Skritter Integration is LIVE!

I think I'm reproducing it, with that version of Flash Player and IE. It'll be tough to track down, but in the meantime, to anyone who is having trouble with Skritter Lite just sitting there and not loading: please try upgrading your Flash Player and let me know if that solves anything.

I think the "is not in our database." bug is something else, but this might be Calkins's issue (perhaps).

Sebire, the other option to get round the problem with lack of admin rights is to go to portableapps.com and install Firefox portable on your machine. You can install this to your My Documents folder, so shouldn't need admin rights (my university computer - to which I have no admin rights - is full of useful software installed in this fashion), and then you can use Skritter in Firefox. Although - on the down side - this won't mean that the problems get debugged...

Sebire, please shoot me an email: nick at skritter dot com. I'll give you a list of things to try and debug it and we can quickly work through them and find the problem--and then no one else will have it, either. I'll give you some free Skritter time for your trouble.

Yes, that doesn't work either.

if IE8 doesnt work right (rather strict now), you can set the domain into "IE7 compatibility mode" (Page properties). Hope that helps.

Hi guys, yes I did have to sign up for another Skritter trial (sorry) because I couldn't test it otherwise. All I got was "loading" for the Chinese characters, and none of the buttons work. I wanted to know what I needed to install to get it to work. I really would like to use Skritter, seeing as I now have access to a more powerful machine, but obviously don't want to spend money if I can't get it to work! I begged work for an upgrade from IE6, and don't think they'll be too happy if I now beg for a downgrade to IE7. I really wish I had administrator rights...

Sebire,

Ah yeah..here it is,in case you missed it,from the newsletter:

"And if you'd like to try out the Skritter Lite scratchpad but don’t currently have a Premium subscription, feel free to email us at support@praxislanguage.com and we’ll happily set up a free 3-day Premium re-trial for you"

Sebire,

Yeah,good tip RJ.Also didn't I see you can also now get a 3 day premium trial to try out skritter lite on the site here? That'd be worth a burl I reckon.

Sebire

Perhaps Nick will see your post and give you a more informed answer but I think you would be fine with IE8. I am using IE7 without issue and I dont think there are any special requirements. There may be some issues with IE6 but IE6 is notorious for having compatibility issues with just about everything. I would suggest you sign up for their free trial and see. Skritter does have a 2 week free trial.

What are the actual system requirements for Skritter? I can't seem to find them. I am wondering whether this laptop with IE8 will run it (unfortunately cannot install anything on it without asking people nicely). For instance, it doesn't have East Asian fonts, yet I can still display fonts when using compatibility mode - what do I need to do to get Skritter to work?

@nwinter 

I have no idea of what you are talking about but .. keep going!  I'm thinking that although we all have individual writing styles there are a finite number of patterns that can be identified; you could then identify the really common ones (or at least a Chinese linguist, say, could.)  I am each day trying to decipher cursive writing by Chinese students and even I am beginning to notice patterns - I have these breakthroughs; 'oh, so that is how that character is commonly written.' For sure people don't write as beautifully as Skritter does.  To read cursive it is almost a case of learning a new set of common character patterns.  The patterns are possibly also a function of the writer's age, or the period in time that they learned to write - that is what we notice in written English anyway.    

Yeah, you actually did get me thinking. I guess you could amass a handwritten character corpus and prompt for the pinyin given the handwriting sample. You could then do SRS on that; we could work that into Skritter...--no! It is a fool's errand!

'Sides, it'd probably be more efficient to build a paired text reader using handwritten texts such that you could instantly check characters you can't decipher. You could then internalize the transformations automatically, instead of having to actively answer for each one--much faster if you can get most of them. And you could get multiple scribes for each text, so you'd be able to switch styles to compare...

"Actually, reading some Chinese handwriting is impossible. I just had a thought; you could model it on the handwriting of Chinese doctors."

..you just need to get a good Chinese pharmacist on board.

I particularly liked motto's suggestions above.I think it would have to be an extra tab in the vocab section for the basic list [ordered according to frequency of use] while at the same time maintaining the ability to practice writing new words in lessons we're studying.In other words,have it as an "added feature" rather than an "instead of" feature.

@nwinter

Sounds like I have got you interested.. :-)

Actually, reading some Chinese handwriting is impossible. I just had a thought; you could model it on the handwriting of Chinese doctors.

Motto, you can try holding the Show button (示) or the "S" key briefly to get a hint of one or two strokes.

You can try making a new vocab label with basic writing chars and studying from that, but I think you'd have to trawl to do that from ChinesePod (not that that's bad, as you could hit a few lessons and pick what you needed). There's also a bunch more ways of adding vocab for writing practice on the main Skritter site.

Bo Dawei, I have no idea how one would go about writing software for that. It's like impossible.

@nwinter

Thanks.  Writing and talking about characters is one of the most enjoyable things about learning Chinese for me.  I think I prefer pen and paper but Skritter is definitely very cool.  I find that it is reminding me of bad habits that I have slipped into - oh yeah, that's how it should be written.  

What i'd really like now is a program that systematically helps me learn to read Chinese 'scrawl' or cursive (if you know what I mean.)  There is no lack of material.. :-)

A really nice addition to the learning tools. And the animation is so enjoyable to watch it make me want to use it more, and to get better in my writing.

Two suggestions:

1) I would like to "cue" just the next stroke, rather than the whole character, when I forget.

2) My writing vocab is way behind my reading vocab. I want to learn to write the most basic characters. So I cant really use my current vocab list and would have to start again. Nor am I sure how to add new basic characters to write, without trying to trawl thru all the lessons to find them. How about having a) two different vocabs one for reading one for writing b) A basic list of writing characters that is the same for everyone, perhaps ordered according to general frequency of occurrence?

That's strange. My first guess is that the vocab is stored in two different ways on ChinesePod: 帐户 is being displayed, but 账户 is getting passed into Skritter. My second guess is that we have the two swapped in our database somehow. Will check this one out when I get back on Monday.

John

I just did the 'Bank Transactions' lesson (because I have to open an account tomorrow) and noticed a weird 'feature' - the word 帐户 is used in the lesson and vocabulary but when you try and write it using Skritter it requires the word 账户.  What does this kind of glitch/feature mean?  I realise that both words can mean account, but CP has used one and Skritter requires another.  It confused me; it may confuse others.      

henning and tevorb,

We've fixed the issue of traditional characters appearing in Skritter Lite when character set in set to simplified.  I've taken the liberty of checking with both henning and trevorb's accounts, with various lesssons of different lessons, old and new, and all were OK.

Now that we've got that squared away, we'll start investigating these weird loading issues (Calkins' issue).

henning,

Thanks for pointing this out!  We're looking into it at this very minute.  Looks like the "show both Simplified and Traditional characters in word popups" option is not performing exactly right either.

trevorb, much thanks for the help and offer!  I'm out the door heading to work, but I'll check it again later...

Issue pinpointed!

if you expand the "extra options" in the Settings popup window (via the cogwheel) and select "Show both Simplified and Traditional characters in word popups." then Skritter is fed with Traditional, regardless of the main setting.

Calkins  I find the loading thing happens if I try to use all or a vocabulary list With a number of pages. The ones I've got only a few entries in load okay, even if they are practice traditional Chars.   Does th e lesson  in question have a large vocabulary?

With regard persistent settings via cookies I've tried on other browsers that I don't usually use for Cpod  and it is still an issue.

I remember setting something that let me see both Simplified and traditional chars but  I can't find this setting anywhere now.   there is a link within the settings box for advanced settings but nothing happens.   My theory was this setting may be confusing skitter somehow.

Anyway feel free to ask me to test/do anything that may help, ;-)

John / tech. team, 2 glitches in the Love Triangle 2 lesson:

• My vocabulary now shows simplified characters.  I have never changed back to simplified since the cogwheel was created.
  
• Skritter doesn't load in that lesson's vocabulary page.  It reads "Loading...", but after 15 minutes hasn't loaded.

It seems to only affect this lesson, a few other recent lessons I checked were fine.

Thanks.

after switching to simplified, logout & login, Skritter wants me to input traditional characters, too. Just to let you know that this bug seems not to "happen" in a few accounts.

Henning,

OK, thanks.  Good to know. That might be related... Those of us that have no issues seem to do more switching.

John,
no - my settings have been on "Simplified" since April 2006. The first time I switched (back and forth) was end of last week after I ran into the issue.

Henning,

Ha ha...  Nice attitude.  Thanks.

Out of curiosity, though, do you frequently switch between simplified and traditional? I wonder if cookies or previous character setting states (at the time of the Skritter update) come into the picture.

john,

no sweat! I follow the Microsoft principle and try to declare all the bugs in my life to be secret features. In this case, I took it as a hint from destiny to look at traditional - and what can I say: It is fun.  ;)

For your info: I just checked, and the issue persists even though meanwhile I swiched locations, IP address, provider, and logged out and in at CPod.

henning,

We have looked into your account specifically.  You're definitely experiencing a bug that others are not.  (trevorb, you're probably experiencing the same bug.)

We're on it. Sorry for the inconvenience!

I'm struggling now I'm only being offered traditional characters not simplified ones despite having my prefrerences set to Simplified.  I did try to go to the advanced settings as I thought that I had set something that meant I would get traditional characters as well but alas that link does not seem to do anything for me any more.

Is there a proper thread somewhere for this so that you can get feedback in one place or should I just keep posting here?

John,

I tried the lesson pages for:

• Where Did you go
• Lao Wang - the Finale
• 智能手机
  

Henning,

Is this from a lesson page or from your personal vocab?  If it's from a lesson, which lesson?

@nwinter, 

Meanwhile, can you confirm that the hang + no words + "is not in our database." happens when you first click the "Writing" link (next to the brush) from your Vocabulary tab?

That's exactly what's happening.  No big deal, but if you could look into it, would be much appreciated.

nwinter,

thanks. I still have questions, but posted them on the Skritter Forum, as they is not that relevant for the CPod addin...  :)

It sort of does that now if you set your character style to "both"--when adding new words, both forms are added at the same time (if you're adding from a list). But they do get spaced out from each other, and they don't get prompted together afterward (because you might get one scheduled later and one earlier after missing one and not the other).

It could be a lot better, though. Maybe later. There are not very many people learning both at the same time.

nwinter,
promting one after another...

Henning, how do you mean, studying them side-by-side? Prompting one after another, or having both visible in the prompt when writing one, or...?

It looks like there are some problems passing the words to be studied into the Flash app. I'll email John and we can see what can be done.

Meanwhile, can you confirm that the hang + no words + "is not in our database." happens when you first click the "Writing" link (next to the brush) from your Vocabulary tab?

“What about an option to study Traditional and Simplified side by side?"

..I'll second that as an excellent idea.

John,

yes. I switched back and forth several times.

When on Simplified, the vocab list correctly shows 团队 but Skritter expects me to write 團隊.

Somehow this makes me hungry. Nwinter: What about an option to study Traditional and Simplified side by side? (Of course in "Skritter - the original site" traditional variants would be added to the total score of "characters learned"!)

Henning,

Is that still happening? I can't replicate it.

When I have simplfied set, I see simplified, then launch Skritter and get simplified.  When I have traditional set, I see traditional, then launch Skritter and get traditional.

Hi Nwinter, no it just says "is not in our database."  There might be a leading blank.  I have 42 words in my vocabulary.  However, it loads in random order, so I'm not sure which word is causing the problem.  Some of the words are 荤菜,　凡是,　行动, etc.

If it makes any difference, CPod has permission to grant you access to my account.

nwinter,

I don't have a problem with words from the Cpod vocabulary list not loading on Skritter. However some words used by Cpod is not in the Skritter database, for example 洗碗布. When loading Skritter, a message appears saying 洗碗布 is not in the database. Not a big deal for me since it could be expected that there would be words used by Cpod not on Skritter's database.. 

tvan, did it mention that specific words were not in the database, or was it like " is not in our database" (leaving whatever it is that's missing blank)? It is strange that it's not loading any of the words. Can you give a couple examples of words that it should be loading? Thanks!

nwinter, wow, that was fast.  

Most of my vocabulary came from the lesson "Funny Business #4.  The lesson tab Skritter works fine.  However, my Vocabulary tab practice doesn't work.  It flashes "Not in Database."  I often add unfamiliar characters/words from the exercises/example sentences, so that might be creating the problem.

I'm not sure how skritter is selecting words from my vocabulary list.  I've experienced the hang that Tvan mentioned but on closing restarting the browser it then loads a random number of words from my vocab seemingly from anywhere.  Am I missing a way to select a list or is this random behaviour right?

Using it in the vocab list though works perfectly, especially on my tablet PC at work.  If you really want to use this seriously the tablet is definately the way to go.  Luckily windows 7 is likely to spawn lots of cheap tablet devices :-)

bodawei, yes, on the backend that becomes more complicated than you would think (or like). Anyway, glad you're digging it! I'd suggest writing the 记 what you describe mentally or on paper when that situation arises in Skritter.

tvan, which lesson did you try? Send me an email (nick at skritter dot com) and we can try to debug it using illegal ninja moves from the government.

I just tried the Skritter function out and, for some reason, have a "Loading" message that just keeps running.  I'm running this on a pretty robust Gateway laptop, Vista OS, Google Chrome setup.  Am I missing something?

@nwinter

Apology accepted and, although I wonder if we are at cross purposes, I want to congratulate you on a super product.  I like it so much I want it to do everything. To take a simple example, the verb 登记 deng1ji4 (to register). Everyone is enrolling at uni at present here.  记 is already hard-wired in my mind, but 我都记不得这个汉字‘登’ (I don't quite remember the character 登。） However, after writing 记，I can recall 登。 It would be great if using Skritter I can write 记 without 登 popping up when I press the blue button. If it is too hard for Skritter to supress the more difficult 登 while I write the simple 记, so be it. Anyway, as I say, it is a great product and the integration with ChinesePod is terrific.      

John,

I really like the way you worked skritter into cpod. The way it is set up allows one to study the new vocab definitions in support of the lesson at hand and at the same time adds to the number of total characters you know over time. This technique consolidates what tends to be two separate learning tasks in Chinese. Smart move, and for those who want more, you can study anything manually stored in labeled sections of the "me page" vocab and/or use this larger database for periodic review of an ever growing list of familiar characters. I have to say this is a perfect compliment to Cpod which was already a powerful way to learn listening and speaking skills. Cpod is truly an example of integrated Chinese learning now. The Cat's pajamas as it were. A+

Thanks John, hope soon to be able to use Skritter with my laptop in the office (when the staff's not looking 哈哈！)

bodawei, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to be dismissive. It is certainly a limitation of our software: it's not that you don't know the word when you write characters out of order, it's that it's too hard for Skritter to figure out what you know in this case.

I agree that the functionality you describe would be useful. From an implementation and interface perspective, though, it gets very complicated (more than you might think). The Skritter lite functionality embedded into ChinesePod is drawn from a more complicated spaced repetition system that needs to be able to determine out which characters, tones, and words you remembered correctly and which you forgot. That system will explode without doing the characters in order, and for consistency of interface and simplicity of maintenance, they both should work in the same way.

This makes my lessons complete! Love the integration on the vocab tab. What a great way to practise writing

@nwinter

Couldn't disagree with you more I'm afraid, and surprised by your quick dismissal of my comment/ suggestion.  But hey it's your business.  Have you ever sat around a table with a bunch of native speakers who have lived in China all their lives, arguing about how to write characters?  (It's entertaining on a few levels.)  They don't just write smoothly from left to right, or give up.  In my experience you sometimes have to skip a character and this does not impede the learning experience.  Having the first character shown to you when you are actually trying to work it out yourself does impede the learning experience somewhat.

It seems to work too well...now my simplified CPod Skritter all switched to Traditional (the vocab list is still simplified).

I suddenly have to draw a 黑 before the 点...Not that this isn't interesting...   :)

John, thanks for getting the traditional characters fixed...works like a charm now!

paulinurus,

Nick has worked out a fix for the MDBG thing, and we'll de deploying it soon, after testing.

The traditional character bug has been fixed, tested, and deployed.  Please let me know if any of you are still experiencing it.

Thanks!

nwinter,

Do you have any suggestions to enable Windows Vista IE8 to successfully link to MDGB? I still get ?? on MDGB screen instead of the chinese characters. 

I don't think we will make another skip function in the style you describe, bodawei. From Skritter's point of view, you don't know how to write the word if you can't write its characters. Being able to write the first character after being shown the second character, or only being able to write the word backwards, does not count as knowing it well enough--Skritter will encourage you to get the whole thing down solid instead of relying on the second character as a crutch.

Making an entirely separate way of going to the next character sounds like unwarranted complexity to me. Other thoughts?

Re my question posted yesterday: (1).  When a word comes up, is it possible to skip characters and come back?  I do this all the time in the real world - quite often seeing the second character helps me recall the first character. 

Henning kindly responded with a suggestion to use the Blue Arrow but in fact this defeats the purpose, because it reveals the first of two characters making up a word.  I want to proceed to the second part of the word without having all revealed.  Are there any other suggestions for achieving what I am after? Maybe a 'skip function' is something that could be looked at to make this tool more adaptable to writing characters in the real world?   

bodawei,

hehe,you'd have to think Kevin would be sympathetic wouldn't you mate?

ps Just found out who Lu Kewen is.Hehe.Yeah,he might have a word to Kevin.

@barbs

'Even though I can't read Hanzi on this work computer' 

Some employers are so inconsiderate.  Chinesepod should be an obligatory add-on, hell they should legislate.  Get onto the Labor leadership at once. Lu Kewen might put in a good word.   

:-) 

PS. At one place I used to earn a crust they even blocked gmail.  Worse than China.  

excellent.This is like Christmas.All our wishes are coming true.hhmmm,now what else can we ask for? hmmm...how about after I've written each character with my mouse I get an artistic appreciation score and some reasuring voiceover telling me just how wondrous it was,with cheering and clapping in the background?

We'll be adding some settings eventually that live on that page alongside the Flash window, one of which will be a speed control for the stroke order animation.

calkins,

Hmmm, you're right...  This bug seems more complex than we originally thought.

Anyway, Skritter does support traditional characters, but there is a bug in the way the system feeds the characters into the Skritter scratchpad.  We are on it.

woot.Even though I can't read Hanzi on this work computer,skritter still works.Yet another bonus.woot.

woot.

baba,

Just a thought, but this way they will know how many people are using this feature, which may be related to their contract with Skritter. Even if it is not, it will provide cpod with user stats. Whatever the reason, its an easy thing to do. Aint Skritter great?

John, your tech team may want to take a look at older lessons as well (in regards to Skritter and traditional support).

Going back to the Newbie - Intro 4: Do you like China? lesson (2005), traditional characters appear in my vocabulary tab, but I am forced to write simplified in Skritter.

usr260809,

Skritter does support traditional characters, but there is a bug on recent lessons' vocabulary section.  (You'll notice that on those same lessons, the dialogues and expansions display in traditional characters just fine.)  This will be fixed very soon.

John,

Sorry mate,I was just curious that's all because I don't know how these things work or the significance of them.It was this bit that got me curious:

"but will need to activate it"

So yeah,it was your 3rd point I was unclear on.I don't mind,but how come we don't have to activate anything now and it's working fine,and will have to activate things in a couple of weeks? How will we do that and what's the significance of it?

the new feature does not seem to work with traditional characters, or?

After switching to trad. (the small wheel top right) - I still have to write simplified.

bababardwan,

Do you have questions about the notice at the bottom?

The main points it means to cover are:

1. ChinesePod's writing practice functionality is provided by Skritter.

2. The current version of the app and the functionality it covers are free additions to Premium and above subscriptions, and we have no plans to change that.

3. When the beta period is over, Premium and above users will have to actively enable Skritter functionality (kind of like you have to enable traditional character support).

Is anything unclear?

John and Team

    I love the new features. Great job !!! Young in Atlanta

Wow.  This is great!  Thanks.  I would say I agree with bababardwan that if the stroke order could be slowed down it would be easier. 

ryanchild,

Sure mate.I sensed it was probably sarcastic but that I was also probably missing something.Yeah,I must read John's blog more...I still haven't seen that one yet.Thanks for clarifying anyway.Cheers. :)

bababardwan,

sorry for the confusion, but that comment that i wrote on 8/15 on the N&F was a friendly bit of sarcasm directed at john because he had recently written about SRS on his blog. i can see how my comment could be misleading to other poddies, but yes, SRS is generally a good thing. I can't comment about  Skritter Lite in Chinesepod because I'm a basic subscriber :(

Yeah, great tip Calkins, thanks.  

oh,one more thing.Is there anyway to slow down the animation of stroke order? For the more complex characters I need to hit the replay a couple of times otherwise.Not a biggie,but just wondering...

Hey,I've just noticed this clause down below the skritter scratchpad:

This is the beta version of Skritter Lite. When this two-week beta period ends, ChinesePod users (Premium and above) who enjoy Skritter Lite can continue to use it on ChinesePod for free, but will need to activate it. The technology powering this app is provided by Skritter.

..so what's all this then?

Calkins,

Great tip mate.Thanks. :)

Paulinurus, the 'show' button is the 's' key on your keyboard.  Hold it down and the stroke order is shown.  Nice!

boymeetschinese, there is a mobile version the likes of Skritter.  If you haven't already, check out PlecoDict. 

For practicing character writing on the go and just about anywhere, there's nothing better that I know of.

paul,

On skritter,down the bottom 4th button from the left...clicking once shows the whole character on the scratchpad,holding it down gives stroke animation.Sorry I wasn't more help last time,but hopefully got it right this time.

When I use my desktop computer (Windows XP SP2 IE7) the link to MDGB works.

The fabulous thing about linking to MDGB is that on MDGB one can also see/learn (a) traditional character (b) radical (c) animated stroke order.

nwinter, could you explain further on the "Show" button... where is it? On Skritter (after completing the writing) on on MDGB? 

You know when Chinesepod started out it seemed that the podcast was the thing and very much an aural experience, the learning of characters was an inconvenience that was particular to Mandarin and an oddity for a template that would tranfer easily to other languages that didn't center on mysterious pictograms in the written form.

This has to be a quantum leap forward for a learning approach that has already harnessed technology to provide bite-sized learning on the go but it was also constrained by the same technology which ably achieved the listening and speaking aspects of the language but when it came to writing showed surprisingly poor innovation. The arrival of Skritter is a welcome and indeed vital addition that will bring the experience of writing the characters to life in an interactive and seamless way. Making Skritter mobile is the next challenge that brings the language both spoken and written to the masses and leaves the traditional website to the pointy-heads who can quibble about the numerous ways to say 'husband' or 'wife' in Chinese.  Meanwhile this marriage between Cpod and Skritter can only spawn more innovation to benefit the many poddies/skritters.

hi nwinter,

Thanks for clarifying. For a moment there I thought the program had more of an affinity with people down under than people up yonder. Yes, my office laptop is using Vista with EI8. Looking forward for the fix. The joint venture between Cpod and Skritter will be more than awesome with a robust link to mdbg. Now 'cuse me while I go indulge in some chinese writing.

Awesome!  Thanks for this cpod.

nwinter,

Got it.That's excellent.Champion job.Very happy.Thanks mate. :)

paulinurus, bababardwan: the MDBG link was thrown in there as a "okay, okay, here's the dictionary link, but it's not done yet so I'm keeping it invisible". I would guess if it's not working, it's because the URI isn't encoded properly for Internet Explorer. I'll see about fixing that up later.

henning: we're actually up to 4070 characters now; will have to update that FAQ.

bodawei: you can add stuff to your ChinesePod vocabulary and practice it through there, or you can go to the main Skritter site to practice arbitrary stuff.

bababardwan: you can hold down the "show" button (or "S") to see the stroke order animated. (Another new, undocumented feature.)

mate,hang on,I'll give it another shot to see why it worked here.

ok paul,

I just went on the latest ellie lesson to verify it again.[Yeah,btw,I'm pretty sure my popup blocker is up and working..I'm always getting asked if stuffs allowed..but it doesn't go off when this thing activates mdbg].Ok,just tried it on a couple of words by clicking on the little shaded blue box just to the left of the upper left hand corner of the scratchpad [and thus just to the right of the pinyin].Worked fine both times bringing up the words straight away in separate tabs.Sorry,I'm not technical enough to help any more than that,but feel free to ask and I'll help if I can.I can only verify it's working on this end.I'm using firefox on a PC if that helps.Good luck mate. :)

Actually just read your post again.Certainly sounds like you're clicking on the right spot.Yeah,maybe it's got something to do with your security settings or something.Can you temporarily turn them off and see if that makes a diff?

bababardwan,

I did click on the chinese characters (to the right of the pinyin shaded in yellow). Each time mdbg came up with ??. Do you have a pop up blocker on your computer?

bodawei,

...to be sure,to be sure it's the Irish [sorry Ken,I realise you guys probably hate hearing that...personally I love it though]

Thanks very much Henning - since I posted I have been playing, and enjoying it very much - an excellent learning tool to be sure (as the English say, or is it Irish.)  A seriously good addition to CP. 

does not seem to work with traditional characters, or?

After switching to trad. (the small wheel top right) - I still have to write simplified.

Disappointing.

bodawei,

ad 1) you can skip a character with the blue arrow-icon and (in CPod) jump around the vocab list with the vocab-buttons below the scratchpad.

ad 2) if you add vocab to Skritter, the characters must be in their database - which currently contains 3893 characters according to their FAQ.

One small stroke for cpod, one giant stroke for poddies everywhere!

Thanks John and the rest of the CP crew - the Skritter add-on is a bonus.  The lack of a writing function did hold CP back, so well done.  

I have a couple of questions (I am new to Skritter - make that about five minutes).  

1.  When a word comes up, is it possible to skip characters and come back?  I do this all the time in the real world - quite often seeing the second character helps me recall the first character.  

2.  Is it possible to try any character there?  I seem to be limited by the words in my vocab list.  

sebire,

Sorry,when I saw John's reply at the same time I realised I was up the creek without a paddle,and he'd answered you anyway.I actually hadn't specifically heard that term SRS until ryanchild mentioned it on August 15 on the N&F and I must have misread his meaning but I thought he was suggesting it was something bad.I looked up SRS at the time and realised of the possible things that could be referring to that it must be this spaced repetition system.It sounds good to me.I'd like to have that happening.As it is I have hundreds of words saved in my vocab section that need sorting through.I'd like to master some and then just get 'em outta there to make it more manageable and focus on stuff I don't know.Anyhow,sorry I didn't quite twig what you meant.I initially thought you were referring to the srs but then I wasn't sure what you meant by "or do you literally just get the one word on the lesson vocab page?"..that last bit kinda threw me.Must be all the unexpected heat here lately.我脑子坏了，哈哈。

It is really great!! I didn't know of Skritter before and I think it has been an excellent idea to integrate it with Chinesepod. The idea of including it also on each lesson's vocabulary is simply perfect.

I have just subscribed to Guided (by the way, thanks for the special offer of August) and I am anxious to be assigned some lessons to start using all the possibilities of the site, including this wonderful tool Skritter.

Congratulations and thanks!

Thanks John, Baba.

Baba, what I meant was on Skritter, you have all the vocab which then comes up again at intervals, depending on whether the algorithm thinks you've learnt it or not.

(Love the woot, v amusing).

self deleted

sebire,

No SRS in Skritter Lite. (Apparently SRS is heavy...)

paulinurus,

It did automatically open a new tab in mdbg with the word not only in the translation box ,but also the translation below it for me.I'd give it another shot mate.I think you need to click on the actual characters,not the pinyin.Good luck. :)

Not being a premium subscriber, I am curious - do you get the whole spaced repetition thing, or do you literally just get the one word on the lesson vocab page?

Nice work John and excellent integration... it works like a charm! Also, linking it to the vocab has made this function very efficient since poddies can focus just those words they wish to learn to write.

However, unfortunately the link to mdbg is not completed. Clicking a word gets to the mdbg dictionary, however the word appears as "??". If the word could be entered into mdbg's "translate" box, it'll be perfect.      

This fills a huge gap.

What's next?

:)

c'mon John,

Your not really gonna leave us hanging like that, are you?

Thanks, guys!

We're not done yet...

Thank you for adding the character writing functionality! As far as I can see now, it works perfect and the "routing" is natural and logical. So excellent work!

I can say goodbye to my real life Chinese teachers now :-). Just kidding, but there have been added so many good things!  It will be hard to top this month in the future!

Hey,I love having it on the vocab page of the lessons.The perfect spot to put it.What I love about this idea of integration is that for me personally ,while I loved the idea of skritter,I wasn't overly likely to just go off and practice hours of writing on its own.Now I can incorporate it as part of completing the study of a lesson..it's in a nice bite size chunk that I'm much more likely to actually do.I know I should review stuff,but in reality,apart from my new iphone toy and the awesome app that came with it,I pretty much don't .I like the setout showing the list of words etc.The only thing I can see missing that I would have liked to have had would be an animation button so I could see stroke order and direction.I guess that's only for the full blown version ? Still,extremely happy with this addition.Thanks CPod and Skritter.

Hey,it's even on the very oldest lesson already rather than having to wait for it to be rolled out.

Also just discovered if you click on a character from the skritter page it takes you to it in mdbg.The only benefit I can see to this is that mdbg has that nice scissor tool so you can break down the character.

Ha ha!  Great to hear.

I think the design could use a bit of prettying up, but the important thing is that it works well, integrated with ChinesePod content.

Note that the Skritter app supports both simplified and traditional characters, but we've discovered a bug whereby traditional characters do not display (simplified characters are displayed instead) in the Vocabulary tab of recently published lessons. We'll have that fixed ASAP!

woot!

Low Cal Skritter seems to be working fine in both places. Very powerful addition to cpod. Awesome. Baba will be along shortly to add a woot!