I like the fact that you have added tags to the vocabulary, but adding modifications post insertion is a bit of a pain. Since you have the functionality to add in groups from a lesson, could you also not add in a tag input box, so that as we add a group, we can carry over tagged identifiers to all those inserted words? Seems like it would be quick and easy change to the lesson templates and add a lot of value to the tag function.

Mike Rogero

ps. - From a usability standpoint having the lab’s URL - “http://blog.praxislanguage.com/2007/04/25/chinesepod-labs/” include a date is a bit odd, don’t you think? wouldn’t it make more sense to remove the 2007/04/25….???

Step one: some kind of standard vocab tagging in CP to support moving vocab from ‘current’ to ‘revise’ to ‘learned’, as suggested here.

Step 2: A pie-chart gadget (as in google gadget) that shows the percentage relationship between these tags, and when you click on the pie slices, brings you to the list for that tag (or perhaps the flashcards).

In addition to listening to the podcasts, what I do now is that I load the podcasts into Audacity and manually cut out some key Chinese words and English definitions. I have a small database of Chinese vocabulary mp3 files and English translation mp3 files on my computer. Yap, I do this by hand.

Then I wrote a small script that randomly assembles the English audio and the Chinese audio and inserts pauses in between. This creates custom mp3 files that I use to reinforce some of the key vocabulary words that I need to know.

My feature request is that I’d love to be able to select vocabulary words, place them into a queue, and have chinesepod.com automatically create a customized series of mp3 files touching only on the vocabulary that I need to learn.

James

Is there a better place for me (and others) to make suggestions that, as you mention, don’t fall under the purview of the labs?

thanks! ~Gi.

The next labs project under development is a vocab-reinforcement and repetition tool. This may skip the labs completely and just become a standard audio product. We’re experimenting to see what works best pedagogically — right now we’re waiting for the new lesson development system to be put in place before we can actually launch it.

Issues such as the usability of the vocab lists or other main site features (ie. Cornelia’s suggestion) don’t really fall under the purview of the labs - it’s envisaged more as a sort of sandbox where we can test new tools without interferring with the main site - see what works, see what doesn’t. That being said, people are definitely listening to the suggestions that are being made. I know that the feedback we’ve gotten about the vocabulary lists have been acted upon. We’ve fixed issues people have had with deleting mass content, as well as slow load times. I don’t really control that part of the site and can’t speak personally for when/how changes are made, but I do know that they should have been addressed. Brendan’s idea is really interesting and I think is probably more on par with the sort of thing that will happen here.

We’re definitely not ignoring you. I’ll let David Lancashire answer you in more detail.

Ken Carroll