While I am trying to decide what my next computer purchase will be, I’ve been using my fall back computer – my ASUS EEEPC netbook running Ubuntu 9.04. Despite some of the hiccups I’ve wrote about, I am finding it quite usable.

I can’t do large amounts of coding on the netbook due to the screen size (7in) and the small keyboard, but it’s just fine for doing some daily news browsing, writing blog entries, or some quick server fixes via SSH.

The Chinese input – using Smart Common Input Method (SCIM) – is quite nice as well; which brings me to the point of this entry.

I am using Emacs 22 (GTK) for blogging, and I discovered that it doesn’t support SCIM. It uses its own internal input method to allow for Chinese input. I did a bit of eye rolling over having to learn and setup another input method. I wanted Chinese input to work well because I try to update my Chinese blog once a week (for learning and practice).

After a bit of digging, I found this wonderful script by IRIE Shinsuke that makes Emacs 22 and Emacs 23 use SCIM for input. The page is in Japanese, but the README file in the download is in English.

The Simplified Chinese version works very well. If you use Emacs and want to use SCIM for Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese, or Japanese input, I highly recommend it.

Xiao CiDian is a searchable Chinese dictionary with wild card tone support.

The desktop version has been available for a while. There is a Mac OS X dictionary plugin, and an Adobe Air version. You can download either of those on the 小词典 home page.

However, if you don’t use Mac, or you can’t / wont use Air, then it’s likely been difficult to use 小词典. This web version should work on any device with a decent browser.

Here is a movie showing its usage (and showing a few other really nice online Chinese dictionaries)

Chrome has a neat feature that lets you setup other search engines and assign keywords to them. Using this feature, you can have Chrome search the dictionary when you type a keyword into the search bar – I use xcd.

You can set this up by doing the following:

1. Go into Chrome’s preferences screen, and click the Manage button next to the Default search pull down

1. Click the + button to add a new search engine, and then add:

Name: 小词典

Keyword: xcd

URL: http://cn.robrohan.com/search?q=%s

1. At anytime in the URL bar, type xcd, press tab, and then search away!

While passing the HSK Basic would be a big boost for me, in the grand scheme of things passing the basic test means one simply has a solid base to really begin learning Mandarin. For example, to pass the Basic test you only have to know somewhere between 800 to 1000 characters – for perspective you need to know about 3,500 to read a newspaper. So passing the basic tests really means “you are ready to begin learning”.

Since my personal Mandarin focus for this year is going to be on the test, I’ve updated my Mandarin word of the day service to only send out HSK level 1 words. My apologies to any (of the many) subscribers that are past that level, but I don’t currently have the resources to make multiple feeds for separate levels.

I’ve also put together a few PagePacker books for studying on the go. If you are going to take the HSK Basic (Elementary), you might find them useful:

• HSK 1 Book 1.pdf
• HSK 1 Book 2.pdf
• HSK 1 Book 3.pdf
• HSK 1 Book 4.pdf
• HSK 1 Book 5.pdf
• HSK 1 Book 6.pdf
• HSK 1 Book 7.pdf

They are great to keep in your pocket, and then whip out whenever you have some free time to study.

If you’ve never used PagePacker before this is how you fold the printed pages to make them into little books: