More Chinese Fonts & Apps
« 1. More Fonts 2. More Apps: Input Methods & Tools 3. Encoding Standards »
2. Free and Commercial 3rd Party Chinese Input Methods and Tools
(Plus a few more goodies from Microsoft too!)
Free Chinese Applications
Free Online Chinese Tools
Commercial Chinese Applications
Free Chinese Applications
Microsoft PRC MSPY 2010 Pinyin IME Update
This update adds many new Pinyin input features and often fixes problems with Chinese components in your system. Please see my download and installation instructions for the MSPY 2010 update before heading off to the Chinese language Microsoft pages. (Replaces the MSPY 2007 update.)
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Microsoft Taiwan 2010 IME Update
This download updates the New Phonetic, Cangjie and Quick IMEs, adds a Cantonese Jyutping IME, and adds support for simplified Chinese characters! Please see my instructions for the Taiwan IME 2010 update before heading off to the Chinese language Microsoft pages. (Replaces the Taiwan Office 2003 IME update.)
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Pinyinput: a free Pinyin-with-tone-marks IME for Windows
I have used this and I think it's a great idea. Pinyinput can be selected from your Language Bar and used just like other standard input methods, only in this case you are typing Pinyin with tone marks! So far it has worked well in every application I've tried.
I have no relationship with the developer and can provide no support myself, but he moderates an extensive online discussion group. Visit this page to download Pinyinput and join the discussion on Chinese-Forums.com. 
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Perapera-kan: a free Mandarin-English pop-up dictionary for Firefox
This add-on is highly rated on the Firefox site. I've tried it and I agree, it's great! Just mouse over Chinese characters on a web page and Perapera-kan will offer definitions and Pinyin pronunciation for characters and words (cizu). It also does Japanese and Korean, and translates into English or German.
Download the app from the Mozilla.org Perapera-kan page , install it and then go to the Perapera-kan website to download your dictionaries. The developer accepts donations via PayPal there, suggesting at least "a cup of coffee". :-) Now, I don't know the guy and I don't know where he drinks his coffee, but apparently he is studying in Japan and at a Tokyo Starbucks even a small latte was about USD $7 the last time I checked!
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CantoFish: a free Cantonese / Mandarin dictionary for Firefox
The developer of CantoInput (see below) offers this pop-up dictionary plug-in for Firefox, which displays pronunciation in Cantonese or Mandarin for any Chinese characters on a web page. Yet another app I think would be very cool but that I haven't tried yet...I suffer with Internet Explorer almost exclusively so that I can support you, hope you appreciate it. If you use Firefox, see the CantoFish blog page on Wordpress for info.
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CantoInput: a free Cantonese input method for Windows, Mac, Linux & other OS
CantoInput is a free Cantonese phonetic input application for any OS with Java installed. It supports Jyutping and Yale romanization, and Mandarin Pinyin as well, and it is very simple to install and use.
This is not an IME/SCIM integrated with the system. It runs in a little floating window, from which you can copy-and-paste your text into other applications. The candidate list is arranged by common frequency of usage but, as of version 1.10, the list does not sort any further as you use it. It also only allows you to type one character at a time, no two-character words, no phrases, no concepts. Still, I have found no easier way to add Cantonese to your system for free. Free is good. We like free. And I think this guy has done a really good job with this for what it is.
CantoInput was developed by a gwai loh, like me but apparently far smarter, named John Burket. When you download this, if the files are still hosted on github.com don't click on the "download" button unless you want the source code. Click on the "executable version" text link below the description. Visit the developer's CantoInput blog page on Wordpress to learn more.
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CPIME: a free Cantonese Phonetic IME for Windows
CPIME is a free Cantonese phonetic input application for Windows that installs in your Language Bar like a Microsoft IME. There are Jyutping, Yale and Sydney Lau versions.
Created by an individual developer (who has a Japanese name, interestingly enough), this input method does not auto-sort the candidate list by your frequency of usage, and you can only type one character at a time. No two-character words or longer phrases. But I think it works well enough to meet many users' needs, and it is after all free shareware. Donations are accepted via PayPal.
As of version 6.2.6 I am unable to install this on Windows 7, but had no trouble getting it to run on Windows XP and there is also an online version. For more info and links to downloads and the online IMEs, visit the CPIME site at cpime.hk.
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The Microsoft Cantonese IME
As of the Traditional IME 2010 Update, two variations of the Cantonese Jyutpin input method are available free for download from Microsoft. This update will install on Windows 7, Vista or XP SP3, with or without Office.
Before the 2010 update one Microsoft engineer, Michael S. Kaplan, did everything he could to ensure that a Cantonese IME was freely available for download. If you for whatever reason you cannot install the 2010 IME update, Here is Michael Kaplan's blog post offering a manual install of a Cantonese IME.
If you need to use Michael Kaplan's download please read his blog post very carefully, including all comments, before installing. If you have difficulties with this, I have two suggestions: (1) just try installing again because everyone is human and makes typos, and (2) if all else fails post questions for Michael as blog comments there because I can't really help you much.
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The official and unofficial Microsoft Unicode IME
The Unicode IME is for inputting characters using Unicode code points. For example, typing "499F" will give you an obscure CJK Extension A character that can't be found with any other Microsoft Chinese IME.
If you have Windows 7 (Vista or XP with the MSPY 2010 update) this is already installed in your Chinese Simplified/PRC IME Options menu under "Secondary Input Methods", along with GB code input. This is not in the Chinese Traditional/Taiwan IME however.
If you want this in the Traditional IME too, you can install it there manually. Michael S. Kaplan, the same Microsoft engineer mentioned in the previous section, also went to great lengths to ensure this remained available to us when it was not in Vista at all. See his blog post on the Unicode IME. I've done this install, and it works. Let me know if you need help.
This is a great tool but I discovered the hard way that it does not currently support CJK Extension B, even though Windows 7 and Vista include Extension B fonts like PMingLiu-ExtB and SimSun-ExtB! The only solution anyone could suggest was to use the Japanese IME Pad for Extension B characters. Can you believe that? Either that or one of us can enter all 46,000 or so Ext. B characters and their codes into the lookup table ourselves. Any volunteers? :-)
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Google Pinyin input method
I do not use this, but the last time I checked the Wikipedia article on the Google Pinyin input method it was reported that this IME is not compatible with .NET applications and it did not work well in traditional characters. The Google Pinyin input method can be downloaded here. You may want to use Google Translate (see my next section below) to convert the instructions to English. There is also an official Google Group on Google's Chinese tools.
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Sougou Pinyin input method
I know even less about this IME, but the Wikipedia article on the Sougou Pinyin input method reports that it had been installed over 80 million times as of June 2009 so there's got to be something to this one.
If the Chinese characters look like random "garbage" in the Sougou Windows installer or IME, see my FAQ on displaying Chinese in non-Unicode applications.
You can download the Sougou IME from pinyin.sougou.com and there is an English-language discussion group thread on the Sougou IME at Chinese-Forums.com.
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oopinyin Pinyin ruby text extension for the OpenOffice Phonetic Guide
OpenOffice Writer includes a Phonetic Guide feature, which allows you to place "ruby text" pronunciation guides above your Chinese characters. But unlike the same feature in MS Word, OpenOffice does not automatically look up the Pinyin or Zhuyin for you. A European developer currently residing in Shanghai is working on a Java extension for this. The last time I checked this was in the very early stages of development, but you can help by reporting problems and sending feature requests to the developer. You can download oopinyin from sourceforge.net.
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Commercial Chinese Applications
MyTongue: a Pinyin formula MS Excel add-in
MyTongue is a Microsoft Excel add-in that allows non-English speakers to write Excel formulas in their native language rather than in English, in this case Chinese Pinyin.
For example, instead of =AVERAGE(A2:A6) you would type =PINGJUN(A2:A6). This might be very useful to native Mandarin speakers with good Pinyin but poor technical English.
I haven't finished testing this, and I have no relationship with the developer and can provide no support but I do think this would be very cool. The developer is based in Australia and offers a 21-day free trial of MyTongue via download, after which the software is $19.95 USD.
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[The rest of these descriptions need some updating, sorry. Coming "soon"...]
Chinese Plus
Chinese Plus, from Kingsoft, adds input methods, fonts and tools to Windows XP and 2000. One of the additional input methods is the convenient English-to-Chinese method. Unique utilities include a character-to-Pinyin converter (with tone marks), Chinese and English OCR scanning software, a Chinese and English text-to-speech reader, and the Kingsoft Powerword Chinese-English / English-Chinese dictionary.
The package includes thirty fonts licensed from Founder, fifteen each in traditional and simplified, including the Kai, Fangsong and traditional Hei fonts necessary to complete your basic set, plus Weibei, many other ornate and calligraphic fonts. The developers claim the product is in the latest GB encoding but appears to contain the base character sets for Big 5 and GBK. Installation instructions are in both English and Chinese. Prices range from approximately US $130 to US $300 depending on the number of fonts and utilities included in the package.
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Chinese Star
Chinese Star, from Beijing Chinese Star Cyber Technology Ltd., also adds input methods, fonts and tools to Windows XP and 2000. Additional input methods include English-to-Chinese and a full sentence Pinyin input method called "Intelligent Sentence Recognition". (I have not compared this to the "Full Pinyin" full-sentence input in the MSPY simplified input method editor that is included free with Windows XP.)
Like Chinese Plus, Chinese Star also includes the Kingsoft Powerword English-Chinese / Chinese-English dictionary. It also includes several font editing and art utilities, and the entire manual is in both English and Chinese. The 16 included fonts are in Big 5, GB2312 and Unicode, but I have not been able to obtain a list. The latest versions, Chinese Star XP and Chinese Star MP, sell for about US $300.
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InChinese
InChinese is a plug-in for Adobe InDesign CS developed by AWT System, a Hong Kong supplier of publishing solutions throughout East and Southeast Asia. Separate plug-ins are required for traditional and simplified Chinese. Each plug-in costs over US $400, but perhaps you get what you pay for!
Although Adobe began offering Chinese versions of InDesign beginning with CS2, InChinese plugged into the US version of "CS1" may provide more sophisticated Chinese publishing capabilities. It allows you to display InDesign CS menus, dialogs and palette in Chinese or the original English. It officially supports Adobe fonts and Open Type fonts. This is a professional publishing solution, usually marketed to users of Chinese Windows systems in Asia, but the US distributors claim you can use this in English Windows as well.
I have not tested this myself, so I cannot recommend this combination over the latest Chinese versions of InDesign or vice-versa.
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NJStar
The NJStar Chinese Word Processor is worth mentioning here. Another NJStar product, Communicator, is not necessary for Windows XP or 2000 and in fact it can conflict with the Regional Settings in XP, but I suppose it would still be useful for getting Chinese into older software.
The NJStar Chinese Word Processor is an interesting package, a word processor optimized for Asian languages that adds to your system additional input methods like English-to-Chinese, plus simplified and traditional fonts, Pinyin with tone marks, control over Pinyin entry that may interest teachers using it as an educational tool, Mandarin text-to-speech, an English-Chinese / Chinese-English dictionary including inline "popup" lookup, and a tool for exporting text as graphics right into an e-mail message. Text can be exchanged with MS Office XP and similar Unicode-compliant programs via an rtf file.
The TrueType fonts in the "Pro" package are Song, Kai, Hei and Fangsong in both traditional and simplified, plus two more traditional fonts in the "Plus" package. Prices range from US $99 to US $329 for the various packages, from a version with bitmapped fonts only to "Pro" packages with TrueType fonts and text-to-speech.
Q9
Q9 is a newly popular input method you might want to memorize if you are also going to use it on cell phones or PDAs. On a PC keyboard, you use the number/calculator keypad. The approach is similar to many traditional input methods, in that you memorize a way of inputting characters by strokes, but Q9 is quite an innovation in efficient input with only 9 number keys. (The zero and the decimal keys get used too, but who's counting?)
Methods like this require a very good knowledge of Chinese penmanship. If you didn't grow up writing Chinese, good luck. But Q9's speed is very impressive. About US $10 to add the basic Q9 method, and US $70 for a package of addtional features like fuzzy entry and a bundled dictionary.
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RichWin
Unfortunately, development of RichWin did not continue after Windows 2000 was released. Once one of leading add-ins for enabling Chinese in older versions of Windows, for many it was the only choice. Although no longer necessary in 2000 or XP, the developers could have offered enhancements such as additional input methods, fonts and utilities, but they did not. Three of their competitors have attempted this: see Chinese Plus, Chinese Star and TwinBridge in this section.
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TwinBridge Chinese Partner / TwinBridge CJK Partner
Version 6 of this add-in is for Windows XP and 2000 only, and is priced at about US $180 for a Chinese-only version and US $300 for a complete Chinese/Japanese/Korean package.
Once one of the only choices for adding East Asian languages to previous versions of Windows, Twinbridge still offers some value by expanding on the basic East Asian capabilities of XP and 2000. For example, although the TwinBridge Pinyin input method is quite similar to methods included with Windows XP, TwinBridge also includes additional methods like English-to-Chinese that can be very useful at times. TwinBridge also adds several fonts and system utilities.
TwinBridge 6 includes 49 fonts, enough to complete most users' libraries, all mapped to the latest Unicode encoding (GB 18030) and containing the standard 13,000 Big 5 traditional characters and 7,000 GB 2312 simplified characters. They include the Kai, Fangsong and traditional Hei fonts needed to complete your basic set, plus many more including a zhuyin font, a zhuyin-plus-Kai font and many fancy printing fonts.
TwinBridge utilities convert between various encoding systems, and help with both Unicode compliant software (like the latest versions of MS Office and Adobe InDesign) and older ANSI software (even Notepad). It includes an ANSI converter, a single-byte converter, and even a text-to-graphics converter for use in software that will not accept East Asian content any other way.
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