Chinese Input Methods For iPhone 2.0
August 10th, 2008
You’ve got the following options:
1. Apple
No additional installations, just several clicks on the Settings. But it’s very basic, i mean, in both features and Chinese character dictionary. No surprise at all, after you play it around for a while.
Use only when you’ve got no choice 
2.iCosta 1.2.3(in Chinese)
My choice now. Very stable, as good as it used to be before 2.0,from 1.0.x to 1.1.4.
Easy installation through Cydia is first to install their source from Sections->Repository(freecoder.org) then install your favorite IME from Sections->Localization.
3.WeFit iPhone 2.0(Chinese)
Still in very early development phase,but there’s already a release in Cydia. I Haven’t tried it yet. But i did use the old WeFit iPhone 1.1.x before when i was in 1.1.x. Works like a charm. If I’m right, WeFit iPhone 1.1.x is the first Chinese IME by which you can input character phase, other than character one by one. I may give the 2.0 version a try later when it’s out of beta.
If you are brave enough and can’t wait for a more mature release, you can get it from Sections->[WeiPhone] after enabling WeiPhone source from Sections->Repository.
4.iAcces(Chinese)
Initiated from the same dev group in HongKong who creates the previouse iphone 1.1.x IME NativeCN, now it has a brand new name and lots of cool features.
Very promising. I’m looking forward to its release. The only problem for now is you have to wait 
Google Reader: GWT is back!!
August 6th, 2008
My request(actually ‘our’ request) is fulfilled by Google now. That’s really COOL!
I’ve tried Readerburner iphone version before, when GWT is not allowed. It works fine, the only limitation i think is that i can’t import all my own feeds there.
Now i’ll swich back to Google Reader, and keep readerburner bookmarked as well.
UCWEB: A Wap Browser for iPhone
July 5th, 2008
I’ve been waiting for an iphone edition WAP browser for a long time. Today i just happened to get it: UCWEB.
Of course it can do a lot of things, Nek has made a good summery for us here. Quote part here:
1. WEB and WML webpage browsing
2. WiFi, CMWAP(only in China), CMNET access
3. bookmarks
4. upload and download files
5. search
6. address
7….
For me, the most wonderfully thing is exactly what it’s designed to be: browsing wap sites on the iphone. I myself actually use Google Reader on Safari for the daily news, and Safari does work fine for me most of time, but in the worktime, i do need to visit some wap sites a little. That’s always been my headache when coming to it.
Now it’s come to the end,finally. Cheers
BTW, the source for UCWEB iphone edition is http://wap.ucweb.com/iphone/UCWEB.plist. And its offcial forum is here(in Chinese)
iChinese: Help You To Learn Chinese On iPhone
May 2nd, 2008
I should say I’m very impressive on this native iphone teaching app iChinese, after some playing around. Why? because it has an easy-to-use UI, a very practical and considerable customization setting and finally a really good and robust implementation.
Now i wanna give you a close look step by step.
1.Installation
Add the developer’s site http://ichinese.de/repo to Installer’s source, then find and install iChinese from the Learning category. The most recent version is v1.0.2.
Now that the author has also submitted the app to ModMyiPhone source, you can also install it without adding the source manually. So does Cydia. Only one thing: now it’s v1.0.1, not v1.0.2.
I suggest you add the author’s site to your installer since that will get you the latest version.
Launch iChinese and you will enter the main interface as below (picture from iChinese official site).
2.Preparation
Before you start learning by clicking the button Learn with Trainer or Learn On Your Own on the main menu, you need first download the Chinese-English Dictionary(Demo), related Chinese Characters(Demo) and Lesson 1(to 4, if you want. I choose 1 to 2) from the Library interface. Here’s what you should get so far.
3.Learning
Ok, now let’s start. Click Learn With Trainer from the main interface to enter the Trainer, do as the pop-up says(picture left below), and see what your score is(right below). right, you are on your way now.
You may noticed that i’ve add 3 circles on the screenshots ablove. Reason? well, that’s why i say this app has a VERY PRACTICAL and CONSIDERATE customization setting here. ‘Coz all that can be set by yourself in the following Settings interface.
Don’t forget to tap the three balls one by one to check out what each exactly means to your training and scoring.
Well, the values shown in the picture has been changed by me. You decide yours. Basically by adjusting these values, you can decide how your training lessons will go and how hard the testing could be.
Talking about of this customization, I hope the author can put a Reset button here, by which i can restore all values to the default, esp. after all has been massed up before i completely understand the meaning of each. It would help a lot, i believe.
BTW, one more thing should be mentioned here: when you are asked to write Chinese characters, just write exactly stroke by stroke, in the right order. Never try to connect two or more strokes together or you will get a message saying ‘wrong number of strokes in character 1‘.
This is definitely good to the beginners. They need do good in the very beginning. And writing in the right stroke order is very very important in learning Chinese characters.
However, it sometimes may be frustrating, like in the following Lookup function, when I wanna find out what an unknown character really means.
But, perhaps, this kinda of use may beyond what iChinese is supposed to do. Well, fyi here
4.Lookup
Here you can find out the meaning of a Chinese character by stroke-writing , PinYin-input and English letter. Very easy to use, no more explanation needed, UI says all.
Last but not least, iChinese is a commercial software. The lessons and demo dictionaries are free, but if you wanna get more lessons and dictionaries, you have to pay for them. Details on the official site.
So, all in all, learning Chinese is not an easy task. But if you really wanna do it, a tool like iChinese would help a lot, esp. in the beginning phase.
For the author, if iChinese wanna meet well the need of those people who already learned a lot and will take iChinese more as an Chinese lookup dictionary than an learning application, you have to improve the hand-writing recognition part.
I’m just imagining an iChinese with a HWPen-similar input 
First Handwriting IME for iPhone Released
April 17th, 2008
Yes, the long-waited handwriting IME for iphone has been released. Source is here by ModMyifone.com.
I haven’t tried myself yet, but can’t wait to let you guys know it right now. Here’s the screenshot from MMI:
Even though it’s designed for chinese input specifically, it supports Latin alphabet input as well. Here’s how to intall:
add iphonecake.com/src/all to the Installer’s source list and then install ‘HWPen‘.
Last but not least, it’s still in beta, so as the one said, backup your /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.SpringBoard.plist, just in case…
Don forget to show your appreciation to the author mars1907, if you, by any chance, can be able to see him
Use Books.app As A MMS Reader
March 23rd, 2008
Before SwirlyMMS offcially starts supporting MMS reading function, now you can take use of the Books.app as the a temp MMS reader. And here’s the how-to:
1.install both Books.app and SwirlyMMS from Installer.
Make sure both work well. You’d better download at least one book and one piece of MMS to check if they can func as expected. If you can’t, then you have to manually create the regarding folders.
2.enter command line by either Term-v100 on your iphone or Putty on your compute. You know how to do it, do you?
3.run the following command one by one(case sensitive):
cd /var/root/Media/EBooks
ln -s /var/mobile/Media/MMSFiles MMS
4.done.
So, now you can see basically the whole point is to fool the Books.app by a fake ‘book link’ which actually is where the MMS files are saved. One of the good thing is, now i can read Chinese MMS while i can’t in MobileText.app. Also, i can delete the obsolete MMS files easily by the Books.app’s Delete function.
So, SwirlyMMS.app + Books.app = A Full MMS.app, not bad, huh
Source: 关于SwirlyMMS的使用问题的分析–先谈乱码的解决 【原创】
On Fully Functional 1.1.4 Now
March 9th, 2008
The reason i decided to update my iphone is as below:
1. the unlock works for sure.
2. the newly updated iCosta 1.1.0 supports 1.1.4 now.
3. of course 1.1.4 has some improvements as well. Personally what i’m interested is the one about cell signal.
And here’s the steps i did. In all, pretty easy and smooth.
1.Use iTunes to sync your iphone and make sure everything backuped. Then Shift+Restore to 1.1.4.
2.Download iPlus 1.2 and International Pack. Credit goes to aviegas.
3.Unzip the iPlus1.2.zip to your local harddisk, say c:\iplus1.2. Rename the existed payload.zip to payload-zip.bak. Then copy the downloaded payload_international.zip to c:\iplus1.2 and rename it as payload.zip.
4. Go to c:/iplus1.2 under command line and then run iplus -u. After couple of reboot and boom, the iphone has been activated, jailbroken and unlocked!!
5. Launch iTunes and restore back all of your original settings. and you are done!!
So for now I’m on 1.1.4 now, both firmware and baseband. And i checked youtube, google maps and Settings as well. All works fine. Last but least, i saw the cell signal. So, are you gonna stay where you are or go to 1.1.4 next?
Receive MMS In Beijing By SwirlyMMS
March 2nd, 2008
Finally SwirlyMMS comes to the long-expected version 0.3, where MMS receiving is supposed to be done.
It’s said the new version should be available on Installer in 24 hrs. For people waiting it for such a long time like me, just can’t wait any more. So here’s how it works on my 1.1.3 iphone(soft-upgraded, i.e. 1.1.2 BB):
1.Uninstall the previous v0.2 and restart iphone(restart may not be necessary, but anyway, that’s what i did);
2.Add http://swirlyspace.com/SwirlySpace.xml into Installer’s source and refresh. You should see a new category called ‘SwirlySpace’ (If you can get the new version in your installer by update checking, then it’s not necessary to add this new source);
3.Enter this category and install it. At this moment it’s 0.3.1_1;
4.Power off and on iphone and launch SwirlyMMS(slide to the red bar and power off. Yes, that’s what the author says);
5.Config the settings like this( i’m a Chinese Mobile GoTone subscriber here in Beijing. Guess it should apply to those who also use China Mobile service and have a data package as well):
MMSC: mmsc.monternet.com
Proxy: 10.0.0.172
APN: cmwap
Username: cmwap (actually this was set by the app itself, according to the APN you’ve given)
6. Now you can try sending and receiving MMS now. Below is my testing result. In short, it WORKS!!
If SwirlyMMS says something like ‘EDGE is unvaible’ when you try to fetch MMS, just turn off your WiFi and try again. Don forget to give it couple of minutes. That’s my case, at least.
Only one little bug: the picture I received sizes 400×300 while it’s set as 300×400 in SwirlyMMS. I may try more and confirm this.
Anyway it works. and that’s the most important thing, isn’t it?
Update(Mar.3,2008): No luck on the most latest v0.3.2 any more. It keeps telling me that EDGE/GPRS is unavailable, which,actually, is not true for sure in my testing
Update(Mar.5,2008): v0.3.3 works like a charm now!!
Comment Email Responder and iWPhone
February 17th, 2008
If you are looking for an WP plugin by which your reply to the comment on your blog will be automatically sent to the comment owner, you know, to keep you and your valuable reader connected, then Comment Email Responder is just for you.
Another is iWPhone, by which your wordpress blog will be more iphone-friendly. Here’s what my blog looks like. Nice, eh? Can’t wait to get it? ok, visit here for downloading and installation instructions.
Both free plugins work pretty well in my blog. I love them so much. And very appreciate the authors’ good work and love to give them a 
.
Huge iPhone Unlock Progress Achieved
February 13th, 2008
First, BL 4.6 + BB 04.02.13_G is done by the young well-known iphone-unlocking genius George Hotz(a.k.a GeoHot). Here’s his announcement on his blog. What does this means? Well, it means anyone who plans to use iphone on any unofficial carrier network can go to get an iphone without any hesitation for now. For OTB or upgraded 1.1.2 or 1.1.3, try Ziphone . For others, use google.
Second, one of FF 1.1.3’s exploits founded by Dev Team. So what does this mean, again? It means 1.1.3 has been jailbroken. It means you can try the newly-added features in the latest firmware yourself. Without this, you will never ever get Ziphone.
Last but not least, BL 4.6 downgraded to BL 3.9. Done by GeoHot, Again. I know your question. And here’s my understandings. Tutorial here by aCujo.
Basically, it means you can make your 1.1.3 OTB iphone fully functional(hopefully) while staying at the up-to-date 04.03 BB.
Besides, if GeoHot continues his awesome job, a customized BL would be possible. That means, most likely, the hacking community will take a big step advance in the cat-and-mouse battle against Apple. For the iphone owners like me, we will benefit so much from that. Say no worry of no available unlock method at all when we do the upgrade in iTunes
