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The Wubizixing input method (), often abbreviated to simply Wubi or Wubi Xing,〔This is the name used in Mac OS X〕 is a Chinese character input method primarily for inputting simplified Chinese and traditional Chinese text on a computer. Wubi should not be confused with the Wubihua (五笔画) method, which is a different input method that shares the categorization into five stroke types with Wubi. The method is also known as Wang Ma (), named after the inventor Wang Yongmin (王永民). There are three Wubi versions that are considered to be standard: Wubi 86, Wubi 98, Wubi 18030 and Wubi New-century (the 3rd-generation Version). The latter three can also be used to input traditional Chinese text, albeit in a more limited way. Wubi 86 is the most widely known and used shape-based Input Method for full letter keyboards in Mainland China. If it is frequently needed to input traditional Chinese characters as well, other input methods like CangJie or ZhengMa may be better suited to the task, and it is also much more likely to find them on the computer one needs to use. The Wubi method is based on the structure of characters rather than their pronunciation, making it possible to input characters even when you do not know the pronunciation, as well as not being too closely linked to any particular spoken variety of Chinese. It is also extremely efficient: every character can be written with at most 4 keystrokes. In practice, most characters can be written with fewer. There are reports of experienced typists reaching 160 characters per minute with Wubi.〔Wicentowski, Joe. Wubizixing for Speakers of English. 1996. Yale. http://www.yale.edu/chinesemac/wubi/xing.html〕 What this means in the context of Chinese is not entirely the same as it is for English, but it is true that Wubi is extremely fast when used by an experienced typist. The main reason for this is that, unlike with traditional phonetic input methods, one does not have to spend time selecting the desired character from a list of homophonic possibilities: virtually all characters have a unique representation. As its name suggests, the keyboard is divided into five regions. The Chinese character 笔 (bǐ), when used in the context of writing Chinese characters, refers to the brush strokes used in Chinese calligraphy. Each region is assigned a certain type of stroke. * Region 1: horizontal (一) * Region 2: vertical (丨) * Region 3: downwards right-to-left (丿) * Region 4: dot strokes or downwards left-to-right strokes (丶) * Region 5: hook A major drawback to learning Wubi is its learning curve. Memorization and practice are key factors for proficient usage. In this article, the following convention will be used: ''character'' will always mean Chinese character, whereas ''letter'', ''key'' and ''keystroke'' will always refer to the keys on keyboard. == How it works == Essentially, a character is broken down into components, which are usually (but not always) the same as radicals. These are typed in the order in which they would be written by hand. In order to ensure that extremely complex characters do not require an inordinate number of keystrokes, any character containing more than 4 components is entered by typing the first 3 components written, followed by the last. In this way, each character's data can be entered with only 4 keystrokes. Wubi distributes its characters very evenly and as such the vast majority of characters are uniquely defined by the 4 keystrokes discussed above. One then types a space to move the character from the input buffer onto the screen. In the event that the 4 letter representation of the character is ''not'' unique, one would type a digit to select the relevant character (for example, if two characters have the same representation, typing 1 would select the first, and 2 the second). In most implementations, a space can always be typed and simply means 1 in an ambiguous setting. Intelligent software will try to make sure that the character in the default position is the one desired. Many characters have more than one representation. This sometimes is for ease of use, in case there is more than one obvious way to break down a character. More often though, it's because certain characters have a short representation that is less than 4 letters, as well as a "full" representation. For characters with fewer than 4 components that do not have a short form representation, one types each component and then "fills up" the representation (that is, types enough extra keystrokes to make the representation 4 keystrokes) by manually typing the strokes of the last component, in the order they would be written. If there are too many strokes, one should write as many as possible, but put the last stroke last (this mirrors the component rule for characters with more than 4 components outlined above). Once the algorithm is understood, one can type almost any character with a little practice, even if one hasn't typed it before. Muscle memory will make sure that frequent typists using this method don't have to think about how the characters are actually constructed, just as the vast majority of English typists don't think very much about the spelling of words when they write. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Wubi method」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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