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We have been working with a new character system that differentiates between a dot and a slash in Chinese characters.

The issue I have is being able to instinctively tell which one I should use. When I asked the creators of the system they said it is because it is related to the rules of Chinese calligraphy.

For example, on the character 下 the third stroke looks like a slash down and to the right, but it is actually a dot when handwritten.

Is there a Chinese computer font that shows the difference between the dot and slash more clearly? I had heard that there was one that was considered more standard, but I haven't been able to find it...

Chris Butler
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  • By requesting a font it seems to be that you are requesting something that would be human readable rather than taking this information from a database, why is this the requirement? I haven't been able to track down an open source database which has this information but there are sites like http://www.zdic.net/z/14/js/4E0B.htm which show the breakdown of a character under the section 笔顺 but they don't appear to have an API. – going Nov 13 '13 at 05:07
  • If it needs to be human readable then I agree with Stan's answer below. You are going to have a hard time because fonts are just fonts, you are not going to be able to tell the difference in some cases just by looking at a character. – going Nov 13 '13 at 05:08
  • Correct, this is meant to be human readable. The reason is that it is within an app for someone that wants to start learning how to read Chinese. It would be ideal if they learned the right way from the beginning, but maybe it is more important to be flexible. Definitely a difficult question. Once they have gotten practice with the 'correct' way they can start to open up their learning to other fonts and calligraphy styles. – Chris Butler Nov 13 '13 at 05:25
  • Chinese learners do learn the right way, I spent 3 hours per night for 2 years learning how to read and write. So when we learn and practice we do follow the correct way, but when this goes onto paper you can't just look at the paper to understand what is correct. So the correct answer is it is impossible to tell just by reading. A fluent reader doesn't rely on what they see to answer this question, they rely on pre-existing knowledge. So it can't be taught visually. – going Nov 13 '13 at 05:29
  • Also, this is not the first attempt to do this, see also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cangjie_input_method – going Nov 13 '13 at 05:35
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    @xiaohouzi79: there're opensource databases for 笔顺, but sorry now I'm in mainland and my Internet is restricted so I can't help you find one. But 笔顺 also has different standards between mainland and Taiwan. See this paper with a list: there're 383 characters with the same glyph and different 笔顺 between the two standard! – Stan Nov 13 '13 at 05:50
  • Yikes, Cangjie is pretty complicated. It seems like the consensus is that being more forgiving (allowing either) is the best choice while learning... – Chris Butler Nov 13 '13 at 09:25
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    Chris, if you don't mind ... I have some advice for your IME (though this would be irrelevant to the question) ... 1) your website looks nice, but the icon of the app seems a little absonant. The split complementary colors looks not so comfortable here. Maybe you can try some gradient and highlight. 2) I think you might have known a very old stroke-based IME on Nokia phone, 筆畫輸入法, it treats the dot and the slash as the same stroke. It's quite simple, even my grandpa knows how to use it. You might try that :) – Stan Nov 13 '13 at 12:12
  • Stan, I love advice! :) We aren't building the IME ourselves (right now), but simply trying to use its method to simplify how learning of Chinese is done by Westerners. First, I'll think about the icon. I like it personally... ;) Second, I'll check out the stroke based IME you mentioned. I have seen a few, but I am not sure if I have seen this one. Please do message me if you have any other feedback (on Stackoverflow or via our website). Thanks! – Chris Butler Nov 14 '13 at 06:32
  • I just translated the page and I have seen that one used before. It simplifies things a lot and possibly too much, but it was built for a mobile phone. When we are using a keyboard (touch or physical) we have a lot of keys we can use. Why not allow more complex symbols (that are still simple or rudimentary shapes) to make typing easier? Maybe it is akin to T9 English input to a full keyboard? With an IME suggestion engine it gets even faster to look things up. – Chris Butler Nov 14 '13 at 06:35
  • @ChrisButler: I agree with "more complex symbols can make typing easier". The comment has character limit so I didn't leave my praise to your idea and I didn't express clearly :D That old IME is just one reference example to mean "some other people also think we should treat dot and slash as one" (you see, they didn't use all number on the phone keyboard.) The complexity of your IME is just between those based on character structure (wubi/cangjie) and this simplest one. I think it does a very good try. – Stan Nov 15 '13 at 09:01
  • @Stan, thanks! Please contact me directly if you have any other feedback on our system. I love feedback! :-) – Chris Butler Nov 18 '13 at 09:59
  • @Chris Being forgiving is not good, not even for learning. It stops people from memorizing correct sequences because they can continue to use wrong sequences. The brain needs a rejection impulse to understand that it did something incorrect. Allowing people to input slightly wrong combinations makes it much harder for the brain to pick up what is right and what is wrong. – FUZxxl Nov 28 '13 at 18:06
  • @商榮沛, I think that it helps when people get started, but agree that being more precise, later, is good. The issue is that when you first start learning a language you have to manage the anxiety and frustration that people feel. If they get too anxious or frustrated they will just abandon it. There have been a few studies I have seen that say being overly precise with things like pronunciation or proper grammar are bad... I can try to dig them up. – Chris Butler Nov 29 '13 at 21:47
  • @Chris The point is, people don't want to learn another shape-based method after they have learned one. You cannot be both forgiveful and strict. – FUZxxl Nov 29 '13 at 23:35
  • @商榮沛, I think there are two different topics for discussion in your comments: 1) learning new input methods in general and 2) new learners to languages (L1 vs. L2, children vs. adult, end goal, etc.). For #1, I agree that it is hard to pick up but there are cases for (touch vs. T9) and not (Querty vs. Devorak) new input methods. These example aren't – Chris Butler Dec 03 '13 at 03:22
  • (sorry, bad edit). @商榮沛, I think there are two different topics for discussion in your comments: 1) learning new input methods in general and 2) new learners to languages (L1 vs. L2, children vs. adult, end goal, etc.). For #1, I agree that it is hard to pick up but there are cases for (touch vs. T9) and not (Querty vs. Devorak) new input methods. For #2, we are targeting new learners that are adults. Maybe we pick this up in the comments of the blog post? http://whizzlearning.com/2013/12/03/trouble-dot-dash/ – Chris Butler Dec 03 '13 at 03:39

2 Answers2

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Before simply answering "there is such a font", I would like to seriously suggest you should not differentiate a dot and a slash. The reasons are:

  1. Many Chinese people don't distinguish them when writing, even calligraphers. We care about "fast" and "beautiful".

  2. The standard glyphs among mainland, Taiwan/Hong Kong, Japan and Korea, are usually different, you can't tell which one is the most authoritative.

If anyway you need a computer font to do such analyses, check

  • 標楷體 and 國字標準字體 for traditional Chinese. This font (edukai-3.ttf, title: TW-MOE-Std-Kai) can be downloaded from the website of Ministry Of Education of Taiwan.

  • 微软简楷体 for simplified Chinese. This font (simkai.ttf, title: 楷体. Offered by ZHONGYI Electronic Co., Beijing) is the default Kai font in MS Windows for simplified Chinese. Note that though it is named "simplified Kai", it includes traditional characters.

In the examples of the wiki page 國字標準字體, the first column is "standard" and the second is "conventional" (both should be considered correct):

國字標準字體

Some distinction of a dot and a slash is highlighted (維, 內, 集, 遨, 說, 眾). Yes, I should also mention even in Taiwan many scholars criticize this standard, "sometimes it departs from convention too much". And I've never ever seen any native speaker strictly follows such a standard when they are writing.

Other minor differences can be also found, see the comparison (微, 標):

Kai

I guess you can figure it out :) So, I'm afraid it's better not to differentiate a dot and a slash in a "character system".

Community
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Stan
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  • But there is a standard right, even if it differentiates from convention? – going Nov 13 '13 at 05:03
  • @xiaohouzi79: Yes, but there are also different standards. I think dealing with different standards for the same character would be not so wise, as the differences are often too minor. – Stan Nov 13 '13 at 05:37
  • ahh, yes, I agree. – going Nov 13 '13 at 05:41
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    You can pretty much ignore the taiwanese standard. It's made by overpaid bureaucrats who try to push their false ideas of pseudo-ethymologic writing onto the people using their standards. It's horrible as it neither follows the classic Kangxi conventions nor current practice at all. – FUZxxl Nov 29 '13 at 23:38
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I think you should use a fuzzy system instead of a strict one.
The difference between 點(dot) and 捺(slash) is not always obvious even to native user.

For example, in lower right corner of the character 木, the stroke is a slash, but when we writing the character 林, the slash become a dot in the left 木. Why? because there is no room to put a full slash there. The choice here is base on the aesthetic, and the difference does not matter much when writing with pen instead of brush.

I don't believe a input system based on Chinese calligraphy is a good choice.
Not everyone is familiar with the principles of Chinese calligraphy. And the input method should assist, instead of become a burden to the user. The computer should be smart enough to guess what a user wants based on the input, like auto spelling correction doesn't need user to type every alphabet correctly.

Back to the question about the font, there are different standards of characters. For traditional characters, there is 國字標準字體, and the 標楷體 in windows system should be good enough for your need. For simplified characters, there is 现代汉语通用字表, but it is not based on calligraphy but printing fonts. You can see that if your system is based on calligraphy, it may have issues to handle simplified characters.

AngelLeliel
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