionary to be very good for learners, with entries often containing clear notes pointing out subtle differences in meaning/usage from other words.

[bluetortilla]

Well, all the ones Pleco came with when I bought (PC, CC, and so on). Chinese to English is always better than the reverse. I don't have a Chinese-Chinese dictionary! Is it free?

[imron]

The Guifan Chinese-Chinese dictionary is a paid add on.

I'm not sure if there are other free ones.

The ABC C-E dictionary (also a paid add on) also has good example sentences and usage information.

[bluetortilla]

Yes, it looks like there's a great selection of paid add-on dictionaries. CC-CEDICT is about the best I got running for now, with no really robust dictionaries coming with the basic Pleco subscription (though CC-CEDICT is pretty darn good imo for a free dictionary). Well- the bright side is i have more than enough resources to keep me busy for a good while yet.

I haven't tried out the ANDSOTRANS C-E word for word translating or the Wiseman medical dictionary yet.

[Singe]

Oh, no. With the French translation of my name being 'monkey' I'd better be careful next time I use Pleco.

[GotJack]

Can I ask a question to the guy linked with Pleco (or any knowledgeable users)

When I scan text with the camera for auto-flashcards, it does not add ones it says are duplicate. Now this may be the case as i have downloaded the HSK 1-6 pack, however I still want to add duplicate cards to different sets.

Is it possible to change the settings so that it adds duplicates when scanning for flashcards?

[mikelove]

Yes, certainly.

By default it should already add them to the new category if they're not already in it, even if they are duplicates - this is by design so that a single word has its scores tracked across multiple lists (don't want to study 包子 too many times just because it happens to be in more than one vocabulary list). Have you picked a particular category to add these cards to? In the OCR flashcard scanning mode you're prompted to do that when you launch it; when adding them manually with the + button you tap-hold on it and a menu pops up to let you choose a category.

Aside from that, if you set "Duplicate card handling" in Settings / Flashcards to "Allow," that will let you create as many duplicate cards as you like without any regard for category.

[GotJack]

Hey mikelove, at the moment the dictionary  seems to reveal two sets of characters? Im thinking these are traditional and simplified, and i can see you can switch between what is in the square brackets.

 

What i want to do though is only see the simplified character. Is this possible?

 

Cheers Jack

P.S plecos really growing on me, really happy having paid for the bundle. Great programme, thanks

[mikelove]

Yes - not clear on whether your'e on iOS or Android, but on iOS you'd want to go to Settings / Dictionary / Entry Display and set "Headword Mode" to "One Set Only" (settings screen has gotten a lot better in the new version we just submitted to Apple) or on Android you'd go to Settings / General and set "Headword Character Set" to "One Set Only."

 

And thank you! I'm very happy to hear you're finding it useful.

[alanmd]

I didn't see it mentioned above, but the original poster who didn't like Pleco's user interface should take a look at the recently released and much improved Pleco 3.0.