[sword-devel] Flash cards

[Troy A. Griffitts]

Thanks for the suggestions Daniel.  I think we do all those things right 
now.

Daniel Owens wrote:
>     * It keeps track of words you've learned, so that you see those
>       words less often. That saves you time so you don't study familiar
>       words but focus on words you don't know well yet.

It doesn't keep track across runs, but say, for example, you select 
lessons 1,2,9,17 to be drilled on.  Flashcards scrambles all these words 
and begins quizzing you.  As you get them correct, they drop out of the 
'to learn' list.  As you get them wrong, it marks increases their drill 
frequency and makes you get them correct more times before it will drop 
them off of the 'to learn' list.  The end result is that as you approach 
the end of your quiz, you will be asked drilled on the ones you've been 
missing most often during the drill.


>     * It is also quite easy to add words--two lines for each entry
>       (front and back of the "card").

Same for flashcards.  I believe the data file is a simple properties 
file for each lesson with something like:

word1=front
answer1=back
word2=some_other_front
answer2=some_other_back
wordCount=2
lessonTitle=Simple Lesson

You can view and submit new data files at:

http://crosswire.org/svn/flashcards/trunk/lessons/




>     * You can modify entries from the gui, so when a list has a mistake
>       you can easily fix it.

The Edit tab lets you modify your lessons from the GUI.


> 
> The major disadvantage to it (at least for studying Hebrew) is that you 
> have to edit the XML file that lists are stored in to modify the font 
> for all entries.

I believe that is the same for Flashcards.  There is a lessonFont 
property in the lesson file, but I don't believe there is an option to 
set it from the GUI.  It would be a simple addition though.


> From the gui you can modify a single entry, but if your 
> vocab list is more than ten words that would get tedious.

Yeah, I mostly prefer to generate lists.  The sword-tools/flashtools/ 
folder has a utility that will let you generate word frequency flashcard 
lessons from a verse range.  I hope to make this available from the 
download page so students can ask the website to autogenerate 
specialized lessons for say, if they are about to take a greek exegesis 
class on Galations and want to polish up their vocab for that book.

Thanks for the suggestions.  Maybe the UI isn't obvious for some of 
these features.  I have mostly been using the cellphone version of 
flashcards recently.  I find it invaluable to making productive down 
time in waiting rooms or long lines, etc.

The Flashcards SVN repo is wide open.  It was an experiment to see how 
the project would fair without any source restrictions.  It has done 
fairly well.  There have been some digressions, but mostly positives; I 
think because it is a fairly simple, non-complex project.

I have a bunch of stuff to do on the software soon for extra credit for 
my Hebrew prof so I can pass my final semester of Hebrew, so you should 
see a bunch of improvements soon.

	-Troy.




> 
> Just a few thoughts.
> 
> Daniel
> 
> Troy A. Griffitts wrote:
>> Dear Martin,
>>
>> Yes, Flascards is still being developed.  You might find useful the 
>> programs under:
>>
>> http://crosswire.org/svn/sword-tools/trunk/flashtools/
>>
>> Thanks for the encouragement.  Hope these tools are useful.
>>
>> 	-Troy.
>>
>>
>>
>> martin wrote:
>>   
>>> Hey guys, do you know someone who is working on Flashcards project? It 
>>> is a great and simple program, and I would like to have ability to 
>>> import my own lessons into it from csv file. Would it be possible in future?
>>> martin
>>>
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