Essays
Does the Refold Method Forbid Tracing Characters?
Does Refold's input-first method ban handwriting or tracing Chinese characters? It does not forbid it, but it deprioritizes output. Here is how writing fits.
Lawrence Arya··5 min
Essays
Does Writing Giant Characters in VR Reverse Amnesia?
Writing huge characters in VR is novel and fun, but it is the act of recall, not the scale, that rebuilds forgotten handwriting. Here is the honest version.
Lawrence Arya··5 min
Playbooks
Dong Chinese Sentences but Sync Issues? An Alternative
Dong Chinese is great for sentences and reading, but mobile sync frustrations are common. Here is a focused, writing-first alternative for when sync gets in the way.
Lawrence Arya··5 min
Playbooks
Can You Draw Hanzi Inside a Markdown File?
Markdown is plain text, so you cannot truly draw characters in it. Here are the real options for embedding Hanzi, and why a writing canvas beats them for recall.
Lawrence Arya··5 min
Essays
Drawing a Hanzi From the Dynamic Island?
A Dynamic Island prompt to draw a character sounds slick, but the integration is the easy part. Here is what would actually make a daily writing nudge work.
Lawrence Arya··5 min
Playbooks
Drawing Hanzi on a MacBook Magic Trackpad?
Can you practice writing characters on a MacBook trackpad? You can, but it is a poor surface for handwriting. Here is what works and what is far better.
Lawrence Arya··5 min
Essays
Writing Characters on Large Tablets and Arm Mobility
Hoping to draw characters on a large tablet to help arm mobility? Writing can be a pleasant motor activity, but this is not medical advice. Here is an honest take.
Lawrence Arya··5 min
Playbooks
Drawing Historic Chinese Script Forms: What an App Can Do
You can practice drawing historic and local script forms you have identified, but visualizing their history is scholarly work. Recognition is not recall, and a writing tool trains recall.
Lawrence Arya··5 min
Playbooks
Practicing Simplified Chinese Offline on a Flight
Want to practice simplified Chinese on a flight in airplane mode, with no wifi? Offline practice turns dead time into real progress. Here is what to look for.
Lawrence Arya··4 min
Playbooks
Color-Blind-Friendly Radical Practice: Beyond Color Coding
Many apps mark radicals and stroke order by color, which fails color-blind learners. Shape, position, isolation, and labels convey the same information accessibly. Here is how it should work.
Lawrence Arya··5 min
Research
Dual-Coding and Hiding Pinyin: Training Character Retrieval
Dual-coding theory says we remember things coded both visually and verbally better. For writing recall, that means producing the character's visual form by hand, and hiding pinyin so you retrieve the character, not the sound.
Lawrence Arya··5 min
Playbooks
Does E-Ink Refresh Rate Matter for Writing Practice?
E-ink's slow refresh causes lag and ghosting that hurt fast tracing animations, but it matters far less for from-memory writing, where the value is producing the character, not smooth playback.
Lawrence Arya··5 min