Lingoes- the best free translation software

There are always some friends ask me how to use Google Pinyin. Google Pinyin is really a good IME software, but maybe the Chinese interface is too hard for someone who just start to learn Chinese. Maybe an English version of Google Pinyin is much better, but as Google Pinyin is mainly used by Chinese people, There’s no English version of Google Pinyin, at least now. If you also face such a awkward situation, Lingoes is just the software you need now.

Lingoes is a free translation software. Developed by Kevin and published free of charge, everyone can use this software for free. Although free, the quality is not poor. It is the best translation software I ever used. By adding different dictionaries, you can use lingoes translate not only from Chinese to English or English to Chinese, but also French, German and so on.

So now, you can download lingoes from it’s official website, and the correct dictionaries you need. After installation, you need to do some settings to make lingoes meet your need. For users who want lingoes work with Google Pinyin, here is a screenshot:

When you point you mouse to the word in Google Pinyin, Ligoes will translate the word to some different kind of other language, but I can only understand English-_-.

Well, why not try it now? Lingoes will make your learning Chinese an easy way!

|Website| |Download| |Chinese to Other Dict|

Technorati 标签: Google Pinyin , Learn Chinese , Chinese , Lingoes , Translation

Stop writing Best Life

Best Life is my first English blog. I wanted to make this blog a door for foreigners to China, introducing some interesting stuffs to everyone. But now I find I have already lost my passion in this thing. I am really busy, and I made many aims to do, but writing an English blog is too much troublesome. I will have to spend about one hour for each post, because of my poor English.

Maybe this is a good way to practice my English, but I find I seldom can use English. English can be my free time interest, who is not worth so much time and effort. I should spend more time at my work or other useful skill.

So I decide to stop writing this blog. Thank you for these guys who visited my blog. And if there are some body who want to study Chinese more, can contact with me, maybe I can help you. Or if there are some body who come to Changchun city, Jilin province, it is welcomed to contact with me, I can be your guide in China.

How to contact with me? Well, the best way is email my gmail, whose user name is jetorz. Or you can find me in QQ, with number 123208327.

QQ, The Most Popular IM in China

QQ is a instant messager software just the same as ICQ in the USA or some other countries. We can register a QQ number, and chat with other people in QQ. Maybe ICQ or MSN are the most popular IM softwares in the world, but QQ is more popular in China. Most Chinese people seldom use ICQ for chat, and only some white-collar use MSN, but nearly everybody who plays computer has one or more QQ account. Jetorz have two QQ account, one for family or friends I know in the real world, and one for e-friend in the internet. QQ is especially popular in the young people.

With the growth of internet in China, QQ is more and more powerful. It is not only an online chat software. You can also call video phone, transform file from peer to peer , share files with other QQ users, get online hard drive, get QQ mail and so on with a single QQ account, and all of them are for free! But of course, only limited function for free users, if you want better service, you will have to pay for it.

If you are from countries other than China, and want to get friends with Chinese by internet, QQ may just be your choice.

|Link| |Download| |Register|

About IME go with Windows

We have talked about IME for some time, like "Google Pinyin, Way to Learn Chinese", "New Version of Google Pinyin". The reason why we talk so much about IME is that it is very important to choose a good IME software in inputting Chinese character.

There are also some IME softwares go along with Windows, like ZhiNeng ABC and Microsoft Pinyin and so on. If you do not like to find and install softwares, maybe Microsoft Pinyin is your choice. The latest version of MS Pinyin is 2007, but I suggest using 2003, which is installed automatically when you install Microsoft Office 2003. The interface of MS Pinyin is going with the system language you use. If your Windows is English, interface of MS Pinyin is English. This is good to someone who just start learning Chinese. ZhiNeng ABC may be good long time ago, but It is not so good recently, because there's no progress during these years, while other softwares are trying their best to develop themselves.

I am so sad

I used to use Wordpress.com as my blog, but I just find that it is unable to access Wordpress any more. I know the reason, well, the famous GFW, known as a matter of fact"Great Fire Wall".

China is a great country. It is old, it is mysterious, and it's economic condition astonished the whole world. But China is really not so democratic. At least, we Chinese people can not access the internet world freely. We can not enjoy Flickr, Google Group, Wikipedia...which I do not like very much.

I tried many ways to access blogspot, because I like writing something, and I want to write something in English to practice my English. I am so sad that I will have to try very hard to do so.

User Experience

AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition is a very good Anti-Virus software for personal use. Totally free, and very powerful, I use it as my only software to protect my computer.

But these days I found something with AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition make me very uneasy. Every time AVG updates itself, there will be a window shown up like picture below:

In my personal opinion, update should be very silent. A balloon notification is already too much, a dialog box? Why do you think I should be so much awared that my software is up to date? I do not think so. May there should be a notification to me that my anti-virus database is out of date, but not up to date.

Well, I think it must because this is a free edition. Maybe AVG just want to do some advertise in such a way, just some ads. I am think of changing to another free software, maybe AVS?

Link

What Friendship Should Be

link

Power Menu, Enhance Your Right Menu

Power Menu is an utility to enhance your standard Windows right menu. You may encounter some condition that you have too much windows in your task bar that you want to send them to the tray with only  small icons shown, or sometime you just want some windows to be shown on the top of your screen, no matter if them are active or not. But with standard Windows right menu for applications, you can not do it. Power menu is just this kind of tool to enhance your right menu for Windows. You can minimize nearly any applications to the system tray, or send any application windows on the top of your screen. There are some more functions, like set transparency, or set priority for applications, but I seldom use them. For me, what are useful are "Always On Top" and "Minimize To Tray".

Power menu is a free software, any green software, which means you need not to install it. Just copy it to anywhere you like, and run it. That is great, right?

Link

Vista for Free?

Vista for free? Absolutely not. Microsoft seldom make something for free, especially operating system, which is the foundation of microsoft. What I showed up is a pirated Vista I found in a forum, so called free.

I really do not support anyone use pirated softwares. If you have programmed once, you will know the efforts for making a software. It is really a hard job, so if the author want other body to use his software for free, we will of course say "thank you", while if the author do not agree us using for free but ask us to buy it, the best choice is buy it with your result of hard working, that is money, or do not use it, try some other software instead.

There 's no software in my computer that is pirated software. They are all free softwares, like Pspad but not UltraEdit, AVG Anti-Virus Free but not Kaspersky Anti-Virus Personal, EverNote but not Mybase. Maybe Windows is not so easy to find a substitution, but we can use an OEM version, which is brought to you when you buy a computer, or you can use Linux.

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EverNote in Certain Language

Evernote is really a good software. I like it very much. There are two different kinds of text, which are text note and rich text note. Commonly, when we talk about text, we mean plain text, nothing like link or format is supported. You can only type plain text, just like what the standard Windows notepad does. If you want to creat some format for easy reading or good looking, you will have to use rich text note. Well, that is true, but not in EverNote. In EverNote, text note means HTML based text, in which you can type anything you want, including images, links and all the other types. But in rich text note, you can only creat some kind of format text, image and link are not supported in rich text note. So it seems that there's no need to use a rich text note, which is only limited functionality. Yes, that is true, if you are not a Asian or Middle-Eastern Language user. Asian or Middle-Eastern Language is not supported in the standard text note in EverNote. Only some garbled messages will show if you type these languages in a standard text note, like picture below.

The first line is some characters I typed in a standard text note in Chinese, but only show some garbled messages which mean nothing. And the second line is what I wanted to type. You can try the same thing in a rich text note, what is different?

So this is the problem. If your language is Asians or Middle-Eastern language, and you want to use standard text note, you will have to type it some where else, and then paste them to EverNote. Or you will have to use rich text note instead, which is function-limited.

This is a very unpleasant message for us Asians. We can not get the most of EverNote. I hope the author can fix this problem in next version.

New Vision of Google Pinyin

Google Pinyin has released a new vision, that is 1.0.19.0. Based on the official website, new vision will update itself automatically, so there's no need to manually download and install.

New vision has 4 improvements:

1. fixed the unresponse bug in some condition;
2. support user setting for automatic update;
3. add choose character by word function;
4. improved compatible in some games;

Although it is said that this new vision can automatically update itself, my Google Pinyin has not updated, which means that mine is still 1.0.18.0. what about yours?

link

Blog With Windows Live Writer

Are you a blogger? What's your favorite way to publish your blog? Maybe you just use the traditional way to publish, that is goto the blog website, login, goto the editer page and then type your words. Well, this is a good way, but maybe there are some ways better, like using a off-line blog software. Windows Live Writer is just this kind of software.

The newest vision of Windows Live Writer is 1.0, but this software is still in beta. This is a very powerful tool, just like most Microsoft software. This tool support most BSP type, like Windows Live Space, which is also microsoft's, Wordpress, Blogger, and many other types. I have two blogs, one is blogger and the other one is based on wordpress, so this software can just fit my need. You can do many special effect with it, and I think of course you can find out them. But there is just one thing that I am not so happy with, that is you can not insert picture directly to some web services. You will have to upload you pictures first, and then copy the URL of the picture and paste them to Windows Live Writer, which is rather troublesome.

Unlike most microsoft's softwares, Windows Live Writer is free, you can run it immediately after installation.

Link

Pixie, Tool For Picking Color

Are you a web designer or painter? Is there sometime that you find a color you like but you just can not pick it out for your own design? You may try many ways but you just can not find out the exact value of your color, but just similar, which is rather annoying. You can find out the value of your color with Adobe Photoshop, of course, but that is too much -- what you want is very simple. Well, maybe what you are looking for is this: pixie.

Pixie is a small tool for picking color from anywhere in your computer. After installation, run it, simply point to the place where your colour is, pixie will show you the colour in many ways, like rgb, hex and html. I just use these three functions, but there are also other values, like cmyk and hsv. After knowing the value, you do not need to remember it and then type it, just press Ctrl+Alt+C for copying html value, Ctrl+Alt+X for mixer, and Ctrl+Alt+Z for magnifier.

Pixie is a free software, you can use it what ever you want, without having to register.

Link

Google Pinyin, Way to Learn Chinese

Like some people in China learn some kinds of foreign language, people in other countries may want to learn chinese. Chinese is really a hard language. No spelling, no "a,b,c", but chinese is just composed by some strange strokes. But as China become more and more important in the world's stage, chinese may be more and more useful. So it is just ok to learn chinese. What's more, China is a very old and mystery country, it is very attractive, and what you should know a country first is to learn it's language, that is chinese.

Like all the other studies, you can learn chinese with a computer. But now what is very awkward appears, you do not know how to input chinese with a standard windows keyboard. That is right, there's no way to input chinese directly from keyboard like english. What you need is a software, which is used to input, that is called ime, which means input method editor.

Ime is a technology to resolve input problem for east asian, whose language can not be typed directly from keyboard to computer. You must use an ime to input. There are many different software to do this job. A good ime software means you can input easily and quickly, and maybe even more correctly. I suggest you use google pinyin as your ime software.

Google pinyin, as it's name, is a product of google. There are 5 big advantage for google pinyin:

1.Intelligent suggestion. Google pinyin can highly guessed out what you want to type, and automatically give you the best suggestion, which means you do not need to manually choose words every time. But because of the peculiarity of chinese language, you will have to choose sometimes. But google pinyin is already good enough.

2.Popular words. With a traditional ime software, it is very hard to type some popular words. You will have to choose different characters nearly every time. As google pinyin is based on search engine, he knows the very words that are popular, and with automatically update, you can type out most popular words easily.

3.Internet synchronization. If you have a google account, you can synchronize your onw dictionary with google server, which means no matter where are you, you can easily use your own dictionary, which is very personalized.

4.One key search. You can search with google as you are typing. But i do not think this function is very useful. I seldom use it. I'd rather open firefox and browse to google, and then search.

5.English suggestion. If google pinyin finds that you are typing an english words, he can suggest you with the correct spelling, just like typing assistant. But not so powerful as typing assistant, which is made to type english.

As google pinyin is so good a software, you do not need to hesitant any more. Go and download it!

Link

Gigaget,More Than Fast

Gigaget is a free download software, which can speed up your download by 7-10 times. but that is not the only key point of this software, Gigaget can automatically search resources in the internet, which means that it can deal with dead link. if the original link is unable to use, gigaget will use other alternative resources to download automatically.

gigaget not only can download links of http, but also some other types. like ftp, and even BT. so you can use gigaget as your only download software.Gigaget support IE, firefox and maxthon. after installation, you can set gigaget as the default download method for your browser.

link | download

Pspad,new kind of notepad

Maybe you need to do some work with text edit everyday. What you want is just type some words, so you may do not need a heavy word process software, and what you need is a place to do something with text. Windows notepad is the very software for this, but it is too poor to use. Are there something better? Of course yes. Ultraedit is this kind of software, and it is called "the best text software". But ultraedit is not free, you will have to spend $49.95 to buy it. Well, if you have a advanced requirement of text edit, may it is right price and software, but not for most of us. What we need is a powerful text editor, but not so expensive. Pspad is just this kind of software.

Pspad support many file types of language, with syntax highlighting. There are clip, macro and many kinds of templets to automate you work. Pspad is also integrated with ftp client, hex edit, project, macro recorder, search in active file and other files, code explorer... Many functions are waiting for you to discover. And also, pspad also support many different languages, like chinese, japanese, french, geek and so on. You can find these language files in the official web site. Pspad also support many kinds of files, like c++, html, css, fortran and so on.

Well, now that this text editer is so powerful, why do not you download and try it? Current vision is 4.5.2. Enjoy!

link download

EverNote, Organize All of your Stuffs!

Evernote is a kind of software to keep all of your information. it is easy for you to save you informations in many kinds of format, and you can easily access them and search them, which means you can well organize all of your information.

Evernote support many softwares, like IE, Firefox, Outlook and etc.. you can easily keep things in the other softwares to Evernote. Besides, you can also type them by yourself, like information of your friends, phone numbers, to-do list, and even shopping list, if you like. there are many kinds of template in the offical web site of Evernote.

there are two kinds of Evernote, free vision and plus vision, which is a shareware, cost $49.95. i think free vision is just ok for most users, who do not need the advance feature.

Who Is Wrong？

Indian companies going against the anti-piracy steps of Microsoft in India. We are not against piracy but against the way Microsoft is working to stop it. Moreover, if they want to do business in India then they should change their prices and policies according to the Indian market.

-----via

It is stealing. Softwares are also production of hard work. Any people who want to use a software should follow the TOS of the author, because it is the author who made the software, its his copyright. Using piracy software is a kind of stealing. But it is strange that people in indian think it is Microsoft's mistake because Windows is too expensive so they will have to use piracy Wndows. Well, there are cheap softwares, for example, Linux, every body can use some kind of linux for free, this is cheap, why do not the indians use? Maybe they just feel so good to become thieves. And i just feel sorry to them all.



read more | digg story

FastStone Capture, Not Free Anymore

Faststone capture is a very good screen-capture utility. Easy to use, friendly interface, and powerful editor for image you just captured. Fast stone capture was a free ware. Yes, was, it was free with vision 5.3, while now it becomes a shareware, which will cost you $19.95.

I'm very sorry about this, but i can understand the author. Programming is never a easy job, and we all have to earn a living with something we do. Make a good software, and sell it, is the way programmers live. So i think i can understand the author, although i am sorry about unable to use the newest vision. I will not buy it, because it is too dear for me, a poor guy in a developing country. I will have to use some other softwares instead, or just use the old free vision.

Free Launch Bar, Organize Your Programes

Having installed too many programms in your computer? Then there is a new problem comes: how to find them in a short time. The quick launch bar is a good idea, but the quick launch bar is just too poor to use. No good looking, can't be well organized, and opened very slowly. Maybe the start menu? Well, i can not see any differences between start menu and the quick launch bar. Is there some way to solve this question? Yes, look, here comes a very good software, free launch bar.

What is free launch bar? Free launch bar is a very good software to substitute the traditional windows quick launch bar. What's the differences between free launch bar and windows quick launch bar? Maybe this image can explain it clearly.

Free launch bar, as its name, is free. There is a better edition, true launch bar, but you will have to pay for it.

Typing Assistant--Easy Way to Type

Having trouble with typing? Is there sometime that you just forget how to spell the exact word you want to use? Maybe what you need is a software that can remind you with letters you remember as you type. Well, typing assistant is one of this kind of software, who can just tell you how to spell word as you type.

Typing assistant is a freeware, which means that you need not to pay for it. Some big software like microsoft word can also remind you will the correct way to type, but ms word is never free.

There are some software in east asia called ime, which is used for input characters to computer, because the word they use can not easily typed with the stander keyboard. And some of them are quite good, you can speed up your typing very much. But i find it is just hard to find a software for english like them. Typing assistant is also not a so good software like google pinyin for chinese, but it is already good enough for personal use.

But Typing Assistant is not all good, for example, Typing Assistant does not support firefox and openoffice.org writer, which I use very offen. So I will have to type in notepad, and then copy and paste them to other softwares, like firefox and openoffice.org. I hope the author can improve this problem in next vision.

Update1:
well, i will have to correct myself. i downloaded a vision of Typing Assistant 1.0, and V1.0 is really a freeware. but now the newest vision is 2.1, and the newest vision is not free again! so if you want to use a Typing Assistant for free, you will have to try to find V1.0. can't find yourself? well, contact with me and i can give it to you.


Update2:
As so many people emailed me about this software, I have upload it to Box.net, and now you can get it here: http://www.box.net/shared/f20q6p64ok

First post edited in OpenOffice.org Writer

Using Microsoft office for such a long time, i really want to use a different kind of office software. For example, OpenOffice.org? So i just downloaded an installation file from www.download.com, and installed OpenOffice.org writer, as shown below.


This blog was edited in OpenOffice.org writer, and i did not find anything uncomfortable. But it is really do not fit my habit, which was Microsoft-like. People in china do not have too much idea of copyright. For them, pirate vision is just the same as something you have bought. And Microsoft office is really good, so they'd rather to use a pirate copy of Microsoft office than free OpenOffice. And the same as Linux and Windows. But condition is becoming better and better, the rate of pirate in china is just becoming lower and lower. I hope there will be one day, softwares in most people's computer are free ware or software they bought, but not pirate vision.

Flashget,the best download software

FlashGet is a very good download software. I have tried many download softwares, but flashget is the best . It can speed up your download by 6-10 times, according to the offical web site , which is http://www.flashget.com/index_en.htm . flashget can not only speed up you download speed ,but also can well organize your download files. And flashget can support many kind of different download ways . for example , BT, which is very popular these days , and even eMule , in its newest vision. So what you need to do is just install one software , then you can download any kind of popular staffes.