Chinese Input Methods...?

[hooliganj]

Probably because we want to differentiate between our English and the Queen's English.

[Sokar]

Because we are lazy bastards

[Oneesama]

I myself, have winxp. it is rather easy for me to set up the settings

hm~ one more option to solve your problem, i believe if you install this program, will be able to type either simplify/traditional

www.njstar.com

if you need help in working with that, you can pm me ^__^ i used to use that program alot~

[rcxAsh]

Thanks for the info Oneesama. That program looks interesting. May check that out for fun later. (Especially since one of them comes with some Chinese fonts?)

BTW, so how are you set up in Windows XP? What IME do you use?

[haunterex]

Originally Posted by ramune

Off topic but I just want to say that unless you are REALLY planning to go to mainland China, learning simplified Chinese is completely useless. Most, if not all, Chinese people overseas use traditional, heck even Taiwanese people use it. You will find youself not knowing how to read a lot of traditonal if you only know simplified.

One thing I hate about the Chinese government is how they butchered the Chinese characters that took our ancestors several thousands of years to develope. Yes I know traditonal Chinese is hard to learn, but so what? That's how our language is supposed to be. You can't just be like "oh, our language is too hard, let's make it simpler." Man I can't imagine the day where simplified Chinese becomes standard worldwide...

i totally DISAGREE with you about the popularity of simplified chinese.
If you plan to go to mainland china, simplified chinese is ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY, since it's official there.
Aboute most people from oversea learn traditional, it's because those immigrants in the 90s were mainly from Hong Kong and Taiwan, which still keep the traditional character system.
But unless taiwan takes over china (not bloody liking), traditional chinese WILL NOT spread.
Even in hong kong, simplified chinese is slowly taking over in its society.
So to conclude, if you get to choose which type to learn, learn simplified chinese, unless you already know traditional chinese.

About the butchering comment, it's not because it's harder to learn, it's because during the beginning of the communist era, the government wanted to get rid of its monarchy past, and it wanted to draw a distinctive difference between its new communist ideals/society with the nationist's ideals/society, who had fled to taiwan after ww2.

personally, traditional looks more elegant and more pretty to me, and it's more comfortable for me since i grew up learning tran. chn.
But in reality, people need to adapt to simplified chinese because that's the only form of chinese writing that will survive assuming nothing happens to communist china anytime soon.