Hi

Just started to use Skritter after learning chinese for a while have to say very pleased with it it seems a great tool. I especially like the way it helps with learning tones.

Apologies if this seems like a dumb question but I havent been able to find an answer

What is a word in the progress report? does it mean I have both the pinyin and characters correct. Also with single character words are these still counted in the words progress report?

One other feedback would be nice if you has a link to the manual on the webpage when you are using

Thanks, glad you find it useful!

A word (in Chinese) is any multi-character word. So single characters do not count. A word's progress is tracked separately from the individual characters, but if you get characters wrong, it won't mark the word as known, since you need to know the characters to know the word!

For Japanese it's a bit different; we actually track separately learning a single character as a word and learning it as a component.

We're actually moving away from the manual, at least the way it is now. We're going to try an overlay system where it highlights different parts of the screen and you can hover over those parts to get more information. The user guide will be a place for information on broader topics, like managing your vocabulary, how the scheduling works, stuff like that.

The overlay system is partially complete; if you want to see a preview, run the javascript function showOverlay() on the practice page or the progress page. We hope this will be an efficient and easy to use way to learn how to use Skritter!

Hi Scott

Thanks for the prompt reply. Still trying to get my head around how you score the characters but so far i really like the program. The scoring as mentioned seems a little confusing for example

I look in the vocab a word 举行 afterI have tested. I have been getting the characters correct for the last 3 days and after testing looked at the list

举行 is marked roughy 1/3rd correct for both character and tone. I assume this is because I have only be doing it for 3-4 days last tested is 5 mins
举 is marked "You are not currently studying anything from this word/character" but I never seem to have a problem writing the character
行 is marked last tested 5mins is marked 1/2 right for character amd 1/4 right for tone

Shouldnt the 举 have some score or will it only score if it comes up as a single character flashcard. Do you have a document which would describe how this works in more detail.

Also I have been using pleco on my phone for a couple of years and was hoping to get upto a similar score as quickly as possible for characters I know but felt it was a good idea to go through the tones again as I have problems remembering a lot even if I can write and read the character. Is there any way to make the scoring more aggressive so that it doesnt repeat the character I know too often or manually change the score?

Hit 4 on any character prompt to indicate that it's too easy and it will change the interval much more quickly. You can enable the grading buttons to make this more explicit, in the practice settings.

Currently, single characters aren't activated by default if they're added as part of a multiple-character word. We're considering changing this, though, which would allow those characters to come up on their own. What do you think? Do you prefer to only see 举 and 行 in 举行 until you add them by themselves, or would you want them to come up by themselves, too, if Skritter ever thought you needed extra practice on one of them?

The learnedness indicators correspond just to how long the intervals are. It's a logarithmic scale, and maxes out at an interval of 2 months.

I would have to say that, in most cases, I would prefer to only see the character within the context I need it until I add it on its own. There have been a few times when I've wished I could practice one character, but those have been very rare instances.

Hi Nick

Thanks for the explaination. For me it is good like this, to only have characters if you enter them as seperate cards as I am working through the first 2 HSK lists and trying to get a rough idea of progress. So the way you have it I can add characters and words and get a total for the equivalent flashcards learnt.

I checked the progress this morning though and not sure how it totals.

I am working through 2 lists HSK 1 and HSK 2 I initially used a 3rd but have switched this off. The flashcards complete are.

HSK 1 - 203 complete
HSK 2 - 193 complete
NPCR - 9 complete (this is the old list which I switched odd and the completed flashcards are in the HSK list as well apart from 1 entry)

Total - 405

Trying to match that with progress report I have

Words learnt 151
Character leant 331

Total - 482

This seems quite a difference any ideas why the progress bar would be higher?

The progress report does include those individual characters that aren't activated, but are learned as part of another word. The review bar won't include them; I think the added bar will. Your vocab viewer or list browser won't include them. Export will include them.

There's a certain logic to it, from our point of view, but it often makes counts not match up (like you describe).

Actually the export will not include them. It uses the same logic as the viewer.

For the most part, characters that are learned as part of other words but not studied individually only show up in the progress reports; everywhere else they do not show up. They're included in the progress report so that you know how many characters you know overall, rather than just how many characters you have learned on their own.

The only other exception is the added bar. It does include secondary characters added, since the added bar is based on the progress report numbers.