Kanji Draw Button

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First, thanks for listening to my previous requests.
It works great now, I will make an updated review  video soon.

1.
Can you also add a "search further" option that Aedict2.0 has?

2.
Also, can you think about a way to make it faster for me to actually start 
typing in/drawing kanji? In Aedict2.0 through the menue button on the phone you 
had the choice to start drawing your kanji much faster - due to being nearer to 
the natural thumb position.

Can you place some sort of "kanji-draw"-button somewhere easy, 1 click away? 
Now you need 2 clicks.
Tt is placed so far on the left, that it is hard to reach on bigger phones or 
tablets.

My suggestion: "kanji drawing search" process starting with 1 tipp on the phone 
menue button<-- that would be great. Really great!
Or give us the choice to place it where we want. like on the upper part of main 
screen. there is much space left. but then again it is too far away from my 
thumbs/finger to be easily accessible.
Drawing Kanji is the main thing I do, so I want it to be as assessible and easy 
to do as possible. I hope you agree. 
Do something with the menue buttons of the phone if possible.

Thanks for a great product.

Original issue reported on code.google.com by dezorian...@gmail.com on 22 Jun 2014 at 4:00

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3. 
When having drawn a kanji and you are about to start the next, I would suggest 
that you have the app "auto-clear" the last kanji you typed in. You always have 
to clear it, before starting to draw the next. Just a thought. Maybe there is 
some idea behind leaving the previous kanji in the drawing screen...if so, 
please tell me (:

Original comment by dezorian...@gmail.com on 22 Jun 2014 at 4:19

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Hi, thanks for your bug and for your time :)

1. I thought that the "search further" functionality is superseded by clicking 
on a kanji and then clicking the "DICT" tab - if not, please let me know what 
use-case are you missing.

2. Perhaps I can add a configuration option to select which activity will be 
started by the upper toolbar persistent icon. OR you can perhaps try 
https://code.google.com/p/aedict/wiki/FAQ#Q:_I_want_a_Home_shortcut_directly_to_
Kanjipad

3. The idea behind leaving the kanji uncleared is that if your kanji is not 
found, you can take some steps back and try to redraw a portion of a kanji. It 
is just a thought - perhaps this is not really a valid use-case; in that case, 
please let me know.

Original comment by martin.v...@gmail.com on 23 Jun 2014 at 6:35

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1. Also, I thought that in Aedict 2, there are too many menu items and the user 
gets lost in the menu labyrinth (several users were complaining about the 
labyrinthine UI). So I tried to decrease the number of menu items, perhaps at 
the cost of clicking two times to achieve the same result instead of one click. 
It is hard to balance this right - on desktop, pro users can use keyboard 
shortcuts; there is nothing like that in Android.

Original comment by martin.v...@gmail.com on 23 Jun 2014 at 6:39

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2. you can also activate the main menu by sliding your thumb from the left 
corner to the right corner, e.g. on main search screen - this can perhaps save 
you one click :). Note that this does not work in tabbed activities such as 
Notepad.

Original comment by martin.v...@gmail.com on 23 Jun 2014 at 12:06

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Well, I understand that I may have my own preferences when it comes to 
navigation.

1.
I appreciate the effort to make Aedict 3.0 simple&clean, that is totally fine.
But when I type or draw the kanji "gaku", I want to click "search further", so 
that this particular Kanji is placed in the general search box, so I can 
continue adding the next kanji to it. 
The next thing I noticed is that when I try to compensate for the "search 
further" option, and revert to just "copy to clipboard", then actually paste it 
in to the search box, and try to search for another kanji, which I then also 
"copy to clipboard". When I return to the search box my previous Kanji got 
deleted. That wasn't the case with Aedict2.0.

I don't understand what you mean by having the "DICT"-tab. It isn't replacing 
the "search further" advantages of combining your own kanji combinations, or am 
I mistaken here? :O Or do you mean the predictions of possible kanji 
combinations that are displayed and you just have to pick out the right one in 
mind? 
When I draw the "gaku"-kanji, it just gives me in the tab "DICT" some example 
sentences...nothing more.
So, let's further this example. Imagine me having uploaded another video to 
describe the problem accurately. 
So, I am looking at the Kanji "Gaku" now, I am clicking in the upper right 
corner "copy", I am given the choice to chose from 4 options, I click the first 
one, the kanji itself, of course, why would I chose anything else?, "copied to 
clipboard" it says. I press the phone's back button to return to main screen, 
paste in the "gaku" into the search bar. Then I search for another kanji, by 
drawing "sei". Click on it, copy it again, 4 options again, press first one, 
the kanji itself. Going back to mainscreen by pressing the phone's back button. 
Sadly the last Kanji "gaku" has disappeared...I won't ever be finding my 
"gakusei"...*sadpanda.jpg*

2.
But a mobile phone has its menue-button, I don't know if you mentioned that it 
cannot be done or not. The menue button now allows us to "clear recently 
viewed", an option that shouldn't be prominently placed on the fastest to reach 
location on the phone, I think. Put a Kanji-Pad fuction there. So there isn't 
any visible button that destroys the clean look of aedict 3.0.
It is indeed a nice touch, the sliding menue. But it doesn't eliminate the long 
way up the screen until I reach the kanji-draw button. Maybe a Kanji-Draw 
function in form of sliding from left to right or right to left, instead of 
opening the menue, it directly opens the kanji draw screen. :P that would be an 
alternative to the menue-button. both seem clean and efficient.
As I mentioned, this is just my personal opinion, I cannot speak for everyone 
of course. That's why I assume it could be a nice to have the option to alter 
the GUI individually. Like Firefox etc. placing toolbars up or down the screen.

3.
When I've finished drawing a particular kanji or have chosen one from the 
suggested kanji-tab, and chose the "+" tab, I do not need the succeeded kanji 
to be corrected and there there is no need for it to be still placed there. Am 
I correct, or am I missing something? :P 

Original comment by dezorian...@gmail.com on 23 Jun 2014 at 12:54

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2. The hardware menu button got killed in Android 4.4: 
http://www.androidbeat.com/2013/12/google-kills-hardware-menu-button-android-4-4
-kitkat/

Also here: http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/ui/index.html

In Android 4.x, the hardware menu button simply opens the activity overflow 
menu (the upper-right ellipsis icon, only visible on phones with no hardware 
menu button). The upper-right navigation menu is not assigned any hardware 
button in Android 4.x. I could add the Kanji-Draw function to the activity 
menu, but this 1. duplicates the navigation item, which may get confusing, and 
2. does not really belong to the activity menu as the Kanji-Draw activity is an 
independent functionality from the main activity. Also, other users may then 
ask to add skip search, part search, notepad, etc to the overflow menu, and 
that would be indeed very confusing because it would duplicate navigation menu 
and it would look weird on tablets with no overflow. We have to accept that app 
navigation via hardware menu button is no more - it has been killed by Google.

This of course makes the menu button nearly useless on your phone. Perhaps I 
can add an "expert" setting which duplicates the navigation menu to the 
activity menu? But first, please consider this option: 
https://code.google.com/p/aedict/wiki/FAQ#Q:_I_want_a_Home_shortcut_directly_to_
Kanjipad

Original comment by martin.v...@gmail.com on 24 Jun 2014 at 12:13

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3. so what you propose is this: you draw a kanji, press the + button. The kanji 
is still displayed but when you touch the kanji draw canvas, the old kanji 
disappears - is this correct? If not, please let me know when exactly do you 
wish the kanji to disappear :)

Original comment by martin.v...@gmail.com on 24 Jun 2014 at 12:18

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Hey, I will do another video tomorrow, just to clear things up. I have some 
other things to add either way (: Like I am trying to type in 3 kanji and not 
one is recognized by the program. Even though I carefully rewrote them 
according to the drawing instruction screen in aedict.

But more about that later on.

Original comment by dezorian...@gmail.com on 26 Jun 2014 at 12:58

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In the meantime try to draw the kanji for sekai, saisho or tochigi. Can you do 
it...?

Original comment by dezorian...@gmail.com on 26 Jun 2014 at 1:56

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Update: I cannot draw any kanji anymore. Results are messed up. I wonder whats 
going on. Again, I will show it to you in a day or 2.

Original comment by dezorian...@gmail.com on 26 Jun 2014 at 3:00

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Correction: I actually am able to draw kanji, but the results are just wrong.

Original comment by dezorian...@gmail.com on 26 Jun 2014 at 3:01

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I know, the recognition algorithm is pretty bad. There is one which is better, 
but is GPLed and I cannot use it. Please read further at: 
http://code.google.com/p/aedict/wiki/FAQ#Q:_Kanjipad_does_not_recognize_kanjis_w
ell

Original comment by martin.v...@gmail.com on 30 Jun 2014 at 9:43

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I do not know how to implement better recognition algorithm: this needs image 
processing knowledge and a lot of time, and I lack both :) Sorry.

Original comment by martin.v...@gmail.com on 30 Jun 2014 at 9:44

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Regarding 1:
Perhaps you can use the Kanji Scratchpad as a replacement for the "Search 
Further" functionality? Just add all kanjis found to the Scratchpad (or the 
Quick Scratchpad in case of kanji drawing) and then click the "Search" icon 
next to the Scratchpad - it should add words containing given kanjis only.

To work around omnisearch box clearing: please open the Configuration and find 
the setting "Prefill Omnibox" and try various options. If none of the option 
works for you, please let me know - I will add a new option which disables 
omnisearch box pre-filling entirely, so that the omnibox is not "cleared" 
(filled with content as configured in the Configuration).

Original comment by martin.v...@gmail.com on 2 Jul 2014 at 1:14

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Regarding omnisearch clearing: Omnisearch pre-fill can now be disabled.

Original comment by martin.v...@gmail.com on 4 Jul 2014 at 11:52

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Sorry about the answering delay.
I canot work with Aedict anymore. Not one Kanji is recognized anymore. What 
happened?
Kanjipad is working fine, but is totally useless because you cannot work the 
same way like with the internal. 

I had years of perfect experience with Aedict 2.0, all was working fine. Now I 
was sure to leave Aedict 3.0 to see that Aedict 2.0 is similarly destroyed. 
Kanji aren'T recognized either. What happened? Please tell me I did something 
wrong...

Original comment by dezorian...@gmail.com on 6 Jul 2014 at 5:04

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Another problem is that even with the kanjipad external application 2 kanji 
aren't added up to a compounding word but arranged one after another, making no 
sense, just giving meaning for each individual kanji. I have a similar problem 
with the internal one, when I added 4 kanji in a row, to get the meaning of 2 
words à 2 kanji, just to be given individual kanji instead of compounding 
them, like the first two for the first word, the next 2 kanji for the second 
word....back in the days when it actually recognized kanji. now it doesn't 
recongized anything, so I cannot even explain in a video about that. 
I cannot even finish my homework for tomorrow now...-_- you better invest some 
quality time into recovering this wreck. This was one of the few times I 
invested money on apps...and I am not convinced as of yet of the benefits of 
this Aedict 3.0 in comparison to the prequel.

Original comment by dezorian...@gmail.com on 6 Jul 2014 at 5:15

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PS: Have you even used this app yourself lately?

Original comment by dezorian...@gmail.com on 6 Jul 2014 at 6:08

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PS2: I remember that immediate compounding wasn't possible with external 
kanjipad. So that explains a lot. Which doesn't make it any faster, due to copy 
pasting everything again and again. 

Original comment by dezorian...@gmail.com on 6 Jul 2014 at 6:24

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Please bring back the internal kanji draw recognition the way it has been all 
over the years and I won't complain anymore...

Original comment by dezorian...@gmail.com on 6 Jul 2014 at 6:26

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Damn, I have a whole page to translate and I cannot do anything right now...

Original comment by dezorian...@gmail.com on 6 Jul 2014 at 6:27

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I haven't touched the internal kanji draw code in years. I believe that the 
algorithm behaves differently on different screen resolutions or different DPIs 
- why is that, I do not really know. The image analysis techniques used in the 
algorithm are beyond my skills. So it is perhaps your case that the internal 
kanjipad worked fine on your old phone and stopped working on your new phone. I 
agree that the current algorithm sucks big time. Perhaps I can create a new 
external kanjipad application with the better algorithm, which will be 
integrated with Aedict.

ps: if you wish your money back, please let me know.

Original comment by martin.v...@gmail.com on 7 Jul 2014 at 2:31

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I cannot integrate the external KanjiPad code directly into Aedict, because of 
licensing issues. This explains the reason why I must create a new app for this.

Original comment by martin.v...@gmail.com on 7 Jul 2014 at 2:33

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Ok, sorry to have gone berserk for a while there. I assume it is not your fault 
that the kanji recognition isn't working anymore. 
I will try it again on my old phone then. Is there a way to adapt, reconfigure 
the drawing algorithm depending on what phone you use? Like 5" needs a special 
version as an update? I don't know if that could be done and would take less 
work - or more?
I seem to be able to translate my homework with the external for now...work 
with it is kind of going slow (wonder why i complained back then 2 months ago, 
it was nearly perfect....

As for the money. I just mentioned me paying it to underline my dedication and 
support to you and the responsibility you took. I support your cause on making 
it the best japanese-dictionary there is. Only then can I spread the message on 
campus.
We both will be happy then. Let's work on it.

Original comment by dezorian...@gmail.com on 7 Jul 2014 at 5:30

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I strongly suspect that the recognition algorithm works on some DPIs and fails 
on others. You say that the algorithm does not work on your new phone but works 
on your old phone - can you please provide the exact brand and Android version, 
screen resolution and, most importantly, DPI? If there is indeed a difference 
in DPI, I will tune the algorithm input and we will see whether it works.

Original comment by martin.v...@gmail.com on 8 Jul 2014 at 8:08

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ps: do not worry, I am a bit of a berserker myself, so I understand :-)

Original comment by martin.v...@gmail.com on 8 Jul 2014 at 8:09

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Got it. On my 320DPI phone the algorithm works, on my 320DPI tablet it does not 
work. I think that the tablet touch screen is less precise, the lines are more 
"shaky" and the algorithm fails. I have tried a simple test by reducing all 
strokes to just two points (on average they have 15 points) and the algorithm 
started to work correctly. I will try to employ some "de-shaker" :-D 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramer%E2%80%93Douglas%E2%80%93Peucker_algorithm
and reduce all strokes to max of 3 lines - let us see whether it helps.

Original comment by martin.v...@gmail.com on 9 Jul 2014 at 7:02

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I have released Aedict 3.4.19, please let me know if the kanji recognition 
algorithm works better now.

Original comment by martin.v...@gmail.com on 10 Jul 2014 at 10:46

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Seems to work perfectly now on my Galaxy S 4. Good job. Tried 3 different kanji 
compound words and it worked fine.
Can you remove the "left-over"-kanji that resides on the drawing field, even 
after successively having added it to the row and now are starting to draw the 
next one? There is no need that it still is being placed there if we succeeded 
in drawing and adding it. You always have to press delete to start drawing the 
next one. 
By the way: Also good work on having organised the settings menue. I can set up 
stuff even faster because of the categories now. :)

Original comment by dezorian...@gmail.com on 10 Jul 2014 at 10:55

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The kanji image is now cleared when added to the quick scratch pad.
Marking the bug as fixed. This bug contains a lot of various requests - please 
open a new feature request for each request you may have, so that we can 
discuss each request independently.

Original comment by martin.v...@gmail.com on 10 Jul 2014 at 9:28

• Changed state: Fixed
• Added labels: Affects-3.4.18, Fixed-in-3.4.20