“Pīnyīn Was Plan A” Now Available as an Article on 3lines.org

The article “Pīnyīn Was Plan A” is now available to be read on 3lines.org. This is a revised version of the tiandi.info post of the same name. Here is the link:

“Pīnyīn Was Plan A”

(The login information required is the same as for anywhere else on 3lines.org.)

(If you’re already on the 3lines.org site, you can find this article in the folder Misc ▶ Articles.)

The subject of Pīnyīn and the Chinese characters may be one of the most important subjects I have ever written about, since it deals with facing the most difficult fundamental aspect of the Mandarin language, the language that is the very reason that the Mandarin field exists. This article contains much of the fruitage of months of research and analysis regarding this subject, and I highly recommend that anyone in or interested in the Mandarin field read it. Please feel free to pass on the information about this article to any Witness you know who fits that description. (Many of the principles discussed in this article apply to the Cantonese field as well, which is evidently consolidating on the Sidney Lau system as the romanization system of choice.)

Jeremiah Bk. XLP-iPhone-A5 Size LN-A 3-Line Material for Ch. 13 Posted

3-line XLP-iPhone-A5 size files for Chapter 13 of the Jeremiah book are now available for download from the Jeremiah Book (3-Line, XLP-iPhone-A5, LN-A) page. The files have LN-A (LinkNav and annotation (notes & highlighting)) support, and they are available in Pinyin+Simp. Chinese and Sidney Lau+Trad. Chinese versions.

To help explain how the XLP-iPhone-A5 files may work well on a variety of mobile devices, the following paragraphs are included on the Jeremiah Book (3-Line, XLP-iPhone-A5, LN-A) page:

While the regular files use letter size as the paper size, these files named with “XLP-iPhone-A5” use A5 as the paper size, and are especially suited for use on devices such as the iPhone, the iPod touch, and other devices with similarly sized screens, such as Android phones. (See the 3-Line Material on the iPhone and the iPod touch page for instructions on how to use these files on an iPhone or an iPod touch.)

The XLP-iPhone-A5 files should also be a good fit on 6" (15.2 cm) screen Kindles and other similarly sized devices, as well as on tablets with 7" (17.8 cm) screens, as long as these devices have PDF support. (Note that landscape orientation may work best, as explained on the 3-Line Material on the iPhone and the iPod touch page.) Some may prefer to use these files on larger mobile devices like the Kindle DX or the iPad as well. (See the 3-Line Material on the iPad page for instructions on how to use these files on an iPad.)

Also, instructions are included re how to download the files on an iPhone or an iPod touch using GoodReader for iPhone, and how to download the files on an iPad using GoodReader for iPad.

The relevant folders at the 3lines.org site contain an HTML file (web page) with a link to the Jeremiah Book (3-Line, XLP-iPhone-A5, LN-A) page.

Related links:

• 3-Line Material on the iPhone and the iPod touch


• 3-Line Material on the iPad


• Printing Extra Large Print 3-Line Material


• PDF Link Navigation


• PDF Annotation (Notes & Highlighting)

Good News Brochure Pīnyīn Web Material For All of Lesson 4 Added

Good News brochure Pīnyīn web material covering up to the end of Lesson 4 has been added to:

• Good News Brochure
   (Pīnyīn, Web, Scriptures)
• Good News Brochure
   (Pīnyīn, Web, Scriptures, Night Theme)
   (black background, gray text)
• (Short link: tiandi.info/fg)

Note that:

• For your convenience, a short link (tiandi.info/fg) is now available for the above resources. It also lists other Good News brochure resources.
• The full text in Pīnyīn of all the cited scriptures is included in the above resources.
• The above resources are mobile-friendly.
• Turning mobile devices to landscape orientation causes the text in the above resources to become large-print text.

Also, the introductions explain why it’s good to use Pīnyīn as a writing system on its own.

See the below post for an introduction to the above resources:

• New Resources: Good News Brochure (Pīnyīn, Web, Scriptures) Pages

New Resource: Jehovah’s Will Brochure (Pīnyīn, Scriptures EPUB) Page

The content of the Jehovah’s Will brochure Pīnyīn web pages is now available in EPUB format at this download page:

• Jehovah’s Will Brochure
   (Pīnyīn, Scriptures EPUB)
• (Short link: tiandi.info/jl)

Here is an excerpt from the download page re the advantages of the EPUB format:

Advantages of the EPUB Format

Being in EPUB format allows this material to benefit from the advantages of this format, including:

• Broad hardware and software support
• Easy enlarging and automatic reflowing of the text to accommodate displays of various shapes and sizes, including those of many mobile devices
• Offline use
  • Since EPUB files have been available from jw.org for a long time, many people in the Chinese field are now familiar with how to download EPUB files and use them offline.
• Annotation (notes, highlighting, etc.) support
  • EPUB files can be easily annotated by users in apps such as iBooks, which runs on the iPad, the iPhone, and the iPod touch, and which is also due to become available for the Mac soon. There are also apps that annotate EPUB files on Windows, Android, etc.
• Hyperlinking that is familiar and expected, and that thus will get used and benefitted from
  • Taking advantage of this, scripture references in the main text are links to the full text of the cited scriptures. There, links are provided for returning to the referring citations in the main text.
  • Hyperlinks are also provided for “teleporting” from the table of contents to the chapter headings and back.
  • As well, hyperlinks are provided for going to footnotes and for returning from them to the main text.
• Producibility with simpler, more accessible, more mobile tools
  • This Pīnyīn-only EPUB material, being less complex than 2-line and 3-line material, can be prepared more quickly and easily, with simpler, more accessible tools, even partly with an app running on a mobile device like an iPad, while still providing in a high-quality way the most important raison d’être (reason for being) of the 2-line and 3-line material.

EPUB annotation in iBooks

Watchtower Online Library (WOL) With Pīnyīn (Unofficial) Now Has Sidney Lau Romanization Options As Well

I guess I’ll call it this now:

• Watchtower Online Library (WOL) With Pīnyīn/Sidney Lau Romanization (Unofficial)

These are now the options re the added Pīnyīn/Cantonese Sidney Lau romanization (set by links at the bottom of the web page):

• Pinyin [Pīnyīn ruby text over Simplified or Traditional Chinese characters]
• Sidney Lau [Sidney Lau ruby text over Simplified or Traditional Chinese characters]
• PinOnly (click/tap on More first) [Pīnyīn text only]
• LauOnly (click/tap on More first) [Sidney Lau text only]

Note that the bottom of each page of this website warns that

“This page has been processed by an unofficial browsing tool. Chinese words have added phonetics that may contain mistakes.”

In other words, the added Pīnyīn/Sidney Lau romanization on this site is unofficial, and it has not been proofread. However, while official, or at least proofread, content is more ideal, it takes much time and effort to produce, and in its absence, there are sure to be many situations in which this site’s computer-generated content will be most helpful, and most definitely better than nothing, even if it is imperfect.

A nice additional feature is that hovering your mouse pointer over or clicking or tapping on an expression produces a message displaying that expression’s English meaning.

Update Posted re the www.chinesetools.net Situation

An update, dated 2013-07-06, has been added to this post:

WARNING: www.chinesetools.net Pages Have Been Hijacked by an Apostate Site

The update contains the following, modified from a quote about the Net:

“Jehovah’s Witnesses on the Net interpret apostasy as damage and route around it.”

Good News Brochure Pīnyīn-English Web Material Up to Lesson 2, Question 3 Added

Good News brochure Pīnyīn-English web material covering up to Lesson 2, Question 3 has been added to:

• Good News Brochure
   (Pīnyīn-English, Web, Scriptures)
   (proofread, mobile-friendly)
• Good News Brochure
   (Pīnyīn-English, Web, Scriptures, Night Theme)
   (proofread, mobile-friendly,
   black background, grey text)
• (Short link: tiandi.info/fg)

Note the following re the above resources:

• For your convenience, a short link is available for them.
• The full text in Pīnyīn-English of all the cited scriptures is included in them.
• They are mobile-friendly—they are quite legible and usable on everything from desktop PCs and Macs to iPads and other tablets to iPhones and other smartphones.
• The Recommended Browsers: sections in them contain information about how to get the best viewing experience.
• Besides being viewable online, they can also be downloaded and used offine. Of course, they can be printed out from your web browser as well. (More details are included in the introductions.)

Also, the introductions explain why it’s good to use Pīnyīn as a writing system on its own.

See the below post for an introduction to the above resources:

• New Resources: Good News Brochure (Pīnyīn-English, Web, Scriptures) Pages

Going forward, I plan to focus primarily on producing Pīnyīn and Pīnyīn-English web pages such as the above, because they offer various advantages both for myself and for users.

I am also working on eventually making available some EPUB files, which are relatively easy to produce from the Pīnyīn and Pīnyīn-English web pages. EPUB files can be easily downloaded and used offline, and they can also be annotated.