Sogou Pinyin
Encyclopedia
Sogou Pinyin Method is a popular Chinese Pinyin input method editor
developed by Sogou
, a Chinese search engine
.
A Sohu
announcement, released on June 5, 2009, indicated that Sogou Pinyin input software has been installed more than 80 million times since it was released three years ago, and Sogou input software captures about 70% of the Chinese IME
market.
The latest stable version of Sogou Pinyin is 6.0, in which version several new features such as customizable pinyin alias and simultaneous input of both English and Chinese are added.
; other language groups use other keyboards, e.g. the German-speaking world uses a QWERTZ-keyboard
. Different from input of western words (like "zebra" or "yet") on a German keyboard, the Sogou Pinyin Method does not recognize that on a German keyboard the letters "Z" and "Y" are interchanged. Like this, using the "Sogou Pinyin Method" on German keyboard when a user wants to type the Chinese words 'you 有' you get 'zou 走' instead, and if you type 'yi 一' you get 'zi 字' instead.
named Sogou Cloud Pinyin that can allow any major browser to input Chinese characters on a webpage without installing any new software or plugins. It uses JavaScript and Ajax on the browser and apparently cloud computing technology on the servers.
Version 1.0.1.6 (2006.6.21)
Version 1.0.1.7 (2006.7.21)
Version 1.0.2.0 (2006.8.15)
Version 1.0.2.2 (2006.9.5)
Version 1.5 Beta1 (2006.10.11)
Version 1.5 Beta2 (2006.11.17)
Version 1.5 Beta3 (2007.1.17)
Version 2.0 (2007.1.29 )
Version 3.0 Beta1 (2007.3.2)
Version 3.0 Beta2 (2007.7.2)
Version 3.0 (2007.10.18)
Version 3.1 (2007.12.28)
Version 3.2 (2008.2.4)
Version 3.3 (2008.5.5)
Version 3.5 (2008.6.5)
Version 3.6 (2008.9.11)
Version 4.0 (2008.12.29)
Version 4.1 (2009.3.18)
Version 4.2 (2009.6.5)
Version 4.3 (2009.10.26)
Version 4.3.1 (2009.12.2)
Version 5.0 (2010.3.25)
Version 5.1 (2010.9.20)
Version 5.2 (2011.1.24)
Version 6.0 (2011.6.14)
See Sogou Pinyin Update Catalog for detail.
Pinyin method
The pinyin method refers to a family of input methods based on the pinyin method of romanization.In the most basic form, the pinyin method allows a user to input Chinese characters by entering the pinyin of a Chinese character and then presenting the user with a list of possible characters with...
developed by Sogou
Sogou
Sogou.com is a Chinese search engine which can search text, images, music, and maps. It was launched 4 August 2004 and is owned by Sohu, Inc.. As of April 2010, it has a rank of 121 in Alexa's internet rankings. Sogou provides an index of up to 10 billion web pages. Its major domestic competitor...
, a Chinese search engine
Search engine
A search engine is an information retrieval system designed to help find information stored on a computer system. The search results are usually presented in a list and are commonly called hits. Search engines help to minimize the time required to find information and the amount of information...
.
A Sohu
Sohu
Sohu.com, Inc. is a search engine company headquartered in the Sohu.com Internet Plaza in Haidian District, Beijing, People’s Republic of China. This company and its subsidiaries offer advertising, a search engine, on-line multiplayer gaming and other services. For the fiscal year ended December...
announcement, released on June 5, 2009, indicated that Sogou Pinyin input software has been installed more than 80 million times since it was released three years ago, and Sogou input software captures about 70% of the Chinese IME
Input method editor
An input method is an operating system component or program that allows any data, such as keyboard strokes or mouse movements, to be received as input. In this way users can enter characters and symbols not found on their input devices...
market.
The latest stable version of Sogou Pinyin is 6.0, in which version several new features such as customizable pinyin alias and simultaneous input of both English and Chinese are added.
Features
Sogou Pinyin provides features for customizing its dictionary, appearance and function. The dictionary of Sogou Pinyin can be enriched by adding so-called cell dictionaries, which contain words in special fields. The appearance of Sogou Pinyin can be changed using skins and animation. The function of Sogou Pinyin can be extended using extensions such as mouse-writing.Problems with non-English keyboards
It does not recognize localized keyboards; it assigns all Western characters to their positions on the English keyboard (Y is always the sixth key from left on the second row of the keyboard), that means the mapping of the keys and the relevant characters does not work. The English-speaking world uses a QWERTY-keyboardQWERTY
QWERTY is the most common modern-day keyboard layout. The name comes from the first six letters appearing in the topleft letter row of the keyboard, read left to right: Q-W-E-R-T-Y. The QWERTY design is based on a layout created for the Sholes and Glidden typewriter and sold to Remington in the...
; other language groups use other keyboards, e.g. the German-speaking world uses a QWERTZ-keyboard
QWERTZ
thumb|175px|A computer QWERTZ keyboardThe QWERTZ or QWERTZU keyboard is a widely used computer and typewriter keyboard layout that is mostly used in Central Europe...
. Different from input of western words (like "zebra" or "yet") on a German keyboard, the Sogou Pinyin Method does not recognize that on a German keyboard the letters "Z" and "Y" are interchanged. Like this, using the "Sogou Pinyin Method" on German keyboard when a user wants to type the Chinese words 'you 有' you get 'zou 走' instead, and if you type 'yi 一' you get 'zi 字' instead.
Copyright conflict with Google Pinyin
In April 2007, Sohu threatened to sue Google because after Google Pinyin's initial release, it was soon discovered that Google Pinyin's dictionary database contained employee names of Sogou Pinyin. On April 8, 2007, Google admitted that they used "non-Google database resources". Shortly thereafter, a new version of Google Pinyin was released which no longer appeared to be based on Sogou's database.Sogou Cloud Pinyin
In 2009, Sogou launched a BookmarkletBookmarklet
A bookmarklet is Unobtrusive JavaScript stored as the URL of a bookmark in a web browser or as a hyperlink on a web page. The term is a portmanteau of the terms bookmark and applet, however, an applet is not to be confused with a bookmarklet just as JavaScript is not to be confused with Java...
named Sogou Cloud Pinyin that can allow any major browser to input Chinese characters on a webpage without installing any new software or plugins. It uses JavaScript and Ajax on the browser and apparently cloud computing technology on the servers.
Version history
Version 1.0.1.4 （2006.6.5）Version 1.0.1.6 (2006.6.21)
Version 1.0.1.7 (2006.7.21)
Version 1.0.2.0 (2006.8.15)
Version 1.0.2.2 (2006.9.5)
Version 1.5 Beta1 (2006.10.11)
Version 1.5 Beta2 (2006.11.17)
Version 1.5 Beta3 (2007.1.17)
Version 2.0 (2007.1.29 )
Version 3.0 Beta1 (2007.3.2)
Version 3.0 Beta2 (2007.7.2)
Version 3.0 (2007.10.18)
Version 3.1 (2007.12.28)
Version 3.2 (2008.2.4)
Version 3.3 (2008.5.5)
Version 3.5 (2008.6.5)
Version 3.6 (2008.9.11)
Version 4.0 (2008.12.29)
Version 4.1 (2009.3.18)
Version 4.2 (2009.6.5)
Version 4.3 (2009.10.26)
Version 4.3.1 (2009.12.2)
Version 5.0 (2010.3.25)
Version 5.1 (2010.9.20)
Version 5.2 (2011.1.24)
Version 6.0 (2011.6.14)
See Sogou Pinyin Update Catalog for detail.