GSoC proposal

[Hin-Tak Leung]

--- On Mon, 26/3/12, Cheer Xiao <xiaqqaix at gmail.com> wrote:

> > What you are describing is the desirability of
> predictive and phrasal input
> > methods in general, where the computer can anticipate
> and guess your
> > intention as you type.
> >
> 
> We only disagree in the definition of what a "decent" IME
> is. By
> decent I meant a decent phrasal or sentence IME. Because
> given the
> large amount of homophones in Chinese a bare pinyin IME is
> barely
> usable.

The first step of addressing a problem is to name and describe it correctly. Since predictive and phrasal input algorithms (and allowing fuzzy input) is not specific to pinyin - or pronounciation-based input methods, which the Japanese is also mostly based on - but also applies to shape-decomposition-based input methods like Cangjie.

The majority of pinyin-based input methods are "correct" and complete for what they claim to do, namely translating from sound to words, but not useable.

> > For what it is worth, you are forgetting two entire
> "areas" of people.
> > Taiwan/Hong Kong had always been far more
> computer-literate than Mainland,
> > so your "80% won't bother to learn another" is a gross
> mis-statement in both
> > quantity and quality. Due to different dialects and
> other reasons, Cangjie
> > (rather than Pinyin) had been far more popular with
> Chinese users. But even
> > with Cangjie (which is shape/writing-based, rather than
> sound-based, thus
> > getting around the dialect problem), predictive and
> phrasal input methods
> > are desirable.
> >
> 
> I declared that I was talking about the situation in
> mainland China in
> the beginning - I should have emphasized that along the way.
> But by
> declaring Cangjie is far more popular, you are ignoring the
> mass
> majority of people in mainland China. Again, I won't be able
> to
> convince you that the majority won't bother to learn another
> IME, even
> in highly computer-literate places like CS departments in
> universities. Arguing about facts is plainly meaningless.

You have completely ignore the historical context. Cangjie was the first input method which had a majority usage among ethnic Chinese users. That was in the 80's. It is a known fact that at that time, Mainland had just gotten out of the cultural revolution, and not in the best shape in general education, let alone technical areas, or access to computers or the internet. (in fact it is arguable about the last point even now, but I'll let that pass).

Since reliable statistics does not exist - and the Chinese government won't allow it - any claims on majority or percentage of usage is null and void, honestly. You only speak for your own preference.

> Yes, but "just works" is not the same thing as "usable".

You have again lost my point: pinyin is not the missing part in Linux/X11's chinese input support. Predictive/anticipative/auto-completion phrasal input algorithm is. And predictive/anticipative/auto-completion phrasal input algorithm can be used in combination with non-pronounciation-based (i.e. non-pinyin-based) mechanism, such as Cangjie, which is shape-decomposition-based.