Still interested in four corner lookup. Will pay!

C

cjgait

举人
Just a reminder that I would still be very interested in 4-corner lookup capability for both traditional and simplified characters. I would be happy to pay for this separately from the main dictionary program if it is not something a lot of people want.

There are some characters I just don't write in a recognizable manner, and at that point I have to take out a paper dicitionary with four corner. I would be happy to pay the equivalent of my paper dictionaries' cost ($70) for such a product. Unfortunately there aren't a lot of people who use 4-corner. They seem convinced that it is somehow difficult and therefore torture themselves for years with the arcane and useless radical system rather than spend a week or two learning sijiao.

Thanks!
 
mikelove

mikelove

皇帝
Staff member
Thanks for the reminder. We've found a reasonably good 4-corner code table online, so the main question is whether or not we'll have the time to implement it in our software, but we're certainly trying to expand the search options (hopefully adding some other oft-requested ones, like ZhuYin/BoPoMoFo) so we'll add it in if we can.
 
L

lmcjipo

榜眼
mikelove said:
Thanks for the reminder. We've found a reasonably good 4-corner code table online, so the main question is whether or not we'll have the time to implement it in our software, but we're certainly trying to expand the search options (hopefully adding some other oft-requested ones, like ZhuYin/BoPoMoFo) so we'll add it in if we can.
Click to expand...

Can someone enlighten us Chinese newbies what exactly is "4-corner code table"?
 
mikelove

mikelove

皇帝
Staff member
It's a system developed by Wang Yunwu for looking up Chinese characters based on a 4 (or sometimes 5)-digit numeric code which is found by looking at the shapes at the four corners of the character. It can take a little while to learn, since Chinese characters don't all have four well-defined corners and there are a number of rules for dealing with that, but once you master it it can be considerably faster than a radical index. Much like the Dvorak keyboard, though, in spite of its apparent superiority it's not widely used because of the learning curve involved.
 
C

cjgait

举人
4-Corner vs. Radicals

4 corner does look at a bit daunting at first, but it is much simpler and more consistent than radicals. For one thing it requires memorizing 10 basic rules rather than 214 or so characters. Also, though there are some exceptions and tricky spots, almost all characters are consistently coded. There isn't the kind of guessing game you get as a beginner trying to guess which part of a character is the radical.

You can try out 4-corner lookup for traditional characters with the JWPce program and simplified ones in the Chindex program (both available in several places, Google to locate).

Regards,
Chris Gait
 
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