Transferring Flashcards to 2.0

[jugdish]

Mike,
You have been so helpful to me over the past week through your answers to others' questions.
My question is this: When I upgrade to 2.0, obviously all the stats of the flashcards I have will come with them, but what about the ranks?
Background: I'm just now making the switch from SuperMemo, which I've used for 16 months now. I'm hoping to build a database from scratch using the words from the book that I'm using (New Practical Chinese Reader). I'm wondering what's going to happen if I take a week and enter in all the cards I want, then take 2 months and get to the point in my repetition spacing where I'm being tested on the stuff I need work on, and then switch to 2.0, am I going to be starting over again as far as card stats go?
I'm liking the repetition spacing scheme, though it lacks a couple components that SM has: With SuperMemo, I can be tested on the same words in two ways -- hanzi to english and english to hanzi, I have to choose with your program. (A workaround for that issue has been to cause the program to test me on hanzi to english on all the odd ranks, and english to hanzi on the evens. That works. Open to any other suggestions, too.) Secondly SM has a "final drill", which tests me on all the cards I just got wrong on my normal test. I find this drill is where the bulk of my learning gets done; seeing a card once a day is not enough. I've devised a way to set up my own final drill using your program, but it's a bit complex to type out here.
Thanks,
David

 

[mikelove]

The ranks should carry over to 2.0, but the spacing won't quite be identical (we've completely overhauled the algorithm for it) so you'll likely have to do some tweaking to get things working the way you want them. But the statistics will almost certainly make it over in some form.

Randomizing which parts of a card you're tested on will likely not be possible in the beta version, but it wouldn't be difficult to add, so if a lot of people write us to request it we'd certainly consider putting it in the finished one. Though probably only in the 1.0-like "self scored" mode and not the new free answer / multiple-choice ones. We're actually dropping the feature that lets you tie which part of the card you're tested on to a particular rank (since we're getting rid of "ranks" altogether and using a less clearly-delineated "score" system instead), so there may be a lot of demand for something like this.

A "final drill" like option is definitely something we're planning to include, though - we've gotten at least a few dozen requests for this already.

 

[jugdish]

E2 and "directions"

The reason I've switched from SuperMemo is that it's very inconvenient to create the flashcards in their program. With Pleco, I can do a chapter of words in less than half the time.
I was having the Tungsten E2 issue of being unable to power back on after it going to sleep on me during a flashcard session. Glad to hear that it wasn't just my device's issue.
If you have time for another question, do you think it's acceptable to only quiz oneself using chinese to english flashcards? As you're switching to an algorithm instead of repetition spacing, I see that there may not be a way to quiz in both "directions" (chi-eng and eng-chi). I'm sure you've thought it through, but if there was some way to attach a command to each card that tells it which language to quiz.

 

[mikelove]

I think testing in both directions is best, actually, I just don't like doing it in the same session - most of the time when you're actually working with Chinese you're doing it in one direction or the other, the main exception to this is in conversation but it's almost impossible to become proficient in that until you stop thinking about English while you're doing it. But testing some cards on a given day one way and some another way might make sense, as would using alternate directions on alternate days (Monday/Wednesday/Friday do C-E, Tuesday/Thursday/Saturday do E-C, etc), and both of those can easily be configured in our software.

We're still offering repetition spacing in 2.0, the "algorithm" doesn't change that; it just replaces "ranks" with more finely-grained "scores." And adds a "difficulty factor" not unlike that in SuperMemo/Mnemosyne/et al.

Tying a particular language direction to a particular card would not be difficult programming-wise, the main question is how to design an interface for that which people would actually use - we're already worried that a lot of the new features we've added will be ignored by most people.

 

[jugdish]

OK, thanks

Great suggestion to quiz myself now and then e-c and c-e. That'll suffice.
I couldn't agree more with your concerns about adding too many features that will just confuse people. My friend was just saying the other day that SuperMemo would be much better if they threw out or hid most of the nerdy features nobody understands.
I'm now filling my flashcard database at a pretty good rate. We'll see if my brain holds up. As I add cards, I'm also exporting them and putting them on my wife's Palm E2 as well. If you know of an easier way than this, please let me know!
1. Export chapter of flashcards as a pdb file.
2. Sync with my laptop.
3. Email the backup pdb file to myself or drop it on a flashdrive.
4. Put the back of the pdb file on my wife's desktop.
5. Double-click on the file and sync her Palm with her desktop.
6. Import the file into Pleco.
I wish I could just beam it to her.
Thanks again for your help. By the way, here in Chengdu, you are quite famous amongst my buddies. The two guys I mentioned you to told me they emailed with you like 5 years ago. They both said your name without my mentioning it. Great service!
Blessings,
David

 

[ipsi]

I can help you on two fronts it would seem:

I've got a database of the NPCR Vocab lists for books 1 - 3 on my computer, converted into a database, and other such fun things. If you want it, just let me know and I'll either link you to my website or email it (I'm not too keen on linking to my website, as it may be going down soon, as I'm heading to China for a couple of months).

You may want to have a look through and see if you can spot any glaring errors. I've already seen one... Which is a right pain, as it means that I'll have to reset my flash-card stats when I change the dictionary...

The other thing to do is to download FileZ, which will allow you to beam your files (Or at least, it says it will. I can't try it as I only have one palm).

 

[jugdish]

Awesome

Thanks a ton for the offer of the first three books of NPCR! I'll take em by email! I think you have my email, if not let me know.

I'll get the beaming program, too!

Spreading the Pleco word here in CD,
David

 

[ipsi]

Hmm.... I do not see your email address, so instead I will provide a link to my website:

http://ipsi.strangled.net/ipsi/chinese/

I hope the explanation is ok for you. I just typed it up, and I'm a bit tired so it may be off in a few places (or every place....). But yeah. Have a look. I hope it's what you're looking for.

- ipsi

 

[jugdish]

Cards

It seems your cards are not coming through correctly for me. I'm thrilled with the Filez program you suggested, but when I finally brought your database of NPCR's book 1 over, it gave me some nonsense cards. I must have done something wrong.

I appreciate your help, but I'm pretty picky about my flashcard database anyway, so I'll probably create my own for me and my friends here. We like to have the full Wenlin definition in the answer so we can see examples.

Thanks again,
David

 

[ipsi]

That's fair enough. I haven't tried the latest DB myself, but I think it should work... In any event, it sounds like mine wouldn't be the best for you, as I've only included the definitions (and the examples from the book for lessons 7 through 16). But I figured since I was doing it for myself anyway, I'd put it up for others. I'm glad you find FileZ to be useful though

EDIT: I also see that you probably grabbed my PDF of the character-only texts. Do you find that useful as well? (I checked my web logs, and while I don't know exactly who you are, I can kinda guess).