Try create an Internet shortcut link from your desktop to this http addie.
Now, that’s thinking outside of the popup.
Thanks, Ax.
The shortcut works.
Spoke too soon. The link Ax sent me worked the first time I tried it, but doesn’t anymore.
Anybody else have any bright ideas on why I can’t access dreye definitions on my W2K system since they gave their site a new look?
Or any ideas on an alternative, general-use on-line dictionary that I can use to look up non-specialized terms?
Right now I use Pristine’s lexicon for C>E and the MOE dictionary for C>C definitions.
The MOE dictionary (140.111.1.22/mandr/clc/dict/
) is pretty good, but won’t give me the English for a word like 走春–a word that has a pretty clear meaning, but that I don’t really know if there’s an accepted English version of.
I like the Pleco/Oxford dictionary for Palm OS but it has a serious flaw from my point of view. When you look up from pinyin to English, the example Chinese phrases (to show use of the word in different contexts) are only shown in characters, not in pinyin.
For this reason, I prefer to use the Oxford Chinese Minidictionary at home. It’s pocket-sized and it’s especially designed for English learners of Chinese. It has loads of useful contextual and grammatical information, radical and character indices and a separate section for measure words.
I would love to find a pinyin culinary or botanical English-Chinese dictionary. Does anybody know if such a thing exists? Pleco say the new release of their software will include the ability to import external dictionary databases, so maybe that will help.
Probably slightly off topic, but has anyone ever encountered a three-in-one Mandarin-Cantonese-English pocket dictionary?
I’m a native cantonese speaker learning PinYin. It’s been a “flipping” pain for me going back and forth through my two Mand.C>E and Cant.C>E pocket dictionaries.
I should probably get a Mand>Cant dictionary but i quit cantonese school at the elementary grade level a while ago so my chinese reading comprehension is the pits right now… 
I think there are some e-pocket dictionaries out there that do the job but alas I’m too stinky poor at the moment for that option 
… plus i’m trying to pick up my reading/writing again so a paper dictionary is much perferred 
I mentioned the Hanyu Dacidian in an early post on this thread. You can probably pick up a copy at Laurel Books (Shenghuan Shuju).. The Banqiao location is much larger than the Pucheng outlet near Shida. This is an excellent Chinese scholarly bookstore specializing in books from China
I love the Concise English-Chinese Chinese-English Dictionary pulished by Oxford University Press. It’s the little red book. I have had mine since I started studying Chinese and still carry it around everywhere. Now that my Chinese level is quite high I find there are some words or characters that I can’t find, but it is still extremely useful. As it uses Hanyu pinyin it is always amusing to give it to a Taiwanese person and see them totally confused trying to look up a word.
For a more comprehensive reference I have the Far East Chinese-English dictionary.
taiwan boy,
i checked out the book, it’s nice, but like many of the other mainland material i saw at the bookstore, it’s in simplified chinese 
i’m making an assumption here so this might not apply to you but maybe others can enlighten since i’m a bit curious: Any trouble reading traditional chinese characters after learning simplied first?
the places i’ve only been: vancouver, hk, taiwan, still predominantly use traditional writing. i’ve heard all the chinese teachers say ‘yah learn traditional writing first, then it’s easier to learn simplified than vise versa’.
in most cases it’s true, but for some simplified words, if nobody had told me that was the simplified form, or if i didn’t look it up, i’d never be able to guess it… take ‘can ting’ (restaurant) for example, it’s about 40 strokes, and two words i recognize, now take the simplified form, it’s just only about a freaky 10 strokes! traditional?!? simplified?!? ARGH :!:
( english, mandarin, cantonese ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!! )
[quote=“Gener”]taiwan boy,
i checked out the book, it’s nice, but like many of the other mainland material i saw at the bookstore, it’s in simplified chinese [/quote]
My dictionary has both simplified and traditional characters. The traditional characters are in brackets next to the simplified characters. However, they don’t show the traditional character if there is just a single radical modified to change to the simplified form. Most Taiwanese should have no trouble reading it (it’s just the pinyin that leaves them bewildered 
)
e.g. They only have 语 not 語
Check this thread on Segue posters’ experiences with Simplified vs. Traditional:
forumosa.com/3/viewtopic.php?t=5323
HTH
Iris
A good dictionary that hasn’t been mentioned is the Cheng & Tsui Chinese-Pinyin- English Dictionary for Learners. It has far more examples than any other dictionary (examples in simplified characters, pinyin, and English). Many words also have simple Chinese definitions. Maybe not the best general-use dictionary, but if I want to write something, I always check this dictionary.
The best I’ve found to date:
A Practical English-Chinese Pronouncing Dictionary (actually shows traditional characters AND how to pronounce them when looking them up in English) by Janey Chen / Tuttle.
Far East 3000 Chinese Character Dictionary (shows stroke order and has five indices to look up characters - just in case!)
They’re both fairly simple, but they serve my purposes well enough…
For beginners the best is the Oxford’s Starter Dictionary. I haven’t seen them in Taiwan, but have somebody send it to you.
It has characters, pinyin, grammar and usage notes, and measure words.
If it knows that you are going to make a mistake because you speak English, it will tell you. It also has a separate area on measure words.
It’s very easy to read.
It’s about 15 USD.
My primary language is English but both my parents are cantonese and I was hoping to expand my very limited cantonese that I know as well as take on the universal mandarin language that will compliment cantonese. My question si what is the best all-around chinese dictionary to have or what is one that you recommend? Also, I don’t know if these exist but is there a cantonese-mandarin-english dictionary? I could probably bring my mandarin up to level with my cantonese that way and then move them both up through the english section. Thanks in advance.
I recommend that Far East(ern) Chinese Dictionary, or the Oxford one as a starter.
I have similar problems with Cantonese/Mandarin overlaps. not sure if there is a great solution dictionary-wise though. especially considering its vernacular nature.
but if anyone has a solution, i’d also be interested.
I’ve always liked Lin Yutang’s Chinese-English Dictionary of Modern Usage.
My electronic dictionary (Instant-Dict 快譯通 LD-9600 
), which has served me well for 8 years, gives onscreen and audio pronunciations in English, Mandarin and Cantonese, including 破音字 po4yin1zi4 (multiple pronunciations) for both Mandarin and Cantonese. You can also write a character on the screen with a stylus, and it will recognize it, so you don’t have to look things up by 部首 bu4shou3 (dictionary index key). I’m sure you can find a much better model now (you can check them out at the Guanghua Shangchang market).
As for best all-around printed Chinese-English dictionaries (I don’t know of any that include Cantonese), I can tell you that it depends on what you need. If you use Hanyu Pinyin (which I recommend you learn), the most convenient thing for looking up things you already know how to pronounce or which you hear (especially when you don’t know which characters it is) is definitely the ABC Chinese-English Comprehensive Dictionary , DeFrancis (ed.), 2003. University of Hawaii Press. ISBN 0-8248-2766-x. An excellent expansion on the smaller ABC, this full-sized work has 196,000 entries, and also improves upon the earlier work by adding traditional characters where relevant beside all entries, as well as incorporating information on measures words, and whether characters can stand alone or are bound in compounds. It’s a bit too large for carrying around, so you can get a smaller version like the older, 1996 ABC Chinese-English Dictionary ISBN 962-201-761-4 (71,000 entries), or an even smaller Far East Pinyin CED, ISBN 957-612-462-x for toting. All of them have other indices like dict. keys (so-called “radicals” :raspberry: ).
The ABC’s are pretty thorough for modern and colloquial characters and terms, and decent for classical and slang, but not comprehensive in the latter two. They also do a fair job, again not comprehensively, of distinguishing Taiwan vs China usage. The Far East Pinyin CED is handy but not very complete, and critically it lacks poyinzi cross-indexing, a major flaw which I pointed out to the company but which they have not fixed. They were also completely uninterested :upyours: in suggestions to update and expand the content of the Far East series, so they’re on my black list now, even though the (non-pinyin) Far East CED’s are fairly decent.
I don’t recommend most of the other dictionaries on the market, but would be happy to give you opinions on particular ones if you ask. Hope this helps!
My electronic dictionary (Instant-Dict 快譯通 LD-9600 ), which has served me well for 8 years, gives onscreen and audio pronunciations in English, Mandarin and Cantonese, including 破音字 po4yin1zi4 (multiple pronunciations) for both Mandarin and Cantonese. You can also write a character on the screen with a stylus, and it will recognize it, so you don’t have to look things up by 部首 bu4shou3 (dictionary index key). I’m sure you can find a much better model now (you can check them out at the Guanghua Shangchang market).
[/quote]
This sounds like just the thing I need. What is the company that makes this. “instant-dict”? or is that the series/model name?
I’ve looked at several, but it’s been hard to find something that will have english, mandarin, and cantonese audio. mandarin i can do without since pinyin will tell you. but since my reading is not so good, hearing the cantonese will allow me to recognize what word i’m looking at. basically, i have gaps in 3 dialects that this thing would complement (it’d be great if shanghainese was in there, but i don’t see that happening).
i know u said u bought this 8 years ago. what do you think is the approx price of one of these things.
my other alternative is to get a cheaper PDA (whose price is only slightly more than some of the expensive electronic dictionaries) and then get the palm software for Oxford Chinese-English Dictionary.
My other worry is that most of these gizmos are tailored towards Chinese speakers learning English, and not the other way around. Or do you find this not to be so.
Appreciate any input.
kuai4yi4tong1 快譯通 makes these; their main competitor is Besta; you can check 'em all out at Guanghua, and try them out in person. But you’re right, " most of these gizmos are tailored towards Chinese speakers learning English." So is their marketing, and the instructions. Good luck.
Thanks for the quick reply. Also, what do you think of the quantity and quality of the dictionary? i’ve heard some can be quite poor.
overall, would you recommend an electronic dictionary, or a trad dictionary? my friend also said there’s a trad dictionary out there for foreigners who can look up words based on a break down of any component of a character ie u don’t have to use a radical, u can just recognise a part of a word, like the “roof” bit to find a path to your word.