Error exporting flashcards as Text format
- Thread starter Long Pan
- Start date
Do you have a memory expansion card (SD Card) for your Palm? If not, I'm afraid there's no way to export your flashcards as text (Palm's internal storage system won't work with text files), so your best bet would be to export them as PalmDoc. To convert that to text for ZDT, HotSync your Palm with your desktop, go into your Palm Desktop Backup folder (C:\Program Files\Palm\(your username)\Backup) and locate the exported file, then use a PalmDoc to text converter program like WavePDB to get the text out of the file.
Bear in mind, though, that due to copyright restrictions our flashcard export files don't include definitions, so they won't be much good in ZDT unless you add those definitions yourself.
Bear in mind, though, that due to copyright restrictions our flashcard export files don't include definitions, so they won't be much good in ZDT unless you add those definitions yourself.
It should indeed be legal, but I'm afraid it's not supported in the current version; we mainly intended the export feature to be used for sharing with other PlecoDict users (whose software can fill in those definitions for them). We're planning to change this in a future version, though.
Thanks for your advise Mike. Indeed my Z22 has no SD Card.
So I did what you said : get WavePDB to convert Palm to a .doc file (because my .txt does not take GB 2312 - do not know why), then work on the .doc file (in fact I do not need ZDT as the main aim of my export is to sort and transform my list in a quicker and easier way than I could do it on my Palm).
Untile that step, everything is OK. Trouble is that when I import the transformed list on my Palm, it appears in the Pleco flashcard list but with nothing inside :cry: This is all the more surprising as the HSK flashcards which I got from your website has no problem to be imported in my Palm.
Do you have any idea of what is the problem?
Thanks again,
So I did what you said : get WavePDB to convert Palm to a .doc file (because my .txt does not take GB 2312 - do not know why), then work on the .doc file (in fact I do not need ZDT as the main aim of my export is to sort and transform my list in a quicker and easier way than I could do it on my Palm).
Untile that step, everything is OK. Trouble is that when I import the transformed list on my Palm, it appears in the Pleco flashcard list but with nothing inside :cry: This is all the more surprising as the HSK flashcards which I got from your website has no problem to be imported in my Palm.
Do you have any idea of what is the problem?
Thanks again,
All encoding is GB 2312
Here is the process I follow:
- From the list I get from WavePDB, I work on it with MSWord. Then I change the name at the top of the list (for example "// new list") and I call the file "new list.doc".
- Then I go back to WavePDB and convert the file to a PDB one (which get called "new list_doc.PDB") and then I synchronise.
- In Pleco / manage flash card / import, I have a "//newlist" which appears (note that the name has no space between "new" and "list" contrary to what I wrote on the .doc document). I import it.
- Then in the Pelco / Manage Lists, the list appears at the end, but 2 problems:
1) the name is not "new list" but something like "new list (a square)? tui". "tui" being the first pinyin of the list, and the "(square)?" must be the chinese characters not recognize in the list name - like if I did not go on the line on my list (which I did)
2) when I open the list, there is nothing inside !
Here is the process I follow:
- From the list I get from WavePDB, I work on it with MSWord. Then I change the name at the top of the list (for example "// new list") and I call the file "new list.doc".
- Then I go back to WavePDB and convert the file to a PDB one (which get called "new list_doc.PDB") and then I synchronise.
- In Pleco / manage flash card / import, I have a "//newlist" which appears (note that the name has no space between "new" and "list" contrary to what I wrote on the .doc document). I import it.
- Then in the Pelco / Manage Lists, the list appears at the end, but 2 problems:
1) the name is not "new list" but something like "new list (a square)? tui". "tui" being the first pinyin of the list, and the "(square)?" must be the chinese characters not recognize in the list name - like if I did not go on the line on my list (which I did)
2) when I open the list, there is nothing inside !
You could try opening the PalmDoc file on your Palm with the editor QED and see if your flashcard list is intact after the conversion and synch.
http://www.qland.de/qed/
Maybe the problem is with using MS Word to edit the file (MS Word file format is complicated and more problems can occur in the conversion process).
Are you that Word is saving the file in GB encoding rather than UTF-8?
You could try using a text editor instead, such as this.
See this thread
viewtopic.php?t=701&highlight=bom
I found a freeware UTF-8 editor called notepad2 http://www.flos-freeware.ch/notepad2.html that allows you to save the file "without signature" -- this solved the problem.
http://www.qland.de/qed/
Maybe the problem is with using MS Word to edit the file (MS Word file format is complicated and more problems can occur in the conversion process).
Are you that Word is saving the file in GB encoding rather than UTF-8?
You could try using a text editor instead, such as this.
See this thread
viewtopic.php?t=701&highlight=bom
I found a freeware UTF-8 editor called notepad2 http://www.flos-freeware.ch/notepad2.html that allows you to save the file "without signature" -- this solved the problem.
Tanks Gato for this advise
I have dowloaded notepad2, and created a very simple text fashcards list, making 4 copies or it, one in each encoding format available on notepad2: Unicode / Unicode Big Edian / UTF-8 / UTF 8 with signature.
As my Palm Z22 has no card, I then have to convert these txt files into PDB file, using Wave PDB
Then I import these 4 lists from the flashcard import menue of Pleco (using either encoding UTF 8 or GB 2312)
Nothing works (le list created has one entry, with a wrong character)
However, because I managed to import a PDB HSK list available on Pleco website, I believe that the problem comes from Wave PDB. Any alternative ?
I have dowloaded notepad2, and created a very simple text fashcards list, making 4 copies or it, one in each encoding format available on notepad2: Unicode / Unicode Big Edian / UTF-8 / UTF 8 with signature.
As my Palm Z22 has no card, I then have to convert these txt files into PDB file, using Wave PDB
Then I import these 4 lists from the flashcard import menue of Pleco (using either encoding UTF 8 or GB 2312)
Nothing works (le list created has one entry, with a wrong character)
However, because I managed to import a PDB HSK list available on Pleco website, I believe that the problem comes from Wave PDB. Any alternative ?
It seems that http://www.qland.de/qed/ cannot be opened from China (I tried it many times yesterday and today; no access !). I therefore downloaded from elsewhere a older version of QED (the 2.21) instead of the latest 2.91. Trouble is that I do not understand how to open a file. From QED I don't see how to access to the PDB files which I synchronised to my Palm (these PDB files, being the text files which I converted with Wave PDB as my Palm Z22 does do accept txt files). I tried "open" in QED, but I see nothing...
QED is only one suggestion. You can also try any of the other PalmDoc editors available. These for example.
http://www.freewarepalm.com/docs/cardtxt.shtml
CardTXT v0.70
http://www.freewarepalm.com/docs/tejpwriter.shtml
tejpWriter v3.42
http://www.freewarepalm.com/docs/cardtxt.shtml
CardTXT v0.70
http://www.freewarepalm.com/docs/tejpwriter.shtml
tejpWriter v3.42
http://www.pierce.de/makedocw.html
MakeDocW provides a convenient way for Windows 95/NT4 users to format text and HTML documents for use with the Pilot Doc application.
MakeDocW provides a convenient way for Windows 95/NT4 users to format text and HTML documents for use with the Pilot Doc application.
It works 
The reason why I failed is that I get confused with the encoding. As far as I am concerned (Palm Z22 which has no possibility for card extension, therefore no possibility to deal directly with text format) the process only works with GB 2312 and not with UTF 8. To sum up, here is the process which works; it may help others. Thanks Gato and Mike for challenging me; without you I would have given up.
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Suppose you have a big flashcards list (over than 100 hanzi) on your Palm and that you want to sort and organise in different lists: doing it on the Palm is possible but definitely a real headache; better export it, sort & classify it on your PC and then import back the result on your Palm. Here is the process I follow:
The reason why I failed is that I get confused with the encoding. As far as I am concerned (Palm Z22 which has no possibility for card extension, therefore no possibility to deal directly with text format) the process only works with GB 2312 and not with UTF 8. To sum up, here is the process which works; it may help others. Thanks Gato and Mike for challenging me; without you I would have given up.
-------------------
Suppose you have a big flashcards list (over than 100 hanzi) on your Palm and that you want to sort and organise in different lists: doing it on the Palm is possible but definitely a real headache; better export it, sort & classify it on your PC and then import back the result on your Palm. Here is the process I follow:
- - in “Manage Flash Card”, select the list to “Export”, choose “PalmDoc” encoding and “GB 2312”. The file name can be changed or kept as it is : “Exported Flashcard”.
- After synchronisation of the Palm with the PC, the “Exported Flashcard” file goes to "C:\Program Files\Palm\(your Palm ID)\Backup" as “Exported_Flashcards.PDB”
- Use Wave PDB as suggested by Mike in the second post of this thread, to transform the PDB file into a text file.
- At this stage, one thing quite confusing at first is that the file I get called “Exported Flashcards”, has no extension! (it is not a txt, just a “file”). The only way I have to open it is by using MS Word, selecting the “simplified Chinese – GB 2312” (from all encoding proposed by MS Word)
- Then I just stick on MS Word to work on the file (to sort the list, classify it; create other lists…). Ultimately I save it through MS Word as a text document (in the File/ save as/ text) to be able to convert it back as a PDB file with Wave (I tried to convert “.doc” file but it does not work). It creates an “Exported Flashcards.txt” on my desktop. The trick is here, which made me lose many hours: when I double click on the “Exported Flashcards.txt” my NotePad is automatically launched but the opened file has lost all Chinese characters – this is because NotePad 1 or 2 do not read GB2312 (at least mine don’t). This got me confused at first because I thought I had to manage to read it through NotePad to export it well – so my idea (bad idea) was to cut the list from the Word document (before saving it as a text) and paste in on a new Notepad file – which magically works – hanzi were intact! Problem is that by doing that you switch to another encoding, lose GB 2312 and can never export back to Palm. So the solution is to forget NotePad, only use MS Word to work on the file and save it as txt format; in case I want to go back to the “Exported Flashcards.txt” I open it with Word and not with NotePad
- Then using Wave, I convert the “Exported Flashcards.txt” to a .PDB (in the options proposed by Wave, select “none” everywhere except in the last option windows where I only select “Compress” and “BackUp with Hotsync”)
- Then click on the PDB file (“Exported_Flashcards.PDB”) to push it to the Palm synchro windows. Then Synchronise it.
- On Palm, “Manage Flashcards” / “Import” / “From PalmDoc” + “GB 2312” I select the “Exported Flashcards” (I kept the same name from the beginning; of course you can change it in the process if you want), and that’s it !
- The format used is the one described page 45 of Pleco users manual, V 1.0.3