Pinyin method
Encyclopedia
The pinyin method refers to a family of input methods
based on the pinyin
method of romanization.
In the most basic form, the pinyin method allows a user to input Chinese characters by entering the pinyin of a Chinese character and then presenting the user with a list of possible characters with that pronunciation. However, there are a number of slightly different such systems in use, and modern pinyin methods provide a number of convenient features.
For non-Mandarin-speaking Chinese, the main advantage of pinyin becomes its disadvantage. They will need to learn the Mandarin pronunciation of characters before they are able to use this input method.
However, since all children in the mainland China
are required to learn pinyin
in school, pinyin is in fact very popular in mainland China
.
Unlike stroke-based input methods, the pinyin method only requires the user to know how to speak Mandarin and be able to recognize the characters. It does not require the user to be able to construct the character from scratch as one would do in writing Chinese. This is both an advantage and a disadvantage. It is an advantage in that people will be able to type all the characters they can recognize. It is a disadvantage in that it may cause language attrition
and skill loss in adults, and it may be a learning barrier for written Chinese in children.
In the most basic systems, one character is converted at a time. This makes a very time consuming input process. Not only does the user have to select characters one at a time, it also means that the input system does not have the ability to prioritize character choices using word phrases, grammatical structure, or context. In addition, since the input method only supports one character at a time, it likely requires the user to type out the full pinyin spelling to narrow down the selection. This system still exists in embedded applications such as cell phones.
Common pinyin implementations on the computer today can hold up to a clause in pinyin before requiring a conversion. The method attempts to guess the appropriate characters by using word phrases from a dictionary, grammatical structure, and context.
For the sake of convenience, tone selection is disabled by default in most modern pinyin systems on the computer. The user may have the option to enable it depending on the pinyin implementation.
(U-umlaut) and ê
(E-circumflex). Given that the US keyboard layout is the most common keyboard layout in China, any pinyin method implementation would need to be able to facilitate the input of those vowels on US keyboard.
Since the letter "v" is unused in Mandarin pinyin, it is universally used as an alias for ü. For example, typing "nv" into the input method would bring up the candidate list for .
The handling of ê is not as universal since the character 欸 is the only commonly used character under this pronunciation. It is an interjection
roughly equivalent to "Eh
" in English. Some IMEs such as Google Pinyin merge it into "e", while others create an additional letter combination for it, such as "ea" and "eh", or "ei" in iOS. Others would simply drop this sound.
In systems that support user-defined phrases, users can even define their own abbreviations that might not follow standard pinyin rules.
, a variety of Mandarin Chinese. Regional accents
are prevalent in Mandarin among both native and nonnative speakers. This means that a significant number of Mandarin speakers would have trouble distinguishing a number of similar sounding syllables of pinyin, such as c and ch, s and sh, z and zh, n and ng, h or hu and f, or n and l. Fuzzy pinyin or fuzzy input (模糊音) is a feature that allows a user to input those similar sounding vowels or consonants as if they were the same thing. It also has disadvantages as the user must choose the correct characters or words from a longer list of "homophones".
is a feature of an input method that attempts to guess the next series of characters that the user is attempting to enter. This feature is often used to refer to two different mechanisms that have similar functions.
One of these mechanisms is akin to an auto-complete function for user input. While the user is typing the appropriate pinyin, the input method would take the input and look up all possible word phrases that might match the user input even though the input is incomplete. For example, when the user enters "shang", the input method would show "上海" (Shanghai) as a word candidate under this feature.
The second possible mechanism is the prediction of the user's next input after the user completes entering a set of words. For example, in the above example, after user selects "上海" (Shanghai) from the word candidate list, the input method's pinyin buffer would be empty. Under this mechanism, the input method would display a list of words that often follows the word Shanghai, such as "人" (people), "市" (city), "的" (an auxiliary word).
s, pinyin method implementations can recognize possible typos and show appropriate word candidates. Using Google Pinyin as an example, when encountering a suspected typo, Google Pinyin would show both the word candidates assuming it is correct and the word candidates assuming it is a typo.
The following examples show the difference if user wishes to enter "这SQL漏洞可以瘫痪整个系统。" (This SQL
vulnerability could paralyze the entire system.):
. It is free to download them at the official websites.
Windows
Linux/Unix
Mac OS X
Webf
Chinese input methods for computers
Hundreds of Chinese input methods are available for entry of Chinese characters into computers, but most keyboard-based methods rely on either pinyin phonetic readings or root shapes in Chinese characters...
based on the pinyin
Pinyin
Pinyin is the official system to transcribe Chinese characters into the Roman alphabet in China, Malaysia, Singapore and Taiwan. It is also often used to teach Mandarin Chinese and spell Chinese names in foreign publications and used as an input method to enter Chinese characters into...
method of romanization.
In the most basic form, the pinyin method allows a user to input Chinese characters by entering the pinyin of a Chinese character and then presenting the user with a list of possible characters with that pronunciation. However, there are a number of slightly different such systems in use, and modern pinyin methods provide a number of convenient features.
Advantages and disadvantages
The obvious advantage of pinyin-based input methods is the ease of learning for Mandarin speakers. Those who are familiar with pinyin would be able to input Chinese characters with almost no training, compared to other input methods.For non-Mandarin-speaking Chinese, the main advantage of pinyin becomes its disadvantage. They will need to learn the Mandarin pronunciation of characters before they are able to use this input method.
However, since all children in the mainland China
Mainland China
Mainland China, the Chinese mainland or simply the mainland, is a geopolitical term that refers to the area under the jurisdiction of the People's Republic of China . According to the Taipei-based Mainland Affairs Council, the term excludes the PRC Special Administrative Regions of Hong Kong and...
are required to learn pinyin
Pinyin
Pinyin is the official system to transcribe Chinese characters into the Roman alphabet in China, Malaysia, Singapore and Taiwan. It is also often used to teach Mandarin Chinese and spell Chinese names in foreign publications and used as an input method to enter Chinese characters into...
in school, pinyin is in fact very popular in mainland China
Mainland China
Mainland China, the Chinese mainland or simply the mainland, is a geopolitical term that refers to the area under the jurisdiction of the People's Republic of China . According to the Taipei-based Mainland Affairs Council, the term excludes the PRC Special Administrative Regions of Hong Kong and...
.
Unlike stroke-based input methods, the pinyin method only requires the user to know how to speak Mandarin and be able to recognize the characters. It does not require the user to be able to construct the character from scratch as one would do in writing Chinese. This is both an advantage and a disadvantage. It is an advantage in that people will be able to type all the characters they can recognize. It is a disadvantage in that it may cause language attrition
Language attrition
Language attrition is the loss of a first or second language or a portion of that language by individuals. Speakers who routinely use more than one language may not use either of their languages in ways which are exactly like that of a monolingual speaker...
and skill loss in adults, and it may be a learning barrier for written Chinese in children.
Elements and features
Pinyin input methods differ in a number of possible aspects. Most pinyin input methods provide convenience features to speed up input. Some of these features can speed up typing immensely.Conversion length
The basic idea of an input method is to have a buffer that holds the user input until it is converted into characters that would otherwise be unavailable from the keyboard.In the most basic systems, one character is converted at a time. This makes a very time consuming input process. Not only does the user have to select characters one at a time, it also means that the input system does not have the ability to prioritize character choices using word phrases, grammatical structure, or context. In addition, since the input method only supports one character at a time, it likely requires the user to type out the full pinyin spelling to narrow down the selection. This system still exists in embedded applications such as cell phones.
Common pinyin implementations on the computer today can hold up to a clause in pinyin before requiring a conversion. The method attempts to guess the appropriate characters by using word phrases from a dictionary, grammatical structure, and context.
Treatment of tones
Chinese is a tonal language. Tones can be used to further distinguish characters of the same sound. Many of the early single-character pinyin method implementations required input of tones in order to narrow down the character selection.For the sake of convenience, tone selection is disabled by default in most modern pinyin systems on the computer. The user may have the option to enable it depending on the pinyin implementation.
Treatment of extended Latin characters (ü and ê)
With the exception of intonation, there are two extended Latin vowels in pinyin. They are üÜ
Ü, or ü, is a character which can be either a letter from several extended Latin alphabets, or the letter U with an umlaut or a diaeresis...
(U-umlaut) and ê
Ê
is a letter in the Friulan, Kurdish and Vietnamese languages. The letter also appears in Afrikaans, French, Portuguese, Welsh, and Albanian dialects as a variant of the letter "e", as well as being used in certain Chinese and Ukrainian transliteration systems.-Afrikaans:Ê is not considered a...
(E-circumflex). Given that the US keyboard layout is the most common keyboard layout in China, any pinyin method implementation would need to be able to facilitate the input of those vowels on US keyboard.
Since the letter "v" is unused in Mandarin pinyin, it is universally used as an alias for ü. For example, typing "nv" into the input method would bring up the candidate list for .
The handling of ê is not as universal since the character 欸 is the only commonly used character under this pronunciation. It is an interjection
Interjection
In grammar, an interjection or exclamation is a word used to express an emotion or sentiment on the part of the speaker . Filled pauses such as uh, er, um are also considered interjections...
roughly equivalent to "Eh
Eh
Eh is a spoken interjection in English, Armenian, Japanese, French, Italian, Greek, Spanish, Portuguese and Catalan that is similar in meaning to "Excuse me," "Please repeat that" or "huh?" It is also commonly used as a method for inciting an answer, as in "It's nice here, eh?" It is occasionally...
" in English. Some IMEs such as Google Pinyin merge it into "e", while others create an additional letter combination for it, such as "ea" and "eh", or "ei" in iOS. Others would simply drop this sound.
Treatment of hm, hng, ng, n
The character 嗯 (ng) can be written using the IBUS linux and the Microsoft input method by typing "en".Usage statistics and user dictionaries
Most modern input method implementations would adjust the positions of word candidates in the candidate list based on prior usage statistics. In addition, the input method would also support user-defined phrases via a user dictionary.Abbreviation
Abbreviation is a feature that allows the user to omit all but the first or first couple of letters in the pinyin spelling. This feature can speed up the input of long word phrases significantly. Under this feature, the user can enter the word for "concert" by typing "yyh" as opposed to "yinyuehui".In systems that support user-defined phrases, users can even define their own abbreviations that might not follow standard pinyin rules.
Fuzzy pinyin
Pinyin was created based on the pronunciation of Standard ChineseStandard Chinese
Standard Chinese, or Modern Standard Chinese, also known as Mandarin or Putonghua, is the official language of the People's Republic of China and Republic of China , and is one of the four official languages of Singapore....
, a variety of Mandarin Chinese. Regional accents
Accent (linguistics)
In linguistics, an accent is a manner of pronunciation peculiar to a particular individual, location, or nation.An accent may identify the locality in which its speakers reside , the socio-economic status of its speakers, their ethnicity, their caste or social class, their first language In...
are prevalent in Mandarin among both native and nonnative speakers. This means that a significant number of Mandarin speakers would have trouble distinguishing a number of similar sounding syllables of pinyin, such as c and ch, s and sh, z and zh, n and ng, h or hu and f, or n and l. Fuzzy pinyin or fuzzy input (模糊音) is a feature that allows a user to input those similar sounding vowels or consonants as if they were the same thing. It also has disadvantages as the user must choose the correct characters or words from a longer list of "homophones".
Word prediction
Word predictionWord prediction
Word prediction is the provision of words that are frequently used in response to a user's keystrokes.-Purpose:The original purpose of word prediction software was to help people with physical disabilities increase their typing speed, as well as to help them decrease the number of keystrokes needed...
is a feature of an input method that attempts to guess the next series of characters that the user is attempting to enter. This feature is often used to refer to two different mechanisms that have similar functions.
One of these mechanisms is akin to an auto-complete function for user input. While the user is typing the appropriate pinyin, the input method would take the input and look up all possible word phrases that might match the user input even though the input is incomplete. For example, when the user enters "shang", the input method would show "上海" (Shanghai) as a word candidate under this feature.
The second possible mechanism is the prediction of the user's next input after the user completes entering a set of words. For example, in the above example, after user selects "上海" (Shanghai) from the word candidate list, the input method's pinyin buffer would be empty. Under this mechanism, the input method would display a list of words that often follows the word Shanghai, such as "人" (people), "市" (city), "的" (an auxiliary word).
Double pinyin
Vowel groups in pinyin can be up to four letters long. Double pinyin (双拼) is a method whereby longer vowel groups are assigned to consonant keys as shortcuts. Thus, when the input method expects a vowel, the user can use the shortcuts to speed up typing.Typo correction
Similar to automatic typo correction for English in word processorWord processor
A word processor is a computer application used for the production of any sort of printable material....
s, pinyin method implementations can recognize possible typos and show appropriate word candidates. Using Google Pinyin as an example, when encountering a suspected typo, Google Pinyin would show both the word candidates assuming it is correct and the word candidates assuming it is a typo.
Language mixing
Most advanced pinyin method implementations allow the mixing of English into an input stream without requiring the user to change the language mode. However, it often comes with some limitations such as requiring the input to be uppercase.The following examples show the difference if user wishes to enter "这SQL漏洞可以瘫痪整个系统。" (This SQL
SQL
SQL is a programming language designed for managing data in relational database management systems ....
vulnerability could paralyze the entire system.):
- "zhe [switch to English] SQL [switch to Chinese] loudong keyi tanhuan zhengge xitong." (Unsupported)
- "zhe SQL loudong keyi tanhuan zhengge xitong." (Supported)
Implementations
The following are the most popular pinyin method editors used in the mainland ChinaMainland China
Mainland China, the Chinese mainland or simply the mainland, is a geopolitical term that refers to the area under the jurisdiction of the People's Republic of China . According to the Taipei-based Mainland Affairs Council, the term excludes the PRC Special Administrative Regions of Hong Kong and...
. It is free to download them at the official websites.
Windows
- Microsoft Pinyin IMEMicrosoft Pinyin IMEMicrosoft Pinyin IME is the pinyin input method implementation developed by Microsoft and Harbin Institute of Technology. It is bundled with Microsoft Windows and Chinese editions of Microsoft Office...
, bundled with Windows 2000 or higher, developed by Harbin Institute of TechnologyHarbin Institute of TechnologyThe Harbin Institute of Technology , or HIT, is colloquially known as Hagongda . It is a research university in the city of Harbin, Heilongjiang Province, China....
(微软拼音输入法). - ZNABC, bundled with Simplified Chinese edition of Windows XP, developed by Peking UniversityPeking UniversityPeking University , colloquially known in Chinese as Beida , is a major research university located in Beijing, China, and a member of the C9 League. It is the first established modern national university of China. It was founded as Imperial University of Peking in 1898 as a replacement of the...
(智能ABC输入法). - Sogou PinyinSogou PinyinSogou Pinyin Method is a popular Chinese Pinyin input method editor developed by Sogou, a Chinese search engine.A Sohu announcement, released on June 5, 2009, indicated that Sogou Pinyin input software has been installed more than 80 million times since it was released three years ago, and Sogou...
, SogouSogouSogou.com is a Chinese search engine which can search text, images, music, and maps. It was launched 4 August 2004 and is owned by Sohu, Inc.. As of April 2010, it has a rank of 121 in Alexa's internet rankings. Sogou provides an index of up to 10 billion web pages. Its major domestic competitor...
created the IME on which Google based Google PinyinGoogle PinyinGoogle Pinyin IME is an input method developed by Google China Labs. The tool was made publicly available on April 4, 2007.- Windows :, Google Pinyin is available for Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Windows 7. There are both 32-bit and 64-bit versions available.- Android :Google released a Pinyin...
(搜狗拼音输入法). - Google PinyinGoogle PinyinGoogle Pinyin IME is an input method developed by Google China Labs. The tool was made publicly available on April 4, 2007.- Windows :, Google Pinyin is available for Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Windows 7. There are both 32-bit and 64-bit versions available.- Android :Google released a Pinyin...
, Google's implementation for Windows XP.（谷歌拼音输入法） - Ziguang Pinyin
- QQ Pinyin
- Baidu Pinyin
- Pinyin Jiajia
Linux/Unix
- Smart Pinyin (scim-pinyin), pinyin implementation for the SCIMSCIMThe Smart Common Input Method platform is an input method platform containing support for more than thirty languages for POSIX-style operating systems including Linux and BSD....
input platform on LinuxLinuxLinux is a Unix-like computer operating system assembled under the model of free and open source software development and distribution. The defining component of any Linux system is the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released October 5, 1991 by Linus Torvalds...
, BSD, and other Unices. - Bimspinyin, pinyin implementation for the xcin input platform on LinuxLinuxLinux is a Unix-like computer operating system assembled under the model of free and open source software development and distribution. The defining component of any Linux system is the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released October 5, 1991 by Linus Torvalds...
, BSD, and other Unices. - OpenVanillaOpenVanillaOpenVanilla is a free, open-source text-entry and processing architecture, and includes a collection of popular input methods and text processing filters. It serves as a bridge between input methods and the operating system...
, a cross-platform framework for Chinese and more. - Ibus-Pinyin (ibus-pinyin), pinyin implementation for the IBusIntelligent Input BusThe Intelligent Input Bus is an input method framework for multilingual input in Unix-like operating systems...
input platform on LinuxLinuxLinux is a Unix-like computer operating system assembled under the model of free and open source software development and distribution. The defining component of any Linux system is the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released October 5, 1991 by Linus Torvalds...
, BSD, and other Unices. - Ibus-sunpinyun, a statistical language model based pinyin input method for IBusIntelligent Input BusThe Intelligent Input Bus is an input method framework for multilingual input in Unix-like operating systems...
.
Mac OS X
- Pinyin input is part of the standard installation of OS X. With version 10.5.8 and before, the international standard term ITABC was used, but was changed to "Pinyin - Simplified" in OS 10.6.
- Fit smart Pinyin is a good alternative to the standard OS X Chinese input method.
Webf
- Sogou Cloud Input Method web-based IME through browsers, can be embedded into other pages.
- QQ Cloud Input Method web-based IME through browsers, can be embedded into other pages. Similar to above.
- Online Pinyin Input Method web-based IME through browsers.