I have been having a lot of problems with hand and wrist pain, so I haven't really been able to to study anymore. I have a progressive illness that causes me to lose strength, and I am afraid I am reaching the point where my time using a tablet to draw characters is coming to an end.

However, there is something that I think would be really helpful and still allow me to take advantage of this website. Right now the hint button (the big "?" In between the previous and next buttons) works two ways. You can click it and it will show the whole character, or you can click and hold and it will show each stroke in succession until it is completely revealed. I was wondering if it would be possible to add an option so that clicking the ? would you show the next stroke instead of revealing the entire stroke.

When you are studying hundreds of words is extremely tedious to have to hold down the button to reveal the strokes used from the first stroke. Especially when you want more than one hit per word, if I forget the second stroke, and then later the 12th stroke, to see that 12th stroke I will have to hold the button and go through all of the other strokes again just to get to the 12th.

To elaborate on this, the way I would like to study is I would go through each stroke in my head and click the ? Button to review each one as I remember it, and if I get the stroke wrong then I will know how to grade the character. Trying to remember the entire character would be no different than using a flash card program, and I think the system you have in place is far better. At least this way by going through each individual stroke I think I would have far greater retention. Even if I can't hold a pen I figure I can do what a lot of native speakers do when trying to remember a character, and use my finger to draw it onto my palm. That way I would at least be able to go through it each stroke at a time to keep track. This would allow me to bring in the muscle memory aspect. This is a lot of words to describe something simple but I just want to make sure I am getting this across.

Maybe instead of changing the functionality of the ? Button, or making an option to change the functionality, may be there could be an option to make a "next stroke" button appear? That way it wouldn't be too intrusive for people that would like this function. It seems simple in my head, but I know when you are trying to implement things some things can be deceptively troublesome. Do you think this would be possible?

Thank you, and if I rambling too much or this would be a giant headache, sorry.

Sorry to hear about the hand pain--not being able to study must be disappointing. Hopefully we can work something out for you!

I like the idea of having a next-stroke-for-a-hint function. That would be generally useful to most people. We're actually trying this out in the iOS app right now: a single tap reveals the next stroke, and a double tap reveals the whole character.

The way it would work for your use case seems a bit different, though. It seems like for you, you wouldn't want the character to be marked wrong after using, say, more than one hint? And you would want to hit the hint button for as many strokes as there were in a character, in a row, for each prompt?

I really didn't think of that. Maybe an option in settings to make it so that giving a hint will not affect its rating? I have no problem manually marking which ones I got wrong or so so, just as long as it defaults to correct. But you get the general idea, I would like to go through each stroke in a row for a character.

But the idea you have for the functionality of the hint button was something I was actually thinking about today. The idea was that tapping it would reveal the next stroke, and holding it down would reveal the whole thing. Which is pretty much the same thing you came up with.

Thanks for trying to hash this out with me.

Instead of going for something fully general and useful to everyone (I'll do that later), I just whipped something up really quick for your use case. Press "C" and it writes the next stroke. This is only on beta.skritter.com for now, and only enabled for your account, since I don't want to support it. I hope the keyboard works for you--otherwise we can do a mouse thing. Also, raw squigs has to be off.

Hope this helps!

Thank you so much! I can't use a keyboard, but I do have a 3dconnexion SpaceNavigator I think I might be able to map the C key to.

Okay. Let me know if you need some other form of input for it.

I have been using it for a bit, and the way it goes through the strokes and everything is exactly how I envisioned it. The only problem is that on that controller I mentioned I can't control the key repeat aspect of it, and it is really sensitive and seems to be independent of the settings I can use to control that on Windows. So a lot of the time it's held down a fraction of a second too long and it registers a couple clicks and I end up getting a couple of extra strokes I didn't want so I can't really getting true gauge of how well I am remembering them.

Is it possible to make it so that just on my account clicking the hint button shows only the next stroke, and holding it down shows the entire character? Or an extra button underneath?

If not I completely understand, and you guys have already gone above and beyond. I think I can find another way to map the c key.

Hey SpokeLee, did you play around to see if there was another way to map the c key? Otherwise, I can add some code to lower the repeat rate Flash-side, if that would work? The show button thing could work, too; it's just a bit tougher to write.

Sorry I didn't get back to you sooner. Everything is okay, I was able to find a way to fix the repeat issue so everything is working just fine. Thank you for being so accommodating in such a timely matter. I make sure to let everyone know about this site anytime they ask for advice learning Chinese or Japanese.