Chinese Words Separator 8.24.84.2222 CRX for Chrome

Read more, hover less with Chinese words separator's sentence/phrase dictionary.

Easily change the hanzi's size.


See features in pictures: https://www.reddit.com/r/ChineseLanguage/comments/npuqf6/chinese_words_separator/


7.3.0: NEW: Additional predefined settings: Intermediate, Advanced, Expert

Beginner: Hanzi 2x, pinyin, color-coded tones, space, automatic read-aloud, sentence dictionary
Intermediate: Hanzi 1.5x, tone marks, rotating colors, exclude learned words from color, word dictionary
Advanced: Hanzi 1.25x, rotating colors, exclude learned words from color, on-demand word dictionary
Expert: Hanzi 1x, on-demand word dictionary

FIX: When on-demand word dictionary is used in text boxes, the dictionary does not disappear when moving away from the text, must hover the mouse in the dictionary first and then move away the mouse cursor away from the dictionary so the dictionary will disappear. This is fixed now, it is no long required to hover the mouse cursor on the dictionary first when making the dictionary the disappear, the dictionary will disappear when mouse cursor is moved away from either text or dictionary


7.2.0:
NEW: Grayscale slider control for both hànzi and hànzi's grid on calligraphy worksheet (Print)

NEW: Grid type option for calligraphy's box

NEW: Print selected text. To print, select text, click the mouse right button, select Chinese words separator > 🖨 Print “东西”

NEW: New sentence mining site, zh.glosbe.com. In Options screen, click the pickaxe button, then click *Add back the default sentence mining sites* in Options screen

FIX: When word dictionary is activated (via Alt or option key (mac)) while using sentence dictionary, and keyboard navigation is used (e.g., letter 'a'), and the mouse cursor is moved away from Chinese text, the dictionary will disappear; however, the keyboard navigation is still working and will show the dictionary. This is fixed now, navigation should only work when the dictionary is visible

FIX: Hanzi color is not showing in youdao. Fixed now







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HIGHLIGHTS:
- Separate words by using color and/or space

- Use guides above/under the Chinese words, i.e., pinyin, HSK level, tones

- Make language learners be aware of reading ambiguity by boxing the garden-path words
Reference: https://chinese.stackexchange.com/questions/17071/how-to-determine-the-end-of-words/17074#17074

- Dictionary: Look up from 317,851 (mix of simple and traditional) words, proper nouns, idioms, expressions, colloquial (e.g., AA制) while reading Chinese web sites just by hovering the mouse cursor on the Chinese words.

- Dictionary is set to sentence dictionary mode by default. All the words in the sentence are shown in the dictionary. Read more, hover less

- Easily look up example sentences from a dozen of high-quality Chinese sentence mining sites using single key shortcut. Language learners can add more

- Convert the page/clipboard between Traditional Simplified instantly. Can also revert the page back to original characters, some sites have mixed traditional and simplified characters.


HOW TO USE:
Simply go to a web page in Chinese, by default the words are separated by colors. Then to use the dictionary, hover over the Chinese characters with your mouse to see a window open up showing the English translation along with the pinyin romanization


FEATURES as words separator (see Option's screen):
- Separate words by using color and/or space

- Sentence can be copied with spaces between words. Highlight sentence or paragraph, right-click mouse, select Chinese words separator > Copy with space.

- Word ambiguities are shown by boxing the garden-path words. Enabled by default, this can be disabled in Options screen if desired
Reference: https://chinese.stackexchange.com/questions/17071/how-to-determine-the-end-of-words/17074#17074

- When in sentence dictionary mode, the definitions of the boxed garden-path words can be displayed by holding the *Alt* or *option* key (mac) first, then hover the mouse cursor on the boxed garden-path words

- Mark learned words by clicking the words. If a website already uses the click functionality, learned words can be marked by right-mouse-clicking the word and selecting: Chinese words separator > Toggle learned words (no verification). After marking the learned word, the learned words count will be shown on screen

- Learned words can be verified by inputting the pinyin of the Chinese word, or by speaking the Chinese word on your computer's microphone (allow access when prompted). These are disabled by default, and can be enabled on in Options screen. Pinyin verification can be made stricter by typing the number with the pinyin input

- See the tone marks above the Chinese character. This can be useful if you already know how to read Chinese words and don't need pinyin, but sometimes forgot how to pronounce the word's tones correctly.

- Use color as an aid for tones. Uses Pleco-based tones color scheme for light mode, and modified-Hanping tones color scheme for dark mode. Somehow, modified-Hanping tones color scheme works in light mode as well. Color for tones can be enabled in Options screen

- Use color to identify the HSK level of a word. Can also show the word's HSK number under/above the Chinese text

- Show the pinyin under the Chinese sentence, can be changed to above. Pinyin is not enabled by default, it can be enabled in Options screen

- Colors for words separator, HSK level, and tones, all of these can be changed in Options screen. Have separate color configuration for dark mode and light mode

- Switch between dark mode and light mode font color schemes by clicking the CWS's icon on the browser's toolbar. The dark mode has an overlay of 月 (yuè, moon) character

- Change the Hanzi size. This is useful if the Chinese text is so tiny, e.g., Facebook

- Pinyin/guide's size changes proportionally to the hanzi's size

- Can change the pinyin/guide's size

- Change the font of the Chinese words only. Does not affect non-Chinese words. There are 16 Chinese fonts to choose from. Can revert to original font by selecting the 17th font named Original.

- Change the font of the pinyin/guide. There are 12 fonts to choose from. Can revert to original font by selecting the 13th font called *Same as Hanzi*

- When phrases or idioms are identified as one, the pinyin have correct spacing, e.g., (there's no place like home (idiom))
金窝银窝不如自己的狗窝
jīn wō yín wō bùrú zìjǐ de gǒuwō
The bùrú, zìjǐ, gǒuwō are treated as one word


FEATURES as dictionary (see Option's screen):
- Supports both traditional and simplified characters.

- Includes the current version of the widely used CC-CEDICT Chinese English dictionary with more than 100,000 entries, and CedPane with more than 65,000 entries

- Can switch to large font size for the dictionary's Chinese characters and its English definition, this can be enabled in Options screen

- Can activate an even larger font size for the dictionary's Chinese characters by switching the dictionary to character dictionary mode. In character dictionary mode, the animation and the step-by-step frames of the character's strokes are both shown. Character dictionary mode can be activated by pressing the letter x while the dictionary is open. To revert to previous dictionary mode, just press the letter x again. The shortcut can be changed in Options screen

- On sentence dictionary mode (default), all the definitions of each word in the sentence is displayed in the inline window (default)

- On word dictionary mode, CWS highlights the characters and its translation is displayed in the pop-up window.

- Word dictionary can be made to activate only when needed. To use on-demand word dictionary mode, on Option screen's Dictionary section, select the *On-demand word*. When the dictionary is needed, hold *Alt* or *option* key (mac) first, then hover the mouse cursor on Chinese character

- Dictionary might not work when hovering over the characters that are in text boxes. When this happen, press *Alt* or *option key* (mac) first, then hover the mouse cursor on Chinese character. The dictionary can be used to proofread what you typed

- Read aloud (text-to-speech) can be accessed by pressing letter s when the dictionary is active

- Also supports keyboard navigation for translating the next character, the next word, or the previous character.

- You can copy the definitions directly from the dictionary's window (be it inline vs pop-up). The dictionary's window does not disappear quickly, can even scroll the dictionary and copy its content when the dictionary has multiple words. The dictionary has multiple words when the dictionary is in sentence dictionary mode

- Spreadsheet-compatible copy. You can copy the dictionary entry of the currently selected characters to the clipboard by using the 'c' (small letter) key on your keyboard. This is useful if you want to paste this data into a spreadsheet, for example. Each entry appears on a separate line, and the individual parts a dictionary entry consists of are tab-separated, so they appear nicely aligned in separate rows and columns when pasting them into a spreadsheet

- When in sentence dictionary mode, you can use the 'C' key (big letter) to copy the definitions and sort them by pinyin. You can use also use the 'c' (small letter) key in sentence dictionary mode, the definitions are copied in the sequence the words appeared in the sentence

- Look up example sentences for a given word/phrase from 13 high-quality Chinese sentence mining sites. Language learners can add more sentence mining sites in Options screen, a Chinese sentence mining site can also be added right from the CWS's icon on the browser's toolbar. The first nine can be accessed quickly by pressing 1 to 9 when using the dictionary. These shortcuts can also be changed in the Options screen


EXTRAS:
- Translate sentences/words with Bing at the sidebar. This can be accessed from the dictionary's Bing icon or by right-clicking the highlighted words/sentence, then selecting Chinese words separator > Bing translate to sidebar: "东西". You can conveniently use Bing's text-to-speech while Bing is at the sidebar. Bing's text-to-speech is the best in its class, there's even some subtle breathing between words and good amount of pauses between phrases.

- Translate sentences/words with Google on another tab. This can be accessed from the dictionary's Google icon or by right-clicking the highlighted sentences/words, then selecting Chinese words separator > Google translate to tab: "东西"

- Read aloud any highlighted text even when the dictionary is off. This can also be accessed by right-clicking the highlighted sentences/words, select: Chinese words separator > Read aloud "东西"

- Read aloud can also be used when hovering on Chinese words. This can be enabled by ticking the *Automatically read aloud hovered word/phrase* checkbox in Options screen

- Read aloud can be slowed down by repeatedly pressing the letter s (default shortcut key for text-to-speech, a.k.a. read-aloud). The sound will revert to its original speed 3 seconds after the last press of letter s, or when listening to new word/phrase/sentence

- Convert page/clipboard between Traditional Simplified instantly. Can also revert the page back to original characters, some sites have mixed traditional and simplified characters. Conversion can be accessed by right-clicking the CWS's icon on the browser's toolbar. Conversion can be made permanent by setting it in Options screen; though the setting can be made permanent, you can still switch the page between traditional, simplified, or mixed (Revert to original characters) from the CWS's icon on the browser's toolbar when needed

- See the learned words and high frequency words in Statistics screen. Word frequency can help the language learner know the words to prioritize learning or mine sentences of. Click the chart icon in the Options screen to access the Statistics screen.

- Mining sentence is also available in Statistics screen.

- Print calligraphy from the text that the leaner typed or pasted

- Proofreading mode. This removes the colors, tones, spaces from the Chinese text, the hanzi's size is reverted to its original size, and the dictionary is set to sentence pop-up mode. Example use: HTML-based word processors or composing email

- Predefined four level modes:
Beginner: Hanzi 2x, pinyin, color-coded tones, space, automatic read-aloud, sentence dictionary
Intermediate: Hanzi 1.5x, tone marks, rotating colors, exclude learned words from color, word dictionary
Advanced: Hanzi 1.25x, rotating colors, exclude learned words from color, on-demand word dictionary
Expert: Hanzi 1x, on-demand word dictionary

- Assignable shortcut for enabling/disabling the dictionary

- The dictionary's format is compact, it can double as a tooltip when Chinese buttons or links are tiny

- External services (e.g., sentence mining sites, translation) opens in one tab only. So when there's a need to simulate using the external services as a sidebar, it will be possible to do so. To do that, detach the tab of the external service to its own window, then make a split-screen, most modern operating systems can now conveniently resize the split-screen windows. Make the window of the external services smaller. Voila! experience the convenience of a sidebar's instant availability


Intuitive default keyboard shortcuts:
- Next word is letter a (think *a*dvance)

- Previous character is letter A

- Read aloud (speech) is letter s. So if the learner want to hear the word automatically upon advancing to next word, just press both the letter a and s at the same time. The two letters are adjacent to each other, it's easier to press them at the same time

- Next character/字 is letter z (zì 字)

- Despite the default keyboard shortcuts' intuitiveness, these shortcuts can still be changed in the Options screen

- Many functionalities can be toggled/cycled via keyboard shortcuts. These functionalities can be assigned with keyboard shortcuts by going to chrome://extensions/shortcuts. Alternatively: Click the puzzle icon on the browser's toolbar > Manage Extensions > on top left corner, click the 'burger' menu > Keyboard shortcuts