To iphone users - one tip - one question
skedzinger
April 10, 2009, 06:42 AM posted in General DiscussionTip first:
there is a iphone app called iflipr - it's just perfect for studying with flipcards. you can make your own lists - or take some that has been shared from otheres.
for example, i started to make a deck to learn the chinese provinces - displaying the map with one highlighted province on front - pinyin and chinese on the back. just to discover, that someone else already did it!
its very convenient to use and also can be used offline! great excercise help!
question:
i downloaded the 888 lessons after joining, i copy them to my iphone to learn in the gym. now i find that some are holding the dialogs in written form, displayed on the iphone during playback - but most dont! why is that? it is so convenient to be able to have a quick look to see if you got the tones right etc...
i have five lessons on it at the moment - all newbie - and only one shows the dialogs - am i doing something wrong - or are some just missing that information ist there a way to find out which have this information before using them?
skedzinger
May 13, 2009, 09:17 AMnobody? i'd really love to be able to read the dialoges on the iphone while listen to the lesson. that would be great way to reensure you got the tones / writing right...
frognotinawell
May 13, 2009, 11:45 AMskedzinger
You cannot copy directly from the pdf file, because CPod use some weird formatting. You have to use the html version. Either use the 'text version' link at the bottom of the PDF or go to the lesson on CPod, open the transcript download and change the url from ***.pdf to ***.html. Then you can copy & paste to your app.
matthiask
May 13, 2009, 11:45 AMsorry to leave you alone on this. I'm crying out for a while to have the dialogues pre-dialogued.
As I don't have access to the 888 files, I also don't know whether they differ from the online files.
And last, if i copy paste it, it's displayed on my ipod correctly.
user080509
May 13, 2009, 01:41 PMForget the pdfs because CPod is not able to make a PDF with chinese AND correct Copy&Paste. (Competitors like CLO or Melnyk can, but Cpod ...).
Use the HTML and change the URI from .pdf to .html, that may work...
The low quality podcasts dont contain the text, the high quality podcasts seem to contain. Maybe the old lessons in the 888 bundle don't follow this convention fully.
On my iPod 4G the Chinese text is never to be seen although the iPod can display text, even Chinese. I dont understand why this doesnt work, maybe Cpod makes something wrong during podcast creation.
I will not subscribe because of these problems, the poor flashcards, and the high price.
matt_c
May 14, 2009, 04:41 AM@user080509
Hi, I understand your dissatisfaction regarding the flashcards. The new flashcard system is currently being built and will incorporate SRS functionality. In the mean time, we have enabled vocab export functionality for powerful flashcard and learning tools such as Anki and Pleco. See here for Anki instructions, and here for Pleco instructions. Study Arcade is a free app for the iPod touch & iPhone thank you can sync your ChinesePod account with - this will download your saved vocab to the app - this is another flashcard app that uses an SRS algorithm.
As for the price - a LOT of time, effort, money is spent producing ChinesePod, and we have tried to structure the pricing to be as fair as possible - there really is no such thing as a free lunch. :-)
trevorb
May 15, 2009, 12:18 PMI don't have a 4G iPod but I think if you press the middle button when the podcast is playing you should see the text.
I get the text displayed perfectly on my touch with updated Os for the elementary lessons. I do believe that the text is not included in the free lessons though but maybe someone from CPod can clarify that.
user080509
May 15, 2009, 12:24 PM@trevorb
I know all these tricks, but it on my iPod 4G Clickwheel no text is displayed. It's maybe too old. But no money to buy a touch or iPhone :-(
Other mp3 files contain texts and the text is displayed, but with CPod's lessons it does not work :-(
user76423
May 15, 2009, 05:13 PM@user080509
Same with me, on my iPod the texts are also not displayed. Support is unable to tell me why.
skedzinger
May 17, 2009, 05:52 PMi just figured out, that if you download and imlpement the dialog only mp3 file, it always shows the dialog!
you can just cpoy it to the main lesson file in itunes and have it everywhere! happy happy! (even if i dont understand why they did it in the dialog files - but not for the lessons...).
its so good - using it frequently.
i first listen to the lesson 3-4 times, to get the explanation in my head. so i'm always carrying like 5 lessons with me, that i'm actually learning.
everything i finished just lands in an endles playlist, just the dialoges. as they are short, you can go trough a lot of them quick. it really tunes you in to the melody of the language.
i already find myself in situations, where i'm not sure about a tone, then i recall the way they say it in the dialogue, and can judge from there.
to me this is a beautiful solution to my problem of getting the toes straight!
daniel
skedzinger
April 28, 2009, 12:20 PMok - i figured out now, that i can add the lyrics to each file in itues. great for putting in the dialog for looking at it on the iphone!
problem: when i copy from the transcript, it looks like that:
Ù? @
zh` er yˇou c`esuˇo ma?
Is there a bathroom here?
any idea how i can make it work? it would be perfect to be able to look for charakters occasionaly while hearing the lesson they belong too.
(for some files its preentered as i found)