ANS:
The basic knowledge of Chinese characters required by mastering the ECCode™ is illustrated as the knowledge structure in the following figure.

Knowledge Tree of ECCode™

ANS:
ECCode™ not only simplifies the structure classification of Chinese characters, but also simplifies the stroke classification of Chinese characters. Among them, the classification of Chinese strokes simplified by ECCode™ is in accordance with the Chinese information processing specifications. Here we no longer explain why the classification of Chinese strokes should be simplified in this way.
So， why should ECCode™ simplify the structure classification of Chinese characters? This involves the complexity of a system. Reliability studies show that the complexity of a system is proportional to the number of objects it deals with. That is to say, the more objects a system needs to be categorized and processed, the more complex the system is, and the more difficult it is to learn and master the knowledge about it. For example, there are at least 14 kinds of Chinese character structure according to the traditional classification method, and if the encoding rules are formulated according to the 14 kinds of Chinese character structure, which undoubtedly increases the complexity of the encoding solution. However, ECCode™ only divides the structure of Chinese characters into two categories and four sub-categories, which greatly reduces the complexity of the encoding solution. This is a basic requirement of Chinese character encoding for its learnability.
In the same way, according to the stroke classification of the traditional Chinese character theory, there are 26 strokes in hard-pen writing and 78 strokes in brush-writing of regular script. The Chinese Information Processing Standard classifies all Chinese strokes into five basic strokes, and the other strokes are classified into these five basic strokes according to their characteristics. Obviously, this processing method of Chinese information processing standard greatly reduces the complexity of Chinese character encoding solution.
In fact, before the advent of the computer, the content of Chinese character teaching and its teaching methods can abide by the the model based on the traditional Chinese character theory which has already formed. However, in the virtual world of the Internet, if Chinese characters want to challenge David Moser's pessimistic assertion of "A Losing Battle (of Chinese characters): The Internet" in his book A Billion Voices: China’s Search for a Common Language, or, in other words, if Chinese language wants to internationalize in the context of the Internet, we must reshape the teaching content of Chinese characters on the premise of maintaining the characteristic attributes of Chinese characters, so as to satisfy the "equal national treatment of Chinese computer" for Chinese and foreign users in the virtual world.
For example, if both of a foreign adult Chinese learner who has never lived in China and a Chinese pupil have mastered 500 Chinese characters, Which of them types faster ? Although foreigners may be more skilled in keyboard fingering, they may know the characters "蜂" and "蜜", but they may not necessarily know the meaning of "蜂蜜" and "蜜蜂" because they lack the language environment in which Chinese phrases could naturally accumulate in their lives. Obviously, without the natural accumulation of phrases in the language environment, when foreign Chinese users use Pinyin input method, they will encounter more coincidental codes than Chinese users - they have to use more mouse to select target Chinese characters, which makes their skilled keyboard fingering useless. This is a typical phenomenon of "unequal national treatment of Chinese computer", and it is also an important reason why German Sinologist Professor Andreas Guder calls for the cultivation of Chinese character keywriting ability in teaching Chinese as a foreign language.
Therefore, Chinese character teaching in the future should be based on the application of Chinese characters in the two worlds of "virtual and real", and under the condition of no "wiping out" Chinese characters, the Chinese literacy education in the virtual and real world should be guided by a more systematic, non-conflicting theory of Chinese characters based on the unified cognition. As for whether such a unification of Chinese character teaching theories focusing on the two worlds of virtuality and reality will affect foreigners'perception of the beauty of Chinese characters, this need not be worried. Because we have said that this improvement of the traditional Chinese character theory is not a "revolution" or a complete abandonment of the inherent characteristics of Chinese characters, it is just to reconstruct the narrative method while maintaining its inherent characteristics, and to integrate the theory of Chinese character teaching in the virtual and real world, so as to enhance the scientificity of Chinese character theory compared with traditional Chinese medicine theory.

ANS:
The computer encoding solution of Chinese characters is grafted on the English keyboard, which undoubtedly brings a problem, that is, the solution is limited by the keyboard design. In addition, there is no unified measurement standard, which leads to a variety of Chinese character encoding solutions with different focus. Some focus on easy learning and neglect efficiency, such as pinyin encoding method; Some focus on the efficiency of text input and neglect the easy to learn, such as WuBi; Others claim to take into account the above two indicators, but either using the number keys and function keys instead of the English alphabet keys, or using various other keys on the keyboard in addition to the alphabet keys, which highlights the defect of neglecting the probability layout feature of the English keyboard, instead of giving full play to the users' advantage of the skillful fingering of the keyboard in the phonetic language countries.
Even because of the various defects of Chinese character keyboard input solutions, some people put the hope of learning Chinese characters by using electronic dictionary for foreigners on various recognition technologies (such as handwriting recognition, scanning recognition...), and want to abandon the keyboard, which foreign people are the most familiar with and is also the best interactive tool for human-computer conversation. However, as the most familiar human-computer interaction tool for foreigners, keyboard has already been an objective existence, so if wanting to assist foreigners to learn Chinese characters and provide a paperless office way for them who take Chinese as working language in the Internet era, it is inevitable for a Chinese character encoding solution to directly face the problem of keyboard application, and avoiding this problem is not the best way.
Therefore, we believe that before designing a Chinese character encoding solution, we should first design and develop a set of performance index system to evaluate the merits and demerits of the solution. Only in this way can we avoid the phenomenon of "Each says he is right", so that we can find the best solution under the guidance of a unified evaluation index system and avoid the situation of "being unable to attend to everything at one time ".
Of course, before elaborating which performance indexes should be included in the evaluation index system of Chinese character encoding solution, we should also clearly realize that: as a grafting technology, or as a set of rules system created from nothing, it should be an unrealistic dream to master these rules without experiencing the process of learning the rules. However, the complexity or simplicity of the rule system itself is completely in the research scope of this evaluation index system. That is to say, there is no absolute "idiot" rule system in the world; for any new knowledge, if it needs to be applied, it will always take a little time for people to learn and master it.
In fact, after comprehensive research, we found that a set of scientific encoding evaluation performance index system for Chinese characters should at least include the following aspects:
1.Learnability: that is to say, the rules are simple, easy to remember and not easy to forget; suitable for foreigners having learnt Chinese for three or four months;
2.Few encoding rules, easy to master；
3.Low rate of coincidental codes: it's the best that the rate of coincidental codes is lower than Wubi, and the typing speed is faster;
4.Good standardization, no conflict between rules: For example, on the one hand, the traditional Chinese character theory emphasizes the rules of stroke order, on the other hand, it tells foreign Chinese learners that there is a radical "囗" in the character "国" and a radical "匚" in the character "区"; However, when foreigners learn to write these two Chinese characters correctly, they cannot write out these two radicals according to the rules of stroke order; This is not only the place where the traditional Chinese character theory must make itself more systematic, scientific and need to improve its content in order to cater to the information processing of Chinese characters, but also the place where the Chinese character information encoding solution must respect the rules of stroke order;
5.High input efficiency: Not only must have the very high typing speed, also must have the very high input accuracy rate -- i.e. must have the very low ratio of mistyping;
6.Psychological rules suitable for Chinese characters writing: The order of Chinese characters' appearing in mind is "first sound, then shape, they are a whole";
7.Suitable for the habit of "blind typing": Aiming at the mainstream application scenarios of Chinese character information processing, it is better to use only letter keys instead of various function keys and number keys in Chinese character encoding solution;
8.Follow the principle of probability layout: Abide by the probability layout principle of each letter key in the keyboard design, and lay the foundation of key position structure for efficient typing.
Considering the comprehensive consideration of the above eight aspects, the ECCode™ avoids the phenomenon of "pressing the gourd and floating the ladle" to the greatest extent.

ANS:
Acturally, this question can also be asked, "In the age of the Internet, what other aspects of TCFL need to be improved so as to keep pace with the times?"
As we all know, in the real world, the cultivation and application of Chinese ability are mainly reflected in the four aspects of Chinese listening, speaking, reading and writing. However, the emergence of the Internet has changed this situation, especially for the foreigners who study and use Chinese, because 99.5% of them lack the Chinese language environment in which Chinese vocabulary could accumulates naturally, which makes it more difficult for these people to apply Chinese in the virtual world. That's why David Moser, an American Sinologist, came to the pessimistic conclusion that Chinese langauge was "losing the battle of languages" in the Internet" (See Chapter 15 "A Losing Battle: The Internet" in A Billion Voices: China's Search For A Common Language by David Moser).
In fact, in the face of the virtual world of foreigners' Chinese learning and application, the biggest difficulty of TCFL is that the efficiency of searching electronic dictionaries is insurmountable. For example, when an Arab learns German, he can master German letters and phonetic symbols in two months. After that, he can independently and efficiently search for new German words in any time and space. However, it also took him two or three months to master the Chinese Pinyin, the basic strokes of Chinese characters and some common radicals of Chinese characters, it didn't mean that he had the convenience of Dictionary inquiry for learning new Chinese characters.
To thicken the broth further, Tom in the picture above who was studying Chinese language did not know the character "李", and no one around him could tell him how to pronounce the Chinese character "李", or what its pinyin is, furthermore, he hasn't mastered the Chinese character query method such as stroke (According to David Moser [莫大伟]in his article "Why Chinese Is So Damn Hard" complaining foreigners learning Chinese character dictionary query method, just like learning a time consuming art)···. That is to say, Tom in the picture can't input the new character "李" into the e-dictionary at this time. In fact, just at this very time, Pinyin has lost any value to Tom! And the significance of modern science and technology for teaching foreigners to master the correct writing of Chinese characters has disappeared.
Therefore, as far as the current teaching of TCFL is concerned, its task setting is far from meeting the needs of foreigners in the Internet era for all-round application of Chinese. Specifically, it can't satisfy the interactive application of foreign users of Chinese language between the "virtual and real world". Considering that foreigners are most familiar with the application of keyboard, and keyboard is also the most convenient and cheap human-computer interaction tool so far, Chinese character keylearning and keywriting based on keyboard is an urgent problem to be solved in the future teaching Chinese as a foreign language.
In short, the future TCFL should be based on new technology and new invention, and expand the four aspects of listening, speaking, reading and writing in TCFL to five aspects of listening, speaking, reading, writing and keytyping. In this way, it can bear the great expectation of foreign Chinese learners and users for the comprehensive application of Chinese in the Internet era.

ANS:
Obviously, the question of whether ECCode™ software is expensive or cheap should be measured in terms of the total cost of achieving the Chinese learning objectives. If a tool can give full play to the learner's initiative and make it convenient to have the chance to achieve the task goal of Chinese vocabulary which traditionally takes several decade months to master in a few months, then compared with the cost of traditionally achieving the task goal of this kind of vocabulary, do you think the price USD 100 of ECCode™ Software is expensive or cheap? And the answer is obviously self-evident.
In fact, the idea of ECCode™ is that it neither wants to make learning new Chinese characters more difficult than learning new words of other alphabetic languages, which actually has already made learning Chinese become a marathon competition, nor does it want learning Chinese to become a "noble" activity. It is better for Chinese learners to easily use the same tool, for example a keyboard, to look up new Chinese characters in an e-dictionary as they use it to look up new words of alphabetic languages in an e-dictionary. In this way, Chinese learning could no longer be radically different from learning other languages in terms of information tool using.
In a word, the wish of ECCode™ is to let Chinese language enjoy "Equal National Treatment of Computer" in front of information equipment and let foreigners fully feel Chinese Power Made Easy!

ANS:
This is an interesting question. While the motivation to learn Chinese is still strong at an initial stage, if memory work is like a sprint rather than a marathon, then many people will be willing to spend some time to memorize the Chinese Letter Table of ECCode™ based on the common sense of "Haste makes waste".
As to the question raised by many Chinese teachers, an Italian female student from Capital Normal University, after listening to the lecture of ECCode™, made a good answer with her experience of learning to play piano when she was a child.
She explained:
In order to remember which piano key position in the music score each finger corresponds to, at that time, the teacher had to paint children's fingernails in various colors in a very troublesome way to facilitate memory. Although this method is very troublesome, it can make children remember the corresponding relationship between fingers and piano keys quickly, which speeds up the their mastery of piano fingering. So it's the same thing to spend some time memorizing the Chinese Letter Table of ECCode™, so that Chinese learners can independently learn Chinese characters faster and expand their Chinese vocabulary quickly in short time.
Listen, how well she said it! After listening to her explanation, as the author who doesn't want to "boast", my suspended heart finally falls to the ground. After all, "Cat Tom cann't take the place of Mouse Jerry to explain her attitude towards the problem that only she would encounter"!

ANS:
Some teachers of Chinese as a foreign language always feel that the method of "Chinese character keylearning" based on keyboard, which disassembles Chinese characters to achieve the purpose of inputting them into an information equipment, can not achieve the effect of "face-to-face teaching of Chinese characters", which can spread the excellent Chinese culture hidden behind Chinese characters through the explanation of them. Based on this doubt, they seem to have some resistance to the modern,simple, and convenient way of Chinese character keylearning.
So, is there a contradiction between Chinese character keylearning and the teaching of Chinese culture contained in Chinese characters?
To answer this question, we'd better take a look at how about the spread of Chinese culture (stories, sayings...) hidden behind Chinese characters having gone before the invention of keylearning. We can try to ask the Chinese around us to see how many people know:
●Why the Chinese character "富" is composed of ["宀"+"一"+"口"+"田"];
●Why the Chinese character "休" is composed of ["亻"+"木"];
●Why the Chinese character "穷" or "窮"is composed of ["穴"+"力"] or ["穴"+"身"+"弓"];
●......
In fact, the results of such surveys are not satisfactory. Perhaps when the respondents were learning these Chinese characters, their teachers might have introduced the "Formation of Chinese Characters" of hieroglyphs and the Chinese philosophy hidden behind them in class. However, in daily life, people usually use their literal meanings more often and forget the stories and culture hidden behind these characters.
It can be seen that any test mentioned above can reveal the difficulties of teaching Chinese culture hidden behind Chinese characters, which existed for a long time before the advent of Chinese keylearning method.
Okay,another question comes: the emergence of the technology of Chinese character keylearning has aggravated the difficulty of spreading the cultural and philosophical thoughts carried by Chinese characters, or has it eased or even effectively solved this difficulty?
We know that before the emergence of Chinese character keylearning technology, there were many animation resources or text materials on the Internet to introduce the cultural background story or Chinese philosophy hidden behind Chinese characters. However, on the one hand, due to the fragmentation of these resources, there isn't any e-dictionary covering the content from the meaning interpretation of the Chinese characters to the thoughts and culture hidden behind them; on the other hand, the more critical problem is that there is no efficient and convenient way for foreigners who are just learning Chinese to put the Chinese characters they don't know or can't read into the electronic dictionary, so that they cannot make full use of this kind of dictionaries containing Chinese cultural and philosophical thoughts. In fact, this is the two indispensable aspects of Chinese cultural communication. In particular, if the second problem is not well solved, even if the first problem is solved, it is only a low-efficiency way of cultural communication which gets half the result with twice the effort. On the contrary, as for the foreign Chinese learners, if the problem of Chinese character input and retrieval in the electronic dictionary has been solved well, it will lay a technical foundation for the efficient use of the electronic dictionary which includes the spread of Chinese culture and philosophical thoughts.
Therefore, we can judge from this that the emergence of Chinese keylearning technology will certainly promote the internationalization of Chinese and the spread of Chinese culture carried by Chinese characters.
In fact, even for us Chinese, we can also ask sucha a question: among today's educated people, why is the proportion of people who master the Chinese culture and thought contained in Chinese characters far lower than that of 70-80 years ago?!
In fact, it has both the negative effect of simplification of Chinese characters and the result of the invisible hand of pragmatism operating in the dark. Especially when the pace of life becomes faster, people generally cherish their time like gold, and strive for the short-term "yield rate" of time investment, many people are often satisfied with knowing the meaning of Chinese characters and are not willing to spend more time to understand why it is "this meaning", i.e., people tend to only seek "results" instead of "causes", only seek to know what it is but not want to know why it is.
However, we can imagine:
If it is easy to understand the culture and philosophical thoughts hidden behind the Chinese characters, and it can be easily accessible by using fragmented time, without the need to set up face-to-face teaching courses with restricted range of target audience in a specific place at a specific time, what kind of attitude will people have towards the culture and philosophical thoughts hidden behind the Chinese characters which could help them to improve their personal accomplishment?
Obviously, if the "marginal benefit" of this fragmented time investment is very considerable, then foreigners learning Chinese will also be willing to make some investment in language learning with a higher cost-effectiveness ratio.
In a word, the Chinese character keylearning is not contradictory to the teaching of Chinese culture contained in Chinese characters. On the contrary, people can make full use of the advantages of information technology to promote the spread of Chinese culture carried by Chinese characters.
For example, after Chinese characters are easily keywritten into an Encyclopedia of Chinese characters in the future- (only when Chinese characters are input into the computer can computer technology be used to learn them; therefore, this step is a very important), they can watch the animation interpretation of Chinese culture and philosophical thoughts hidden behind the Chinese characters anywhere and anytime.
There is no doubt that compared with the "face-to-face teaching" method with a small audience, the way of Chinese character keylearning has more advantages in the use of time and space, and can promote the dissemination of Chinese culture contained in Chinese characters more in depth and breadth.

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The reason why ECCode™ is simple is that it has a strict flow path to compile the code of a Chinese character. General users can master the principle of Chinese character encoding of ECCode™ with a little practice. The following is a flow chart of the encoding of ECCode™. As for the specific encoding method, please choose a corresponding Starter Tutorial according to your knowledge background of Chinese characters (referring to "Download Starter Tutorials of Keylearning and Keywriting for Chinese Characters").

Encoding Flow Chart of ECCode™

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According to Stephen D. Krashen 's "The input hypothesis" theory, we believe that when foreigners have no conceptual awareness of Chinese characters, the first shortcut in learning Chinese characters is to shape their initial understanding of Chinese characters by analogy with the help of their understanding of their mother tongue. Meanwhile, through this understanding of the first impression of Chinese characters, the foreign Chinese learners can get the basis of Chinese character learning in the future, i.e. get the initial value of "i" in Stephen Krashen's "i+1" theory ---- "i" is the existing value of Chinese literacy capacity, which is the basis for their further mastery of Chinese characters in the future.
Everybody knows that the foundation of an alphabetic language is the letters that make up the words. This is the knowledge that every person who learns such a language should learn and master. Therefore, borrowing the concept of "letters" is to make the learners of the ECCode™ understand that the constituents of Chinese character codes are equivalent to the letters of a word in the alphabetic language and there are Chinese 103 "letters", namely correspongding to 103 shape constituents, located respectively on the 26 English letters (Called "The key mapping table of shape constituents (“letters”) of Chinese characters in ECCode™"). In fact, 84.46% of the Chinese character "letters" are easy to remember by means of two rules of memory, and there are no more than 15 key places of shape constituents in the ECCode™ that require a little time to memorize (See Starter Tutorials for details).
When our product lecturer gave a lecture to teachers of Chinese as a foreign language in a university to introduce the way of using ECCode™ to "keylearn" Chinese characters, many Chinese teachers on the spot are questioning the defect of ECCode™ that it can't make foreign Chinese learners look up e-dictionaries like a dummy with zero basis. As an introducer, the lecturer is also worried about this question. After all, we can not answer this question on behalf of foreign Chinese learners.
Fortunately, an Italian female student from the perspective of foreigners at the lecture site answered the question asked by the teachers that the ECCode™ is not for dummies with zero basis of Chinese characters. She explained with her own experience of learning to play the piano as a child: "It is like learning the piano. There's a quick way of teaching kids how to read the notes on sheet music that is coloring each one of them with different colors. The students will remember which color represents which note, and that's it. Although it is troublesome to paint nails with different colors, this method leads to the rapid mastery of piano fingering." What she meant was that taking time to remember these Chinese "letters" was beneficial to the rapid expansion of Chinese vocabulary in the later period, and it was worth it.
Her comments not only relieve the questioned lecturer, but also inspire us greatly from foreign Chinese learners.

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As the saying goes, "if you want to speed up, you can't reach it", the same is true for improving the keywriting ability of Chinese characters.
In order to improve the ability of Chinese keywriting, you need to know which factors restrict the improvement of Chinese keywriting ability. Obviously, the improvement of Chinese character keywriting ability is restricted by the following three aspects:
1. The number of Chinese vocabulary;
2. The performance of Chinese character keywriting tool software;
3. User's proficiency in keyboard fingering.
For many Chinese learners in or from alphabetic language countries, the third factor mentioned above is not the main obstacle to the improvement of Chinese keywriting. Therefore, for foreign Chinese users, how to quickly expand the Chinese vocabulary is the most critical factor to improve the ability of Chinese keywriting; and how to choose a tool software of Chinese character inputting with the best performance index is a secondly important factor.
However, there is a problem that is easy to be ignored: Should you wait until the Chinese vocabulary have been accumulated to a certain extent before you practice to improve the ability of Chinese keywriting, or should you use a Chinese keywriting tool to help expand the Chinese vocabulary quickly? In other words, is it possible that the earlier the Chinese keywriting tool can help expand the Chinese vocabulary, the better? Obviously, the answer is self-evident: it's of course that the earlier the Chinese keywriting tool can help expand the Chinese vocabulary, the better! So, only the solution that can take the two factors into account is the best solution to improve the ability of Chinese character keywriting.
But in this way, we have to face the problem of "more haste, less speed" again. That is to say, if you want to make full use of information technology based on keyboard to rapidly expand the Chinese vocabulary, and naturally improve the Chinese character keywriting ability in the process of Chinese character keylearning, then you have to seriously learn the Easy Chinese Code™ (ECCode™), a Chinese character encoding method. This so-called "slow" is to be more "fast".
Specifically, in order to better improve the Chinese character keywriting ability, we suggest that you:
● Take time to master the encoding method ECCode™;
● Take the advantage of ECCode™ that you can look up new Chinese characters anytime and anywhere, look up any new Chinese character you encounter at any time, and according to the animation demonstration of Chinese character writing in the companion e-dictionary, at least write the Chinese character correctly with your index finger in the palm according to the stroke order of animation demonstration, in order to strengthen the Chinese character memory through the writing process;
● Try to use the ECCode™ to realize paperless homework as early as possible in your learning stage - the earlier the better, so as to lay the foundation for paperless office in which Chinese is used as the working language in the future.

ANS:
As computers have only been born for decades, but Chinese characters have been born for thousands of years, so it is not surprising that the traditional theory of Chinese characters is independent of the computer encoding system of Chinese characters and can not create a new integrative theory of Chinese characters, which takes into account the two "virtual and real worlds" of Chinese characters. Therefore, it is urgent to reshape the theory of Chinese characters so that its theoretical system can take into account some common principles of traditional Chinese character teaching and computer Chinese character encoding theory at the same time. As for the existing problems in this respect, we have pointed out that the contradiction between the rule of stroke order and the identification of Chinese radicals in the traditional Chinese character theory through the examples of the characters "国" and "区" in the previous question 6. Here, we will not repeat.
What we are concerned about is that the transformation or improvement of Chinese character theory should be reflected in the following two aspects of content adjustment:
1.Pay attention to the consistency between the rule of stroke order and the verification of the radicals: Gradually discard the explanation of some radicals that contradict the rule of stroke order, so that "teaching Chinese characters in the virtual world" does not conflict with “"teaching Chinese characters in the real world"”； Otherwise, it will give foreigners who have just begun to learn Chinese characters the interference of Chinese character cognition;
2.Adjust the teaching content of common radicals: While highlighting the thought of "using Chinese character teaching to promote the Chinese phrase teaching", traditional Chinese character teaching should give priority as far as possible to arrange and highlight the teaching of the common used radicals which are used in the computer encoding of Chinese characters, so that it could lay a complete foundation of Chinese character knowledge for foreign Chinese learners to master Chinese character keylearning and keywriting tools.
Obviously, the improvement of the above two points needs to make appropriate adjustments to the content of the existing Chinese character teaching theory or materials.
In a word, in the Internet era, if the teaching of Chinese characters as hieroglyphics specially avoids the teaching of information processing of Chinese characters required by the people using Chinese as their working language as well as their paperless office, or does not take any consciousness of the information processing of Chinese characters into the guiding ideology of Chinese character teaching, it is obviously a serious defect. We look forward to being able to work with all of the resonators on the above two aspects of comprehensive and in-depth interdisciplinary cooperation.

ANS:
At present, almost all of the online Chinese learning dictionaries in the world are equipped with the animation demonstration function of Chinese character stroke order, so as to facilitate foreigners to learn the correct writing method of Chinese characters. However, in the practical application, what happened, so that these dictionaries with stroke order animation demonstration have little practical effect on teaching foreigners how to write Chinese characters correctly?
For example, as shown in the figure above, Tom in the picture has just begun to learn Chinese for three months. His basic situation is as follows:
1. He had mastered pinyin;
2. He has completely mastered the basic stroke knowledge of Chinese characters;
3. He has learned some of the most commonly used radicals.
However, he did not know the character "李", and no one around him could tell him how to pronounce the Chinese character "李", or what its pinyin is, furthermore, he hasn't mastered the Chinese character query method such as stroke (According to David Moser [莫大伟]in his article "Why Chinese Is So Damn Hard" complaining foreigners learning Chinese character dictionary query method, just like learning a time consuming art)···. That is to say, Tom in the picture can't input the new character "李" into the e-dictionary at this time. In fact, just at this very time, Pinyin has lost any value to Tom! And the significance of modern science and technology for teaching foreigners to master the correct writing of Chinese characters has disappeared.
What's more, if Tom sees "宫保鸡丁" in the restaurant and "南天门" on my journey..., all in all, it's outdoors, not in the study or classroom, what should he do if he wants to learn any Chinese characters he sees at any time and anywhere, so as to learn them at the most exciting time?
It can be seen that at this time, if there is a way to help Tom input the new Chinese character into the e-dictionary with his most familiar keyboard, so that he can watch the animation demonstration of correct writing method and learn the meaning interpretation of the character in time... , then, isn't this method to be the best way helping him to correctly write and learn Chinese characters!
In view of this demand, the Easy Chinese Code™ (ECCode™) oriented to the concept of "Chinese dynamic independent learning" for foreigners was born.

ANS:
Actually, you will know what this saying talks about is just a superficial phenomenon when you think it in another way. Imagine, if these foreigners live in Germany or France for a long time, will they learn German or French and only be satisfied with being able to buy vegetables? Obviously, they will learn the words of these languages and do not want to be illiterate in these languages. After all, in many cases, they need to read the product description, write the contract..., and so on. Literacy is so worthful for them in these countries!
It can be seen that from the perspective of comparative research, since foreigners in China spend a lot of money and time in training institutions to learn Chinese, it is impossible for them to be only satisfied with just reaching the level of Chinese illiteracy in terms of listening and speaking. As to a lot of people involved in economy and trade, the value of literacy is self-evident.
However, why do many of these foreigners leave the impression of "little interest in Chinese literacy" to Chinese teachers in Chinese training institutions? In the final analysis, it is the result of the game between "Time Availability VS Difficulty Degree of Mastering Chinese Literacy": Traditionally, learning Chinese characters takes too much time, so that these foreigners can't afford the cost of time and they have to take the emergency needs as the primary task goal, i.e., in their opinion, to solve the problem of developing listening and speaking ability is the first work for them. But even the cultivation of listening and speaking ability, as a foreigner in China, there is only one way, that is, he has to "be immersed in the ocean of Chinese" almost all day. However, it also takes a lot of time!
As a result, many people "immerse" in the streets and lanes of China and achieve the ability of fluent oral Chinese. But when he / she sits at his / her desk and does paperless work, he / she finds that he / she still can't write a simple Chinese contract or email.
It can be seen that the phenomenon that foreigners in China show little interest in Chinese literacy is just a illusion of helplessness, and the truth is that traditionally Chinese literacy is so difficult that they can't afford the time cost of Chinese literacy. Therefore, how to solve the problem of Chinese literacy difficult to master is the most critical problem.
Fortunately, the Easy Chinese Code™ (ECCode™, 【汉易码】™]) was born to solve the problem mentioned above.

ANS:
Obviously, for many foreigners who use Chinese as their working language, Chinese learning is not an end in itself, but their purpose is autually to use Chinese in the workplace. Among the workplace, paperless offices is a kind of occasions where it has to face the problem of how to input Chinese characters efficiently. Therefore, how to meet the efficient requirements of Chinese keywriting for these foreigners is a problem that ECCode™ has been thinking about from the very beginning.
That is to say, ECCode™ should not only solve the problem of Chinese character keylearning, but also solve the problem of efficient keywriting of Chinese characters. Only in this way can foreigners who learn or use Chinese enjoy "The Equal National Treatment of Computer" in front of information equipment.
Obviously, the phenomenon of many tools or technologies being specially developed for Chinese language and different from those of other languages' keylearning and keywriting has just proves that Chinese language has not shared "The Equal National Treatment of Computer" because of its enjoying this "special treatment". In this sense, as long as a foreigner is learning Chinese or using it as the working language, then, whenever he or she is faced with information equipment, there will be a question whether he or she shares "The Equal National Treatment of Computer" or not.
As long as the teaching object of ECCode™ steps into the "virtual world" and wants to obtain the text information resources from it, it will need the functional design of ECCode™ that helps him or her keylearn or keywrite Chinese characters. That is to say, foreigners in the stage of no matter Chinese character learning or having mastered Chinese and taken Chinese as their working language all need a "unified" solution for Chinese character keylearning and keywriting based on their most familiar keyboard. So, those practitioners of TCFL who only focus on the completion of the current existing teaching tasks and do not serve the ultimate goal of internationalization of Chinese prospectively are obviously too introverted and lose the height of TCFL.

ANS:
Pragmatism! Especially in the computer age, even Chinese people seldom use hard pen to write characters, so it is more difficult to motivate foreign Chinese learners, especially those foreign adults who cherish time like gold, to abide by the stroke order rules while writing Chinese characters. Unless they can see that obeying the rules of writing Chinese characters can bring them huge and substantial "dividends", it will certainly be the common, long-standing problem that makes the orthodox teachers of TCFL headache.
In fact, pragmatism is an another saying of "Down to Earth". When disseminating Chinese culture to foreigners, we must conform to the current of the times and let things go their own way. We cann't mistakenly think that "the quintessence of traditional culture" has a sign of carrying forward just according to the fact that a few foreigners who are good at learning our quintessence of Peking Opera.
In the face of such problems, we have to analyze them by linking the number of foreigners who like traditional Chinese essences to the proportion of foreigners learning Chinese. At the same time, it can also be compared with the performance of Chinese people in this respect.
Once we do this, we have to be sorry for finding that the fast-paced background of the times has driven people out of almost no time to master the quintessence of the traditional culture which is a kind of hard work! Although everyone knows the truth that "HASTE MAKES WASTE", the law of negation of negation in nature acts on human beings mercilessly in such a way so as to make them usually tend to show the trend of "seeking quick success and instant benefits".
Therefore, under the condition that people can't break away from the law of negation of negation in nature, the reality of the decline of the form or way of inheriting traditional culture in the past is the concrete embodiment of pragmatism's great influence on people's cultural preference under the background of fast-paced era. In this preference cultivation, foreigners learning Chinese are also "people", who share the common characteristics of people in the same era background ---- this is the short-termism and pragmatism of "cost-effectiveness". This is also an important reason why some people regard pragmatism as the pronoun of opportunism.
In view of this, in terms of how to motivate foreigners learning Chinese to follow the rules of Chinese character writing, except for those minority who are really interested in the art of Chinese calligraphy, for the vast majority of foreign Chinese learners, we must focus on the motivation of following the rules of Chinese character writing, that is, what substantial "benefits" they can get. In the final analysis, this is still a pragmatic "cost-effectiveness" issue.
If we tell Foreigners:
"→After you take some time to understand the rules of Chinese character writing and master the basic principles of these rules, you can use these rules to master the methodology and principles of Chinese character keylearning of ECCode™.
→In this way, you can look up new Chinese characters in an e-dictionary and enlarge your Chinese vocabulary just as you can use the keyboard to learn new German words.
→For this reason, you can not only master the Chinese vocabulary which used to take many years to master in a very short time, but also save a lot of investment cost in Chinese learning."
When hearing that there are such huge substantive benefits, compared with the convenience and efficiency of electronic dictionary query when foreigners learn German, French and Arabic, the vast majority of foreign Chinese learners have no reason to refuse to "save money". It should be a matter of common sense.
Therefore, only the right "medicine" can cure the "disease".