Struggling with building my vocabulary to sync with my iphone.

muzzwood
 November 10, 2009, 05:58 AM posted in General Discussion

Hi,

I'm sure I'm missing something simple here because it can't be this hard! 

I would like to build up a vocabulary of characters that correspond with the characters I need to learn for university. 

I've made a label called 'Unit 9' and I searched ChinesePod's glossary to find the characters I want to study. For example I looked up bie2 别 and found it amongst other characters in various combinations but I can't find a way to just add that single character to my vocab list. 

In the past I've used the DianHua app on the iphone as I can just do a dictionary search for any character I want and then study them with flashcards but I wanted to switch to the ChinesePod app so I could then go online and use that same vocab list with Scritter.

 

So, long story short... How can I just search for single characters and add them to my vocab list?

 

Like I said I'm sure it's something easy I'm just overlooking!

 

Thanks in advance!! :)

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miantiao
 November 10, 2009, 06:03 AM

hey muzzwood,

i'm guessing the best way may be to use an online dictionary such as nciku. i'm not sure, but i think i remember other poddies saying you can import vocab from nciku to chinesepod.

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bababardwan
 November 10, 2009, 06:08 AM

muzzwood,

I hear Pleco is coming soon.It comes highly recommended from those who know.John had a blog post about it recently.

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muzzwood
 November 10, 2009, 06:13 AM

Thanks guys!

So it's not possible with ChinesePod alone?

 

Miantiao, I hadn't heard of Nciku before but it looks great!

Bababardwan, thanks for the link. I hope it comes out soon! :)

 

Cheers

Muzz

 

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bababardwan
 November 10, 2009, 06:35 AM

muzzwood,

So it's not possible with ChinesePod alone?

..what exactly? I think it is but I haven't personally done what I think you're referring to.Basically if a word is on CPod you can add it to your vocab list and then sync that with your iPod.I think you can also get words imported from elsewhere to your vocab list or even add them yourself and then sync.I think I did this once ages ago.I'll have a look in a tic mate.

Ok,I've just tried it with 别 。。bie2 and entered my own defintion of don't.I clicked on the add button but it said I already had this in my vocab list.Basically you go on your ME page,then the vocab tab on that and then near the top is click on the red "add a word" to the right of the remove and apply label buttons.

Ok ,so I've just done it successfully with 污染 [pollution ] a new word I learnt today.The only thing is I entered the pinyin as wu1ran3 and it doesn't convert these to tone marks like it can in these posts,so you'll need a pinyin input for that.Good luck mate :)

hey cool glasses btw.Just noticed your Aussie too and studying in HK.Best of luck with your studies.

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simonpettersson
 November 10, 2009, 07:24 AM

Like Baba says, if you can't find it as a single character with a search (that is, it only shows up as part of a word in the example sentences), then you can add it yourself, manually. It's a bit of a drag, but I've had to do it before, too.

Although, honestly, if it doesn't get used much as a single character, I don't see the point of learning the character alone. You could just learn the words it appears in and not know what the character itself means. I'm that way with many characters, though you get a vague understanding after you see it in a couple of words.

Then again, you say you're learning them at university, so I'm guessing it's a course requirement. Silly univerity. :)