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READ-ME.DOC An Explanation of CANTONES A Program to Teach Spoken Cantonese Version 2.0 (May 1986) ======================================================= (c) 1986 by Louie Crew. All rights reserved. .pa Contents A note on Version 2.0's changes A note on Version 1.1's changes I. What the Program Does II. Limitations of the Program III. The Files That You Receive IV. Use Main Menu PREPARING LESSONS An Overview Naming Files Entering data Ending the Entry of a Lesson Resuming Entry Correcting Mistakes THE REVIEWS The Quick Reviews List both Chinese and English Forms List English Forms Only Chinese Forms Only The Slower Reviews Branching Scores A Sample Slow Review Translation Skills Specialized Reviews V. Creating New Files by Word Class A Tip On Alphabetizing VI. Printing Files Installing Your Printer MergePrinting English-Chinese Lists Back Up Your Files VII. Ending a Session VIII. Improving This Program: A Note from the Author .pa A Note on Revisions incorporated in Version 2.0 (c) 1986 by Louie Crew. April 1986 Essentially the main change in 2.0 was the compiled version, producing the two executable files, CANTONES.EXE and CANAUX.EXE. Each chains readily into the other, and vastly speeds the operation of the program. CANTONES easily shifts between the student and teacher menus. CANAUX allows you to (re)install one menu as the default. CANAUX allows you to print lists and to reorganize them. A Note on Revisions incorporated in Version 1.1 (c) 1986 by Louie Crew. April 1986 In response to requests from the first others to use my program: I have added the following features: 1. New files: A student menu, much simplified menu for anyone to use in reviewing lessons. It shifts easily to the teacher menu, but mainly allows one to avoid the more complicated options of when not wanted. The student menu automatically writes misses alternately to REV1 or REV2. It lists only those files which begin LESSON?? when it prompts the user to name the file to review. It omits the options to review by parts of speech and to review with sentences rather than by words. It also bypasses the options to create new lessons or to print files. Those who want these more complicated functions--especially teachers-- can still access them, through (S)hift to Teachers' Menu. An install feature, to accommodate most different printers. PARA -- the file which the install feature creates and the program accesses automatically to supply the printer's data. A dictionary feature, to reorganize files. (See the "Tip on alphabetizing in Section V). ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Note: If you have an earlier version, replace it with CANTONES vers. 2.0. Otherwise, most of these new files will not work for you. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ New sample lessons: Now LESSONEW LESSONEX LESSONEY LESSONEZ LESSON1 THROUGH LESSON 16 2. An easy escape: The program now allows a user to end a review quickly, even after specifying a desire to review an entire lesson. As the screen prompts: just hit * as in response to the first prompt for any new item in a lesson. The program will immediately report your score on the items actually reviewed and return you to the menu for an orderly exit. 3. A tip on use: Some users complained that they do not type well and find it too difficult to type in the Chinese when responding to English prompts. They do not have to. The program asks you to do so, but does not require you to do so. The program makes no use of the data that you type. Proficient typists may like to type, to test whether they really know the tone markers. No one needs to be concerned about spelling except as it references pronunciation. Many will prefer merely to respond orally. Then type just a blank answer for each translation. The program moves rapidly. Blank answers in Chinese entries must be at least one space or one character. With English responses, even a carriage return moves to the next prompt. Please share your experiences with the program: I will incorporate as many as fall within my programming skills and time allowed. If you have sent a donation, I will keep you advised of any substantial updates. .cp 7 Louie Crew (a.k.a. Li Min Hua) Department of English Chinese University Shatin, NT Hong Kong TELEX 50301 CUHK HX TELEGRAM SINOVERSITY .pa CANTONESE runs with MS-DOS 2.1 or higher. CANTONES is copyrighted "Free-Ware." Copy a friend's disk or download from an electronic bulletin board. Persons who use the program frequently may want to send a contribution to the researcher. Those who contribute at least US$10 will be informed of all future updates as registered users. Persons who don't use the program should give it to someone else who will. The program itself is free and must remain so. For those who cannot find a copy in another way, the author will supply a disk by air mail for US$15, or by local Hong Kong post for HK$70, to cover processing costs. Remit in either US$ or HK$. Warning: No one may sell this program; you may only give it away. The program comes with no guarantees, written or implied. .pa I. What the Program Does CANTONES is designed to teach spoken Cantonese, but can readily adapt to Mandarin, or to any other language which the IBM keyboard can support, sometimes with no modifications. CANTONES serves mainly to teach vocabulary and pronunciation. The program accommodates the tone system used by Parker Po-Fei Huang and Gerard P. Kok in Speak Cantonese, (New Asia--Yale-in-China Chinese Language Center, 1981), who distinguish the seven tones of Cantonese by using western script in combination with three superscript markers ( \ / and - ) and a silent letter "h," as with the following round vowel: _ o = high level \ o = high falling / o = high rising o = mid level \ oh = low falling / oh = low rising oh = low level CANTONES keeps score about the user's success with four categories which the user mush master: word recognition tone recognition measure recognitimn sentence translation CANTONES allows the user to review in different ways: prompted by Chinese or by English prompted with words or with sentences completing whole lessons or special categories of lessons testing only those items which one missed last time or the entire lesson again (The student menu simplifies matters, and retains only the first option here.) CANTONES will print lessons, including lists of those words the user still does not know from a lesson. With a standard word-processor, the user can also MergePrint the lessons into other formats, as for flash cards, vocabulary tests, etc. The program is based on Crew's earlier version, "MailMerge Cantonese," Hong Kong Computer Journal (February 1985), awarded "Best Article of 1985 by the Hong Kong Computer Society. .cp 7 II. Limitations of the Program The program teaches nothing about written Chinese characters. The program teaches nothing about grammar. The program works best if one uses it in the context of a course, with lessons, textbook, audiotapes, and a class in which to practice. The program comes with 20 sample lessons, to demonstrate how the program will work with any lessons which the user wants to learn. Users must finally talk to Cantonese speakers to test their real performance. The program augments the work of teachers, textbooks, and friends who are native speakers. The program allows learners to continue privately, at their own pace, processes which began in class, in books, or in live conversation. III. The Files That You Receive The full program contains the following files: LESSONEW Sample lessons. LESSONEX LESSONEY LESSONEZ LESSON1-LESSON16 : The vocabulary of the first 16 lessons of SPEAK CANTONESE BOOK 1, by Parker Po-Fei Huang and Gerard P. Kok, supplied with the permission of Far Eastern Publications, New Haven, Connecticut. SCORE.SP The file which stores data about your progress. (Empty at first) CANTONES.EXE The primary half of the program, which chains automatically into CANAUX.EXE. CANAUX.EXE Half of the program, which chains into CANTONES.EXE automatically. PARA A file which the install feature of CANAUX.EXE creates and both CANTONES.EXE and CANAUX.EXE access. It automatically to stores printer codes and sets one menu as the default. READ-ME.DOC This documentation file. MERGETST.DOC A sample MergePrint file which MergePrints LESSONEX when used with MailMerge. (Serves as a model for other print options.) The program requires at least one lesson, the cantones.exe files, and para to work at all. The full program is available in one archive, CANTONES.ARC, via electronic bulletin boards. CANTONES.ARC, vers. 2.0, was archived by the public domain program ARC500.EXE. The archive requires Version 500 or a later version of ARC.EXE for the user to extract the files. The program uses SCORE.SP to store data regarding your progress. You never have to open or close SCORE.SP on your own. CANTONES maintains it automatically. It arrives empty because you have not yet taken a lesson, but it will soon hold your scores during your ten most recent reviews. The file must always appear in the same directory with CANTONES for the program to to work properly. .cp 5 IV. Use To use, turn on your computer. CANTONES.EXE and CANAUX.EXE are the two program files, and belong together on one drive. Put all other distributed files (plus any lessons you create) either on the same drive with the .EXE files or on another. If you use more than one drive, log on the drive without the .EXE files and use the path command to tell MS-DOS where to find the program files. (See your DOS manual) When on the drive with the lessons, type: CANTONES The distributed version loads the simpler, student menu automatically (you can change that default with install): S P E A K C A N T O N E S E / / \ / G o n g G w o n g d u n g w a Vers. 2.0 (c) 1986 by Louie Crew (C)omplete review (Q)uick list (S)witch to Teacher's Menu <ESC> to end the session Choice: First the user must specify whether to review completely to list rapidly all of the contents of a file. Second, the user must name the lesson to review. Third, the user must specify either English or Chinese prompts. The teacher menu yields a fuller range of options: Your Name's Copy of CANTONES vers. 2.0 (C) 1986 by Louie Crew Installed for Your Brand Name Printer PREPARE NEW LESSONS 1 = Enter data 2 = Add data 3 = Edit REVIEW LESSONS PROMPTED WITH Chinese English 4 = Words 6 = Words 5 = Sentences 7 = Sentences 8 = Toggle to review by parts of speech (OFF) Just a quick list of (E)ng. (C)hinese (B)oth (A)uxiliary functions (S)witch to Student Menu 0= END Enter: =========================================== If you choose "A" you get another menu: CANAUX Auxiliary Programs to Use with CANTONES (c) 1986 by Louie Crew, Chinese University, Hong Kong 1 = Reinstall the program 2 = Reorganize a file, to put English words first 3 = Print a regular file (Chinese words first) 4 = Print a regorganized file (English words first) 5 = To Main Program 6 = to MS-DOS Study these menus very closely. They can tell you almost everything else you will read in this booklet. They are your main guide to the program. The program should always return to the default menu after you complete any one task. Preparing Lessons An Overview Since the program is not tied to any one textbook, users (teachers or students) will need to to prepare the lessons for review, typically by entering words from a textbook or from some other source, such as a native speaker's list of words around a particular subject one wants to master. Learners will often find that the task of typing the lessons into the computer effectively introduces them to the material; and often in the very first review of the lesson, they will already know a several items from this exposure. Many will not want to limit their use of the program to Cantonese, or even to Chinese. The program allows you to build vocabulary lists for any two languages which the IBM keyboard can support. The Main Menu specifies the options: 1 = Enter data 2 = Add data 3 = Edit "1" here begins a new lesson. "2" lets you continue adding material to an old lesson, as when you have stopped to do some other task or when you have discovered some new terms to add to your special word lists "3" lets you correct mistakes that you detect in lessons that you have already created. Naming Files The student men;u assumes very simple naming conventions. When it tells the user the files from which to choose, it lists only those named LESSON??.--where the two question marks represent the only part of the names which varies. The student menu also writes the items missed to a new file, automatically named either REV1 or REV2. The teacher menu allows much more flexibility, both in creating new files and in accessing them. (Actually, the student menu also lets users access any file: but the student would have to know the name, since the program lists only those in the form of LESSON??. Thereby, teachers may prepare, review, and print special files. Those who use the teacher menu rather than student menu will be wise to establish clear conventions in naming their files, especially to distinguish between permanent files and temporary ones. For example, if I am trying to learn most of my vocabulary from lessons in a textbook, I will want to create permanent files which contain all words in the lesson. Even as I learn more and more of the words in a lesson, I will want to keep the full lesson in tact. I will also want to have temporary files, to collect the items that I now do not know, so that I do not waste time reviewing material that I already know. CANTONES collects mistakes automatically: whenever the user begins to review a lesson, the user must specify the name of a file which will store the items which the user did not know. Then next time, the user can elect to review only that smaller file, and from that, write the mistakes into hopefully an even smaller file, etc., until the latest file of "mistakes" is empty. Usually the user will want to return to the "permanent" file to test memory again. For this process to work efficiently, users need to name files in ways that distinguish between the permanent and the temporary. I recommend my own system: I name all permanent files from the same source in a similar way, such as L1, L2, L3.... for files which come from one source, SLANG1, SLANG2.... for files from another, etc. I name all temporary files REV1 or REV2. When I do, the program recognizes my convention and automatically writes the mistakes in REV1 to REV2, or the mistakes in REV2 to REV1, alternately. Or I may simply number between 1 to 10, or often just "1" and "2" alternately. I don't need to fill the disk with my mistakes, but I do need to store them briefly until I know them. Thereby my names always reflect a files relationship to other files. Whenever I begin a new sitting, I always know which files I can and cannot safely overwrite. Especially remember: the computer overwrites any old file if the user names a new file with the same name. Users will want to overwrite temporary files, to limit their proliferation. They are "temporary" precisely because you will not need them very long. For example, I might need to see the items I missed at 9 a.m. this morning for five more times, but I will not need to see them next week, unless I am too stupid to be learning a language at all. If next week I need to review the same lesson, I need to start with the entire lesson, or with a file I have renamed on purpose, such as HARD6 for the ones I found hardest in Lesson 6. The student menu employs most of my personal conventions, but the teacher menu allows users to adopt conventions that best serve their own purposes. Users will need to have some conventions to make files easily recognizable and distinct. Novices to computers will want to read their computer manual for additional material about the conventions computers require for file names, such as the restriction to a maximum of 8 continuous letters, plus an optional extension of up to a maximum of 3 continuous letters. The teachers' menu requires users to name files often. Do so purposefully, carefully. ********************* Enter data If you choose "1," the screen responds: Here are the files you already have: C: LESSONEX SCORE .SP CANTONES.EXE CANAUX.EXE READ-ME .DOC MERGETST.DOC What name would you like to give to your new lesson? Your own screen here will change to reflect any additions or subtractions to make to your collection of files as you continue to use the program. Notice: Of these here, only "Lessonex" is a lesson file. Only "Lessonex" is a files which you can actually review: and it alone would appear when this question is asked from the student menu. You cannot review any of the other files, but you can review any which you have prepared with options 1, 2, or 3 of the teachers' menu. Next you are prompted to enter data for each item: <> to end. Word in Chinese? \ Suppose you enter the Chinese word yahn. First you type the "y"; then the "a"; then the "\" ... The accent mark will appear over the previous letter automatically (unless you have come to the end of a line). The program recognizes only three such tone markers, and only when you respond to prompts for Chinese: \ = the slash descending to the right / = the slash ascending to the right - = the hyphen N.B.: the program regards these keys strictly as superscripts in Chinese entries: hence they are not available for other uses. Next the screen prompts: English? Here you would enter "person". Then the screen reviews the following parts of speech and prompts you to specify one: a = adverb p = particle at = attributive pat = patterns av = auxiliary verb ph = phrase bf = boundform pn = pronoun cv = coverb pv = postverb ev = equative verb pw = placeword fv = functive verb q = question i = interjection rv = resultative verb ie = idiomatic expression rve = resultative ending m = measure sp = specifier ma = movable adverb sv = stative verb n = noun vo = verb-object comp. nu = number tw = time word on = onomatopoeia x = other useful expressions --------------------------------------------- Part of speech? \ Since yahn is a noun, you would enter "n". Lower case matters here. Be consistent: use upper or lower case all of the time, if you want the program to match properly with several options that you will specify when you review the lessons! (Note: Programmers again could alter these codes to reflect different analyses of Cantonese or or any other languages. See the note at the end about the availability of the source code.) Non-programmers themselves can use different codes here without even changing the program, so long as they remember what codes they have used when later they ask to review items which match.) Since you specified "n" the program will ask you Measure? It will not ask for measure for other word classes. \ The correct measure for "yahn" is "go," which you would then enter. Next the program prompts: Sample Chinese sentence: - - \ / You might respond: Nidi yahn hou guih.<> Next the screen prompts: English? You would need to type "These people are very tired." Finally, the program plays back the full entry and asks: Is the full entry correct? Y/N If you say "N," you are allowed to re-enter it from the beginning. If you say "Y", the program prompts for the next word: Note: the program will also prompt "Correct? (Y/N)" for earlier entries in Chinese, but not for those in English. These prompts allow you to correct smaller, more difficult portions of the entry without having to retype the entire entry. In practice, those prompts speed rather than delay the task, since the Chinese entries are less familiar and provoke more mistakes more easily. Ending the Entry of a Lesson Whenever you complete the entry of one item in a lesson, the program prompts you again for another items, as before: .cp 4 Enter: <> to end. Word in Chinese? The "<>" here means "carriage return" or "ENTER key." To end the session completely, hit the carriage return or the ENTER key. The screen will remind you of the name which you have given to your new file "Your new entries have created ..." and will prompt "Hit any key to return to the main menu." Make a note of the file name. Return to the main menu, and enter your next response, even if merely "0" to end the session. Remember: after each new item when you are entering a lesson, you will always return to this first prompt. Always end a session in the orderly way described. Otherwise you risk losing all data which you have entered for this lesson. You can fearlessly terminate your the creation of lessons prematurely, because the program allows you to return to the same lesson: Resuming Entry As we have seen, the Main Menu specifies the options: 1 = Enter data 2 = Add data 3 = Edit Choice 2 allows users to enlarge lessons created earlier. The program prompts for items exactly as in Choice 1, but first the user specifies an existing file to which the program will add them, rather than a new file. The program also lists all existing files so that the user can precisely name the file to be enlarged. Choice 2 especially helps one who needs to work in short segments of time while entering a long lesson. One closes each "incomplete" version in the orderly way described above; leaves to do something else; and returns to the lesson by Choice 2. Correcting Mistakes Choice 3 provides an orderly way for users to rectify mistakes after they have already created a file. It lists every item in a specified file individually, and prompts "Correct? Y/N." If the user says "N," the program prompts as the user re-enters that item completely. THE REVIEWS The Quick Reviews Both menus support this option. Many times one wants merely to flash through a lesson, sometimes just to see what it there, sometimes to warm up for a more thorough session. The program provides three ways to do so: List both Chinese and English Forms If one responds with a "B" at the Main Menu, the program will list all words in a lesson giving both the Chinese and the English versions. When we type the letter, the screen prompts "Which of your files do you want to list?" and, to guide us as we choose, lists all of the files currently on the drive with the program. When we answer, as with LESSONEX, the program scrolls through the Chinese and the English words in that lesson: \ syu book / bouji newspaper \ Junggwok China / meihgwok America gwai expensive Hit any key for more... Notice that the program pauses when the screen fills. As you hit a key, you see more of the lesson, until you have seen all items. At the end of the lesson you have another choice: 1 = List another file 2 = Return to the main menu Enter: If you choose "1," you will review according to the same terms that you expressed in your first review (here, to see both Chinese and English together). The program prompts to you name the next lesson and you proceed. If you want to change terms for a different kind of review, choose "2" and specify your choice at the main menu. "2" here speeds up this process if you mainly want to flash through several lessons very quickly. .cp 4 List English Forms Only This review works just like Choice B, except that you flash through lessons with only the English words. This is very useful if you want quickly to test your knowledge of a lesson. .cp 4 List Chinese Forms Only This review works just like Choice B and Choice E, except that you flash through lessons with only the Chinese words. .cp 5 The Slower Reviews The heart of the program, and of any instruction, is the slower, more thoughtful review. The teacher menu specifies: REVIEW LESSONS PROMPTED WITH Chinese English 4 = Words 6 = Words 5 = Sentences 7 = Sentences 8 = Toggle to review by parts of speech (OFF) The student menu retains only options 4 and 6 here, i.e., the choice of reviewing all items prompted by either Chinese or English. A teacher who wants students to review words by parts of speech, can still allow them to do so by culling all words in a category, such as all time words (see Part V below) and naming the new collect in a way that it will show up as a lesson in the student's listing, as would the name LESSONTW, for example. The "slow" reviews add features essential to good instruction: Branching The student menu branches automatically, writing the items missed alternately to REV1 or REV2 and inviting the students to review this file in the next round. The more complex teacher menu prompts the user to specify a file to collect the ones missed. Typically, in the next round you will want to review only those items, writing the mistakes in that round to yet another (hopefully smaller) file....until the file of mistakes is an empty file and you have succeeded in learning the lesson. (Alternatively, one may create specialized word lists by "missing" the ones desired for the lists. See Part V.) This feature keeps the program from boring you. It "branches," as any good program must, into what you personally need to know, and does not require you to stay with anyone's prior expectations, yours or those of the one who prepared the lesson which you have begun to review. It also keeps the program from paying false compliments, as it would if you continued to get high scores but only because you limited your vision to what you already know. .cp 3 Scores The program keeps your score, in 4 categories: word recognition, proper tone designation (if you respond in Chinese), proper identification of measure (if the word is a noun), proper translation of sentences. At the end of any lesson, the program computes your score in all categories and reports it automatically. It also allows you to choose to see how you compare in this lesson with your score on the last 10 lessons (or as many as you have completed up to that number). This option lets you diagnose which of the 4 categories to concentrate more closely on next time. The program never lies to you about your progress or your lack of it. It does not court your approval, as many a teacher might. Nor do you have to worry about others knowing your mistakes. Many will find that they will sit at a lesson much longer merely under the compulsion to compete more effectively against their own private record. Note: the program gets you to help keep score. Some will consider this an annoyance, if not a "bug"; others an advantage. After you answer, the screen shows you the correct answer and asks "Correct? Y/N"--for each possible error. One key stroke sends you along. (The program never even shows the Y or N on the screen; nor does it require a carriage return.) Perhaps it would be nice for the computer to decide whether you were correct, but practically that would present more problems than efficiency now seems to warrant. For example, some will want to credit themselves as correct with a translation in which they have only one error in tone. Others will be stricter. Almost everyone will want the freedom to put tone markers over any letter in a syllable, not just over the letter arbitrarily chosen when the lesson was created. Spelling is not the object. Few Chinese people could read these phonetic transcriptions anyway. Their sole function is to point towards intonation and live performance. A Sample Slow Review Here follows a sample of the screens that would appear as one reviewed an a lesson slowly, prompted with English words--i.e., when one requests "6" on the teacher menu or "E" from the student menu. The double underlining here indicates a user's responses from the keyboard. (The file to which you wrote those missed last was: REV1). Type the name of the file which you would like to review. Note: the illustration here assumes that you have just reviewed another lesson. (If you have not, the sentence will appear without a file name where "REV1" appears here.) The program is reminding you that you wrote the items which you missed to a new file called "REV1" (or another specified file), in case you forgot). Often the file of misses is the file you want to review next. Type the name of the file which you would like to review. .cp 2 ? REV1 ==== Type the name of the file in which you would like to store the items that you miss: .cp 2 ? REV2 ==== .cp 7 Person / Chinese: yahn <> ======= \ yahn Note: the screen stops with the colon after "Chinese" until you enter your answer and hit a carriage return. Then the screen shows you the correct answer and asks Regarding the Word? .cp 2 Correct? Y/N = Here you confirm with one key that you got it right or wrong, as with next question, where you missed one: Regarding the Tone? Correct? Y/N Measure: .cp 4 go == go .cp 5 RE measure: Correct? Y/N = Translate: These people are tired. .cp 3 - - \ / Nidi yahn hou guih.<> =================== .cp 2 - - \ / Nidi yahn hou guih. RE translation: .cp 2 Correct? Y/N = Because you acknowledged one one mistake, with tone the first time, the program will save this entire item into your new file of misses (here you named it "REV2"), so that you can review the entire entry again. The program will continue in the same fashion with the next word, the next.... The program will inform you when you have finished and will review your score. (Here we will assume that only this one item was in the file.): .cp 7 You have completed your review of: REV1 Summary 1 = Records in the file 1 = Records actually reviewed 100 = Percentage of records reviewed ------------------------------------- 75 = Overall score ************** 1 = Records with at least one error 100 = % of total Words missed: 0 or 0 % Measure missed: 0 or 0 % of tested Tone missed: 1 or 100 % Sentences missed: 0 or 0 % You earned only the 75% because you missed one of the four things tested for this item. If you had reviewed a longer lesson, these counts would be much more useful, as you would lose track of your score. Often that score keeps you informed well enough before you dive into the misses for another try. Sometimes, however, you want to back off for a fuller diagnosis as the program prompts: .cp 2 Do you want a fuller review? Y/N = Had you said "N," you would have the choice of immediately going to the file of mistakes or of returning to the Main Menu for full options. The full review follows. The statistics here will vary from your own scores. Always the program reports the scores for the most recent lesson first and then the score for 10 most lessons, whether or not the user has asked to review those scores each time. .cp 7 Regarding Words Not Recognized -------------------------------------------- File: Percentage REV1 0 REV2 0 REV1 0 LESSON1 1 REV2 0 REV1 17 REV2 17 REV1 40 REV2 70 REV1 80 LESSON14 95 Hit any key to review next category. Enter: Notice: The user here has recently reviewed two lessons, the current one, L1, (which has only 1 item in it, remember) and L14. Notice how the user improved the score each time with L14 until finally the user had no errors, at least no errors in word recognition. When the user hits any key, the program continues to review the score in like fashion for the other three categories monitored: Regarding Tones Missed Regarding Measure Missed Regarding Translations With Mistakes If for one particular review, one of these categories did not apply, the program specifies "N/A"--as when one reviewed a lesson prompted with Chinese and therefore did not test knowledge of tone. .cp 7 The full review concludes with a composite score: Enter: Here is a review of your overall scores on the recent lessons: Lesson Size Score REV1 1 75 REV2 1 50 REV1 1 25 LESSON1 1 0 REV2 4 100 REV1 7 91 REV2 12 77 REV1 20 77 REV2 24 56 REV1 25 44 LESSON14 30 10 Here the user sees the progress, especially with the full LESSON14, which got smaller and smaller in the reviews of temporary files (here REV1 and REV2). The student still needs to review the full LESSON14 again to see whether these reviews have fixed the full list more permanently in mind. These scores show that the user has chosen to progress only with those most recently missed and needs to test real memory or all of LESSON14, especially of those items recognized once but not reviewed recently. The full score concludes with a reminder: Remember that you have stored all those with any errors in the new file called REV2 Hit any key to list them quickly. \ If the user hits a key, the screen shows the Chinese and English for yahn, since that is the item which the user had missed. Then the user must choose: 1 = Review this new file more slowly again saving those missed. 2 = Return to the main menu. .cp 5 Translation Skills Both menus review any example sentences stored with lessons. Often lessons omit this feature. The program allows teachers to create lessons of either kind. On the teacher menu, options 5 and 7 review only those items in lessons which include illustrative sentences. These options by-pass many of the fundamental questions about individual words. Most will not want to use them except for specialized instruction. Nevertheless, CANTONES most effectively uses translation as an adjuncts to building vocabulary one word at a time. Options 5 and 7 will not really prove very useful, because of two special problems, though a few users may want the freedom to do so. The problems: The program writes any item ("record" is the official term) into one record line, maximally 254 characters long (including spaces, accents...every jot and tittle). After you have entered a word in Cantonese, then in English, then its measure, and its part of speech, typically you have room for maybe one line (80-columns) of sentence and one more line of translation. That is not much room for elaborate translation exercises. Besides, complicated translations do not make good use of the computer screen: a user's answers are too hard to match with stored answers when the eye must take in more than 2 lines at a time. Remember that the program will assume that you have ended entry for the entire lesson unless you enter more than a space or carriage return for the first prompt, the one that asks for a word in Chinese. Even if you user want to use only sentences, you person will still need to enter something, however meaningless, when prompted for the Chinese word. You can circumvent this problem by entering the same null character every time, such as "."-- but will not be able to ask for a quick review of the lesson, as it would list only a screen of dots. .cp 5 Specialized Reviews: Toggle for Parts of Speech A toggle works by hitting the specified key (here "8") to change its condition. It alternates ON or OFF. If ON, this toggle does focus merely on the one part of speech which it later prompts you to specify. The condition when one load the program is stated on the main menu: 8 = Toggle to review by parts of speech (OFF) Users may choose to review words of just one class by first hitting "8." The screen will then show that the toggle is ON. This option when on allows the user to specify any one class of words to review within a lesson, either of a class which the user has chosen and remembered when entering the words, or of a class which the screen prompted for at entry time: a = adverb p = particle at = attributive pat = patterns av = auxiliary verb ph = phrase bf = boundform pn = pronoun cv = coverb pv = postverb ev = equative verb pw = placeword fv = functive verb q = question i = interjection rv = resultative verb ie = idiomatic expression rve = resultative ending m = measure sp = specifier ma = movable adverb sv = stative verb n = noun vo = verb-object comp. nu = number tw = time word on = onomatopoeia x = other useful expressions If a person has problems with words in any one of these classes, this option allows the user to focus. V. Creating New Files by Word Class This section does not apply to those who use the student menu. It serves mainly those who prepare the lessons. With a little imagination, the user can exploit the toggle to generate specialized lessons of great variety. Thereby the toggle can serve very effectively to help one design additional instruction. Suppose, for example that after 10 lessons or so a user wants to review all time words. One can enter each lesson one at a time an toggle to review on the "tw" That method is easy enough--all that most users will need. But suppose that a teacher or learner wants to create a new, permanent file which contains all and only time words. Doing so is fairly easy: 1) Toggle "8" to ON. 2) Specify the class (here, tw) when prompted to do so 3) Specify the file to collect "mistakes" with a name that reflects your design, e.g., LESSONTW.3 -- to contain all time words from LESSON3. 4) "Miss" (i.e., say "N" when asked "CORRECT? Y/N" for at least one of the scores kept on each item. (You can then hit carriage return for all other answers to speed the "review") 5) Repeat steps 2-4 for each lesson from which you want to cull the time words, writing "mistakes" always to different files with the same name, but a different extension, in LESSONTW.1, LESSONTW.2.... 6) After you have culled time words from all files that you wanted to review, then at the dos prompt, type COPY LESSONTW.* LESSONTW.ALL LESSONTW.ALL will contain all of your gleanings. These steps run very quickly and give you a huge freedom in building specialized word lists. Note that nothing prevents you from using other letters to designate word categories, so long as you do so when you enter the words initially into your word lists. .cp 5 A Tip On Alphabetizing Most word lists don't really need to be in alphabetical order, but that order helps for lists from which one frequently wants to isolate specific examples, as in special review lists, small dictionary-making, etc. Users can quickly sort any file which CANTONES creates. All versions of MS-DOS come with a file called SORT.EXE. Enter the following sequence at the DOS command line: SORT <FILETOBESORTED >NEWFILE Be sure to end the line with a carriage return. Also be sure to type the "<" and ">" precisely as shown, with no spaces between the character and the file name. Add drive designators for any files not on the same drive with SORT.EXE. Then inspect NEWFILE (or whatever name you specified) to confirm that it is alphabetized. Usually you will then enter the sequence: ERASE FILETOBESORTED REN NEWFILE FILETOBESORTED --supplying your own names for the files. VI. Printing Files CANAUX allows you to print files. The print facility is especially convenient if you have several words which you have not mastered when you have to end a session at the keyboard and want a paper copy of the words that you still do not know. It is also useful when teachers want to prepare word lists. Installing Your Printer Before you can print, however, you must Install the program to recognize the codes of your own printer. You install this feature from CANAUX, accessible as an option from the teacher menu. Install will ask you to give in decimals the codes your printer uses for superscript on, for superscript off, and for backspacing. You can find those in the manual for your own printer. For example, manuals for my two printers specify: Juki 6100 Epson MX-80 Superscript on 27 68 27 83 0 Superscript off 27 85 27 72 Backspacing 8 8 Some may want to run install more than one printer. That is easy to do if they make separate copies of the program, labeling their disks to reflect how the PARA file on each is installed. Then, to shift printers, choose the disk that the right printer in the PARA file. You may review the contents of PARA (or of any such file that you have renamed, if at the DOS prompt you enter TYPE PARA <>. It also stores the code for the default menu, your name and the name of your printer. Option 9 and option "/" ask you to specify: Be sure that the printer is ONLINE and paper at the first line. What file would you like to print? ? Then the text appears . Users may also view their lesson files directly by using the non- document mode of their word-processors, but should do so very cautiously. Any alterations in the "comma separated variables" could make that file inaccessible to the computer. These files are not very intelligible, as the accent marks appear next to rather than above the appropriate letters. CANTONES reads these files and reports them in the formats described earlier. MergePrinting A sample MailMerge file (MERGETST.DOC) is included with the program for users familiar with WordStar. It shows how users can MergePrint data from the Lesson files. Users can modify this model for other formats, as to print flash cards, vocabulary tests, etc. This method makes print options much more available, as each user will already have installed the proper print codes for his or her version of WordStar. MERGETST.DOC prints the accents (\ / or -) to the right of the letter. If you want the accents over the letters, you can make a second copy of the lesson and use WordStar to add the codes for backspacing and superscripting for each of the three accents used. The procedure looks long, but actually works very quickly: 1. copy LESSONEX (or any other lesson you create) into a file of another name. 2. Let the new name replace the file named after .df in MERGETST.DOC. Better, make a copy of MERGETST.DOC and change the file name after .df to that of your lesson file altered to overprint the accents. 3. Enter the new copy of the lesson via WordStar. 4. Type ^QA 5. When prompted for string, enter \ 6. When prompted for replacement, enter ^PH^PT\^PT 7. When prompted for options, enter NG<ESC><ESC> 8. Type ^QA 9. When prompted for string, enter / 10. When prompted for replacement, enter ^PH^PT/^PT 11. When prompted for options, enter NG<ESC><ESC> 12. Type ^QA 13. When prompted for string, enter - 14. When prompted for replacement, enter ^PH^PT-^PT 15. When prompted for options, enter NG<ESC><ESC> 16. Save the revised file 17. MergePrint either MERGETST.DOC (altered as in Step 2) or from a copy of MERGETST.DOC renamed after you have altered it. English-Chinese Lists Files will be sorted alphabetically only in Chinese, since the first word in any entry is the Chinese word. However, the auxiliary menu allows you to re-organize any of these files into English-word- first. Access the auxiliary menu by typing "A" from the teacher menu or by typing AUXCAN at the MS-DOS prompt. Then choose option 2 from the auxiliary menu: 2 = Reorganize a file, to put English words first After the program creates the new file, it lets you choose to leave to MS- DOS so that you can sort the new file, as described above. When you have done so, rerun CANAUX and specify option 4 to print your new file: 4 = Print a regorganized file (English words first) SORT.EXE can handle any files up to 85K, far more space than most word lists will require. Any longer files can be sorted by parts and recombined with your word-processor in the non-document mode. Back Up Your Files ALWAYS WORK FROM BACKED-UP COPIES, both with program files and with lessons that you create! You can create a batch file to backup lessons after each new creation. For example, if you use the convention of naming all lesson files with LESSON as the first six characters, the following command line from drive B: (with your lessons) will copy your files from to a backup disk in Drive A: COPY LESSON?? A: If you don't want to bother with such a command, type it once into a file called daily.bat. Store daily.bat on your disk wit the lessons, and then simply type DAILY when you are ready to back up. .cp 5 VII. Ending a Session Always end a session in an orderly fashion: type "0" when at the Main Menu. You will return to the DOS prompt from which you began the program. Any other option on the Main Men will return you to the Main Menu when you have completed the task. In this way you will help to assure that your files will remain in tact. .cp 4 VIII. Improving This Program: A Note from the Author I am not a professional computer programmer. I am a writer who teaches Chinese people to write in English. I began this project strictly to help me prepare as I began to study Cantonese. First I wrote a version using MailMerge (see Hong Kong Computer Journal, February 1985). Then I wrote it in BASIC and continued to embellish it, especially to add the scoring feature that made me study more aggressively. Finally, I compiled it. I began on a CP/M machine, and only recently rewrote the program to run on my IBM clone. CANTONES does a job that no other program now does. I avoided silly games, I hope. For example, the computer does not ask for your name and then say, "Mary, got got that one right, didn't you? Congratulations." Computers are not people, and I believe that people should learn from them without fiction. We never had that problem with flash cards, but some programmers treat the computer like a modern prayer wheel. CANTONES never tires as it drills me. I don't want to wear out my teacher or my friends. I hope that my program will help them learn to speak Cantonese. I also hope that some other programmers will help to make the program better. I am now adapting the program to teaching English vocabulary to students of English. The program tests students' mastery of new vocabulary in most of their readings for our literature assignments. I hope that publishers of anthologies will soon provide much more sophisticated versions for the literature of all languages. I want be the among the first to use a program that will let me review Faulkner's or Proust's vocabulary after a chapter has just moved me. I will glady supply the source code for programmers who want to modify CANTONES for other kinds of language instruction. Send US$ 15 to cover my costs in copying and mailing. I hope soon to make available versions of still other programs which I have written for myself, which may also help others. Write me if you want more details: STYLE A Program which profiles syntax CHINGLISH A Program which detects hundreds of forms of English which beset Chinese learners of English and prompts for revision. MUSES A Program which manages a writer's circulation data and related correspondence with publishers. (See Ratner's review in CODA, publication of Poets & Writers, Inc., Summer, 1986) APPLY A Program which manages data for applications--as for jobs, grants, etc. F Keeps up with all expenses and income, sorted into 55 categories, and posts periodic totals to an eXecute files for use in SuperCalc (see preliminary report in Portable Companion, 1985). Computer users are reviving "community" in substantive ways which too many academic settings long ago abandoned. A few computer people still bark at a corner to protect their narrowness, but more and more are abandoning territoriality. That is what "free-ware" is all about--another tradition, that of hospitality, of kindness to the stranger within our gates--as old as Buddah, Beowulf, Ulysses, or Abraham. Please share reactions as you use this material. I hope that CANTONES contributes modestly as you work to learn a language which will access the rich resources of friendship and culture which Cantonese opens. .cp 2 / \ Hou teng indeed! Louie Crew, a.k.a. Li Min Hua .pa