CHINESE SOFTWARE PRIMER BACKGROUND KNOWLEDGE 1. .gb, .hz and .b5 files and Chinese coding schemes. 2. What type of software do I need? 3. How do I write Chinese WHAT SOFTWARE SHOULD I USE FOR 1. Mac 2. MS-Windows 3. DOS 4. Web surfing UNIX/X-WINDOWS ARE SPECIAL 1. MULE 2. CXTERM 3. Midaswww 4. Netscape and Mosaic _________________________________________________________________ BACKGROUND KNOWLEDGE 1. .gb, .hz and .b5 files and Chinese coding schemes. The most popular coding schemes for HanZi (Chinese characters) are GB, Big5 and HZ. + GB (GuoBiao) is the coding standard in Mainland China, Singerpore and where simplified Chinese is used. + HZ is a variation of GB, designed/specified by several experts over the Internet, especially. Dr. Fung-Fung Lee, to circumvent the limitations imposed by conventional Internet email and Usenet systems. + Big5 is the de facto coding standard in Taiwan, Hong Kong and where traditional Chinese characters are used. But don't be fooled by the seemingly coorelation between GB and simplified characters -- you can input and print traditional characters if your software knows how to use traditional character fonts. Chinese files in these coding schems usually have names with, respectively .gb, .hz and .b5 (or .big) suffices. You can often work on only one kind of files with some software packages whereas many recent ones support all of them. 2. What Types of Chinese Software Do I Need? + Chinese capable applications, such as Chinese word processors. The Netscape patch adding Chinese capability, which is available in our archive, also belongs to this catergory. + Chinese environments running on top of existing ASCII/English operating systems. + Chinese operating systems. They are usually solded in Chinese speaking countries or to professionals elsewhere. For these users, Chinese capability is the most important thing. For most people in non-Chinese speaking countries, Chinese environments are the most appropriate because beside giving you the read, write and print abilities as Chinese oeprating systems do, they allow you to switch the native language of your operating system. This primer emphasis on this type of software. 3. How do I write Chinese? Grind your own ink, hold the brush straight, and write collumns from right to left! Yes, writing is this difficult. Most people use phonetic based Pin1Yin1 and BoPoMoFo input methods. For fast input, you got to use WuBi (for simplified characters) and ChangJei (for traditional characters), which use key sequences based on the stroke and other features of the characters. See the tutorials in the info directory of our software area. WHAT SOFTWARE SHOULD I USE FOR 1. Mac typeGBHZBig5Comment and where to get Mac Chinese System3yny sold by Apple Mac Chinese Kit2ynyupgarde kit from this site MacHZ, MacViewHZ2yadd-ons to the above two, freeware from this site 2. MS-Windows typeGBHZBig5Comment and where to get C-Windows3yny sold by Microsoft, Taiwan P-Windows3yny sold by Microsoft, Taiwan UnionWay402yyyvery easy to install, demo from this site TwinBridge2yyydemo exists over the Internet Ch-Star2yyydemo exists over the Internet 3. DOS typeGBHZBig5Comment and where to get CC-DOS3ynn Most popular in China ETEN3nny Most popular in Taiwan zWDOS2nynpopular over Internet, shareware from this site 4. Web surfing You can always elect to have the .gb, .hz and .b5 (.big) files downloaded to your computer before viewing them. If you the files displayed on your screen, you have to tell your WWW browser to display them instead of download them. And if you use Netscape, Mosaic or whatever under any Mac or MS-Windows based Chinese environments or operating systems, you have to change the default fonts to the Chinese fonts. UNIX/X-WINDOWS ARE SPECIAL This often means you are out of luck as regular users. Unix machines have not been good to provide graphic user interfaces. But programmers and technical people love them. So, you will find more applications which do not require graphic sscreens, such for file conversions and the fancy TeX, available for unix machines. I assume many of the unix computer vendors, such as IBM, DEC and Sun, sell some kind of Chinese operating systems in Taiwan and China. These operating systems are not widely used, to say the least. There are two environment type of packages supporting Chinese, MULE and CXTERM. But they only provide Chinese environment within the particular windows they open up. You can work on Chinese when you use any application that runs within those windows. But applications such as Netscape won't work. Below shows you some examples of how to do WWW browsing under Unix/X-Windows. 1. MULE + Multilingual GNU emacs enhancement Mule + w3 mode; or + Gnu-emacs + w3-mode + xhzview + a small patch of elisp codes. 2. CXTERM + cxterm + lynx or line mode browser; + Need HZ support, +hztty 3. Midaswww 4. Netscape and Mosaic + If you need graphics, try Netscape 1.0N with the Chinese patch on this site or check out the localized Mosaic + A not tested idea: ask Netscape of Mosaic to call up Cxterm or MULE applications when getting .gb, .hz, b5 or big files. If you've tested this idea, let us know. _________________________________________________________________ Dong-Ping Deng, Yuan Jiang and Ruwen Jin (C) _________________________________________________________________ Bring the community to gether! (C) IFCSS/CCIC 1995