I installed Microsoft’s input method editor (IME) for traditional Chinese and got the EN/CH language bar (windows XP pro). Mostly I want to be able to type Chinese in MSN messenger. So far so good.
Can anyone tell me what is up? I just don’t know the right key to press or something.
I want the Chinese input to work 2 characters at a time, so if I type in “nihao,” it comes up with 你好 (there she is in action!). So I open the Properties dialog box and switch to Intelligent IME. Presto, I can type two characters and it guesses what word I mean.
Okay but… if I type just one character… the program offers me NO CHOICE of characters. It just spits one out. No way to change it, no way to get the character I want.
This can’t be how the input is designed to work. Anyone know how to fix it?
Try pressing the down arrow before you press enter, or press the back arrow to get to the character you want, and then press the down arrow. That should give you a menu of alternative characters.
Sometimes you can get the character you want by typing a two-character word containing that character, and then deleting the extra character.
Yeah, you hit the down arrow to get the box of choices. I think it would be better if the box popped up automatically. I wonder if there’s a way to set it like this?
I’m impressed by Windows XP’s language options, especially the ability to type Chinese. I’m wondering if there is a hanyu pinyin input option instead of using bopomofo. It’s slower as I intuitively know where letters are on my beyboard, but have to hunt and peck for zhuyin. Anyone able to input pinyin and select traditional characters?
This has been asked before on Forumosa. A search would reveal the answer. Right click on the input icon (bottom right hand of your screen) and find your way to the settings for the xin zhuyin input method. Change the keyboard setting from biaozhun zhuyin jianpan to Luoma pinyin (which is actually Hanyu pinyin) - or it might actually be called Hanyu pinyin. I hope you can figure it out. If you share the computer with a Taiwanese person, don’t forget to change the setting back before you quit using the computer. I often forget, which really annoys my girlfriend!
[quote=“Juba”]If you share the computer with a Taiwanese person, don’t forget to change the setting back before you quit using the computer. I often forget, which really annoys my girlfriend![/quote]I use XP home and I have set up a different account for the wifey, mine uses pinyin, hers uses zhuyin. She can make as much a mess on the desktop with her files as she likes, and it hides my porn stash away from her.
Perhaps this question may have been asked before.
I am currently looking for software with Pin Yin (mainland) character input and a traditional Chinese (Taiwanese) character output?
With Chinese Windows (or English Windows with Traditional Chinese as locale), Open Chinese (自然輸入法) is great for Pinyin (and traditional characters), since the tones are on keys d (2), f (3) and j (4).
It has been asked and answered before, but here goes. I assume you are using the traditional Chinese version of MS Windows. Do as follows:
Right click on the language tool bar (probably somewhere near the bottom right hand corner of your screen).
Click on 設定 shedingzhi (E) (settings).
Scroll down until you find Microsoft New Phonetic IME and click on it.
Click on the 屬性 shuxing (P) (properties) button.
Click on the 鍵盤輸入對應 jianpan shuru duiying (keyboard input mapping) tab.
The input method will probably be set to 標準注音鍵盤 biaozhun zhuyin jianpan (S) - Change it to 漢語拼音 Hanyu pinyin (H).
Click on the 確定 queding (OK) button.
There - you are done. If you share your computer with Taiwanese people, don’t forget to change the keyboard back to zhuyin when you have finished your session.
With this input method, you can switch between Chinese and Latin input by pressing shift. You can get in and out of using proper 2-byte Chinese punctuation marks by pressing shift-space. Tip: to get the “Chinese comma” 、 (for use in lists), press the grave accent key at the top left-hand corner of your keyboard followed by the down arrow key and select the comma.
To see illustrated instructions for the above (with English interface), click here.
Thanks Juba,
Unfortunately I am not using Chinese MS and these specific options appear to not be on the English OS.
The English version has options on the IME to use Chinese (PRC) or Taiwanese input method. However, you are unable to specify using HanYu PinYin to input the Traditional Chinese character set.
Sorry I wasn’t specific enough in my original email.
Well folks, many thanks for all who cooperated in this thread. I have the (sort of) definitive answer…
It seems that the English based MS Operating Systems SME that comes with XP cannot access traditional Chinese characters using HanYu PinYin as an input mode…
…however “NJStar Communicator” is a IME that does everything you could ever want…and more. It gives easy access to the traditional charater set from PinYin input in all standard MS products.
Download it free at www.njstar.com
Once again, many thanks to all who helped out in Forumosa land…
Particular thanks go to Ann Chang…
