智渊别伤心爱兰可以帮你。 我们一起学习吧 in English please?

Let's break this into parts and examine the meaning of each piece:

智渊 (pinyin: zhi-4 yuan-1)  [name]
别   (bie-2)                 don't
伤心 (shang-1 xin-1)         be sad (be depressed, be upset, etc.)
爱兰 (ai-4 lan-2)            [name]
可以 (ke-3 yi-3)             can
帮   (bang-1)                help
你。 (ni-3)                  you.
我们 (wo-3 men)              we
一起 (yi-4 qi-3)             together
学习 (xue-2 xi-2)            study
吧   (ba)                    [ending exclamation]

Roughly translated, this means Zhi-yuan, don't be upset! Ai-lan can help you. Let's study together!

Based on this sentence, we can also guess some context: it is not uncommon in Chinese to reference oneself in the third person. I rewrite the translation to help you understand: Zhi-yuan, don't be upset! I [Ai-lan] can help you. Let's study together!

Let me try to guess some context. This sentence is probably related to school. You may have recently received some scores or grades, and you may not have done too well, so the speaker assumes/imagines that you are disappointed, and he is comforting you and offering help. If I am way off, you may laugh at me.

Amusing how much information one can infer from one sentence.

P.S. Regarding your concern that 爱 means love: you are right--typically used, it means love. However, when used in a name, it is literally part of the name. The word's meaning may give meaning/significance to the name, but it is essentially just the name. In the same way English has names such as Grace, Valentine, and Lily, Chinese has names made of common words that make certain names beautiful--and other names awkward...

P.P.S. Since Chinese is such a tremendously different language than English, and since its history is largely independent of English, it should not be too strange that the punctuation is different. In general, it it best that you use Chinese full-width punctuation (。，) when writing in Chinese and Latin half-width punctuation (.,) when writing in Latin-related languages.


承认 means 'to admit'. It isn't only used when the deed being admitted is wrong or illegal. It can be shameful, embarrassing or simply too shy to admit, which I believe is the situation in your example.
Although 承认 is fine to use, I think an even better word is 坦白, which means 'to confess'. Just like the English word (and like 承认), it's commonly used for sins or guilt, but it can be used for embarrassment or shyness as well.

We confessed that we like each other.
我们坦白了彼此喜欢对方。


xiǎng xiǎng ‘keep on thinking’ vs xiáng xiǎng ‘think for a moment’

I don't think there are any clauses. Both of them are verbs. The different tones express different emotions.

If you say "xiǎng xiǎng", you are emphasizing you are pondering. So you pronounce with stress. For instance, you are quarrelling with someone, and you said "Shut up! Let me think about it!"

And if you say "xiáng xiǎng", most of the time you are imagining (A devil whispering beside you ear "Just think about it, the most beautiful women will be yours"), but some of the time you are pondering (Because you are in the duration of deep thinking, and you don't care your questioner very much, and you are carelessly murmuring).


Understanding the structure, '又什么...' and '又没什么...'

又什么麻烦/ is a wrong expression. The correct one is 有什么麻烦, which could be either a rhetorical or a generic question. The normal expression is 又有什么... and in some cases  有 can be omitted, but you should be careful. In your example, 又有什么不满意 and 又有什么麻烦， 有 should not be omitted.

Well, in 又没(有)什么麻烦, 又 is more like the English word anyway in my opinion. So, 又没(有)什么麻烦 could be interpreted as there isn't any trouble, anyways.

Compare 又没有什么麻烦 and 又有什么麻烦. The latter is a rhetorical device as you said. The former is a normal negative sentence.  Both denote the same underlying meaning, but with a bit different tones, which are the same as the correspondent English sentences.

An interesting phrase I also want to add here is 又什么事，which is short for 又有什么事. In this context, 有 can be omitted. So, I suggest you add 有 all the time unless you know for sure it's right to drop it in your context.


How to interpret 开始起步 in IT企业的电子商务也在1999年开始起步?

Oxford English to Chinese

Start Out

  1 (begin to do sth.) 开始起步

起步 if we look at it literally it means "pick up" + "feet" (steps really but that doesn't sound as good).

So it usually gets translated as

• start

• begin

• In French it's translated as débuter, which also means start or begin but looks like the English debut.

So here's where you're confused it looks like we have 开始 + 起步 as start + start, right?

But if we take the literal translation of 起步 from uptop we could translate it like "began to pick up its feet".

Going off of the French inspiration I would love to translate it as "made its debut", which sounds a lot better.

Dunno if I'm cutting too much out but I would translate the entire sentence IT企业的电子商务也在1999年开始起步 as eCommerce also made its debut in 1999.


拜了个拜 derives from 拜拜 by treating the first 拜 as a verb and the second 拜 as the object of the first 拜 and then adopting the verb+(quantity)个+object pattern.

拜拜 is just a loan word from English bye-bye and mean the same thing.

拜了个拜 is just a novel usage of the word.


The term, 婆羅門, has been used in China for at least 1500 years.

OLDict lists a few dictionaries. All of them transliterate "Brahman" as "婆羅門".

resources:

Digital Dictionary of Buddhism

漢藏梵英佛學術語 (pdf format)

梵漢辭典 Digital Dictionary of Buddhism

There are some Sanskrit-Chinese translations in 《大正藏》54, which can be downloaded in the pdf format. The script of Sanskrit is the Siddham (悉曇體), not the Devanagari (天城體).

《梵語千字文》(1卷)【唐 義淨撰】
《唐梵文字》(1卷)【唐 全真集】
《梵語雜名》(1卷)【唐 禮言集】
《唐梵兩語雙對集》(1卷)【唐 僧怛多蘗多．波羅瞿那彌捨沙集】

～～～～～

《梵漢大辭典》 嘉豐出版社
《漢譯對照梵和大辭典》長春樹出版公司
《梵漢對譯佛教辭典：翻譯名義大集》 新文豐出版公司
《簡明佛教梵英辭典》 長春樹出版社
《基本漢藏梵英佛學術語》 慧炬出版社
《佛學名詞中英巴梵彙集》 慧炬出版社
Language：TC (正體中文)


Help me understand/translate "不留到晚自习就写完多好" (context supplied)

Because there is some uncommon term that OP don't understand.

课代表 so call "class/course representative", is in fact, a helper/assistant roles appointed by the tutor/teacher.  So the author is a "helper" .

这样可以避免我去办公室问作业  : So as a helper, he/she may need to go to the teahcer office to ask about home work for the student if the teacher forget about it.

而且想提前写作业 不留到晚自习就写完多好. What the author mean the he/she are able to do the home work immediately during those spare time between the class, rather than leaving it overnight.


Good Transliteration of the name "Chloe"

The "Hit Girl" actress is 克蘿伊 --

https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E7%A7%91%E6%B4%9B%C2%B7%E8%8E%AB%E7%91%9E%E5%85%B9

   克蘿伊·格雷丝·摩蕾茲 （英语：Chloë Grace Moretz，1997年2月10日－），美國女演員，.......

This page https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chloe shows others with the same 克蘿伊, which seems the most common Chinese rendering of the name.

 克蘿伊‧安格紐，愛爾蘭歌手，女性合唱團體天使女伶（Celtic Woman）的最年輕成員。
 克蘿伊·布莉姬（Chloe Bridges），美國女演員、歌手。
 克蘿伊·瓊斯（Chloe Jones），美國女性色情演員。
 克蘿伊·馬歇爾（Chloe Marshall），英國大尺碼模特兒，2008年薩里小姐冠軍，英國小姐亞軍


Took me a while to find a translation of the poem, by Witter Bynner:

With my wine-bottle, watching by river and lake
For a lady so tiny as to dance on my palm,
I awake, after dreaming ten years in Yangzhou,
Known as fickle, even in the Street of Blue Houses.

It looks as if the translator didn't really get it, but in this poem "rivers and lakes" should be appropriate. The poet was writing about his ten years in 扬州, where there were plenty of rivers and lakes. You could imagine him riding on a vessel, with a drinking vessel in his hand, watching girls dance and wasting himself away.

As for the extended meaning, oh boy that's hard. 金庸 has a book titled 笑傲江湖, when translated to English, it becomes "The Swordsman", "The Legendary Swordsman", "The Smiling, Proud Wanderer", and "Laughing in the Wind". It looks like everyone is spending their best effort to try to avoid translating 江湖.

I guess people doing this because they thought they are translating up to a more prestigious language. They try to avoid anything that's slightly less comprehensible to an English reader, lest he gets offended by a few unrecognizable loanwords and throws the book away.

That's hardly the problem. James Nicoll once said this:

  The problem with defending the purity of the English language is that
  English is about as pure as a cribhouse whore. We don’t just borrow
  words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways
  to beat them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.

English cares not a bit about its purity, so I would suggest that we defile it a little more by translating it as "Rivers and Lakes", or even "Jiang Hu".

江湖 is a world. It's a vastness of turbulence. It's a world where people obtain their loafs at the peril of their lives. It's the world where hermits bide, where wanderers ride, where swordsmen stride, where clans collide... It's like Dungeons and Dragons sans magic and monsters. Now, describe it with an existing English word.

You can't.


What is wrong with my sentence 我的同屋睡觉时候想开屋门一点点?

Since  睡觉 (to sleep) is a verb that doesn't take object,

时候 (time) as a noun cannot follow 睡觉 directly. To resolve the conflict, we  have to add 的 after 睡觉 to make it an adjectival phrase '睡觉的' as in "睡觉的时候" (sleeping time) -- That would then be grammatically correct

In English, the object is usually placed before  the adverbial phrase -- as in   "open the door a little bit"

But in Chinese, the object is usually placed after the adverbial phrase -- as in "开一点点屋门" ( the object '屋门' follows the adverbial phrase '一点点' )


What is the meaning of 及 in the compound word 危及?

及 means to reach. Some examples:

及格: to pass a test. Literally 'to reach the bar'.
长发及腰: 'long hair reaching waistline'.
涉及: to involve. Literally 'intervention reaches to'.
提及: to mention. Literally '(the scope of) mentioning reaches to'.
力所能及: within grasp. Literally 'capability that (one) can reach'.


In Simplified Chinese, 只 is polyphonic. In the sentence, 只 means only, pronounced zhǐ. The meaning you cited corresponds to another pronunciation, zhī, of the character.


Are there characters in which the radicals are the same but the position changes the meaning?

Same meaning:

崕 = 崖 (ㄧㄚˊ / yá) = cliff; precipice

峰 = 峯 (ㄈㄥ / fēng) = peak; summit

毗 = 毘 (ㄆㄧˊ / pí) = to adjoin; to border on

群 = 羣 (ㄑㄩㄣˊ / qún) = group; crowd

飃 = 飄 (ㄆㄧㄠ / piāo) = to float

鄰 = 隣 (ㄌㄧㄣˊ / lín) = neighbor; adjacent

Different meanings:

早 (ㄗㄠˇ / zǎo) = early; morning
旪 (ㄒㄧㄝˊ / xié) = 協 = agreement

吟 (ㄧㄣˊ / yín) = to chant; to recite
含 (ㄏㄢˊ / hán) = to contain; to keep in mouth

旱 (ㄏㄢˋ / hàn) = drought; dry
旰 (ㄍㄢˋ / gàn) = 傍晚 = sunset; dusk

岳 (ㄩㄝˋ/ yuè) = mountain; peak
岴 (ㄑㄩ/ qū) = 嶇 = rugged; rough

星 (ㄒㄧㄥ / xīng) = star
甠 (ㄑㄧㄥˊ / qíng) = 晴 = clear (weather)

啻 (ㄔˋ / chì) = only
啼 (ㄊㄧˊ / tí) = cry; crow

There are many many others.


How does 土口 match 'a person wearing a pendant'?

There is no pendant in the character. 「袁」 (Mandarin: yuán) originally meant to wear (clothes), where

「土」 is a corruption of 「又」, a picture of a hand, signifying the action of wearing clothes, and
「口」 is a corruption of 「〇」 (yuán), a phonetic hint.

「〇」 is the shape of a circle, and this word is now written as 「圓」.

商甲庫1022合集33692
「袁」 was originally 「⿰衣又」, which is an abstract depiction of a hand 「又」 putting on robes 「衣」. This word is now written as 「擐」 (Baxter-Sagart OC: /*[ɢ]ʷˤren-s/).

「擐」 (to wear, put on) is made by

Adding on an additional semantic 「扌・手」

Complexifying 「袁」 to a pure phonetic 「瞏」 (something like /*[ɢ]ʷˁ<r>en/) by adding on 「目・罒」 to the top.

「瞏」 is systematically written as 「睘」 today across all characters.

「⿰衣又」 had a few variants, produced by some small modifications in two main ways:

Sometimes, multiple 「又」 were included, and 「又」 at the top was further corrupted into 「止」.
商甲1648懷特甲骨集商甲存・下506合集31774

Other times, 「〇」 (/*ɢʷ<r>en/) was added as a phonetic hint.
商甲寧滬1.501合集27756商甲2061 (⿰彳袁)小屯南甲骨

「〇」 is the shape of a circle, and this word is now written as 「圓」.

Both of these modifications were eventually incorporated:
西周金史墻盤 (遠)集成10175
Later,

「止」 merged with the top part of 「衣」 and was further corrupted into 「土」
「〇」 was systematically corrupted into 「口」 across all Chinese characters

秦簡秦律十八87 (遠)睡虎地秦簡今楷

References:

季旭昇《說文新證》
殷墟甲骨文中の「遠」「（邇）」と関連字
小學堂
國學大師

郭沫若《甲骨文合集》
中國社會科學院考古研究所《殷周金文集成》
許進雄《懷特氏等收藏甲骨文集》
中國社會科學院考古研究所《小屯南地甲骨》

漢語多功能字庫


A guy looked at me in the bathroom, what should I have said

I don't think there is any "appropriate" response for the old guy since his behavior is abnormal. But you can think about it if it happens in your hometown and how would you react or say in English? Maybe some curse words or yelling.


In mainland China, we say 今天 mostly. I have never heard of 本日 personally. 今日 should only be used in a formal setting like a newspaper or a TV program.


How to distinguish PICTURE OF ME and PICTURE OF MINE in Chinese?

这是我的照片 can be interpreted as "It is a photo of me" or "It is a photo that belong to me"

To avoid confusion, you can write:

这照片是我的 = "this photo is mine"
这照片中的人是我  = "the person in this photo is me"
这照片上的人是我  = "the person on this photo is me"

照片 = photo; picture

图片= graphic; picture


Where can I get a Chinese language word list?

For NLP, I guess you need Chinese word segmentation. A normal dictionary will probably not suffice. You need to look at specialized tools like https://github.com/fxsjy/jieba or https://github.com/lancopku/pkuseg-python


Why is 秘书 (lit. "secret book") the Chinese word for "secretary"?

秘 = secret --> private

书 = 书记 = clerk; secretary

秘 has the meaning of 'secret' , and it extends to 'private'

书 in 秘书 doesn't mean book, it is short for 书記 (clerk; secretary), a job title.

In fact, another common translation of 'secretary' is "书记" as in  "党书记" ( Party secretary)

秘书 is literally a "private secretary"

书记 can be working for a department or for one person, to differentiate the two, we also have the term 私人书记 (personal clerk) = 秘书 (private  secretary)


What is the phenomenon of putting a verb twice in a sentence called?

I think this apparent phenomenon is more the result of the Chinese propensity for brevity and omission, omission especially of pronouns. I would not say this is unique to Chinese. Both sentences can be altered so that there is no repetition. If there are two propositions, you need 2 clauses.

I ride my bike, (I) ride 100 Km every day.
I've been writing my doctoral thesis, (I've been) writing the whole day.

P1: I ride my bike every day. 我每天都骑自行车。P2: I ride 100 Km every day. 我每天都骑100公里。

我可以骑自行车每天骑100km。
I (can) ride my bike every day and every day I ride 100 Km.
I (can) ride my bike every day. Every day I ride 100 Km.
1a. 我可以每天骑100公里自行车。(Probably not referring to a 100 Km long bike!)
I (can) ride my bike 100 Km every day.
我已经写博士论文写了一整天。
2a. 我已经写博士论文一整天了。


Tl;dr: Your interpreting 息 as 'to cease' is incorrect. 出息 as we know it in modern Chinese is a much derived, figurative meaning.

It is better to parse the word as 沒/出息, i.e. understand 出息 altogether. This is also for the fact that the meaning of 沒 is uncontentious. Also, 息 surely is not a verb meaning 'to cease', because it does not make sense with 出 here. In classical Chinese, 息 can also mean 'breath' (the only definition that fits its glyph origin), or 'profit; proliferation'. That is to say, pay attention to its polysemy, and choose the meaning that makes the most sense.

Let us look at the definitions of 出息 chū xī/xí (息 in first or second tone; mainland Chinese uses the first tone, whereas the second tone is predominantly used in Taiwan) first.

佛教用語。稱呼出的氣息為「出息」。
生產所得的利潤。《喻世明言．卷二．陳御史巧勘金釵鈿》：「梁尚賓聽說，心中又忿，又見價錢相因，有些出息放他不下。」《紅樓夢．第五六回》：「一年在園裡辛苦到頭，這園裡既有出息，也是分內該沾帶些的。」

These are very literal renderings of the word, uncommon and rather archaic: the first entry means 'n. expiration; out-breath' (Sanskrit apāna), which is used specifically in Buddhist contexts. The second entry means 'n. yield; profit (息) from labour/production (出)'. Examples of which are drawn from classics like Dream of the Red Chamber. Note how these correspond to the meaning of 息 in classical Chinese (as listed in point 1.), but none means 'to cease'.

Now let us look at the definitions of 出息 chū xi (息 in neutral tone).

努力向上的趨勢。《老殘遊記二編．第四回》：「把我們的待你好意，都摔到東洋大海裡去，真沒良心！真沒出息！」《文明小史．第三一回》：「從來說三代以下惟恐不好名，能夠好名這人總算還有出息。」
利益、好處。《官場現形記．第二五回》：「現在這兩年，聽說出息比前頭好，所以價錢也就放大了。」
少年男女到了青春期間，體態容貌轉為美好出眾。《紅樓夢．第二七回》：「見智能兒越發長高了，模樣兒越發出息了。」

They mean something like 'prospects; an inclination to persevere and work hard', 'benefit', and 'blooming' (as in one's youth) respectively. The commonest use, however, is the first entry. It appears to be most related to the second non-Buddhist literal definition: we say someone is promising if we think they have the potential to achieve something in life (to produce achievement, so to speak). To contrast polysemy, we drop the tone for the second character when we intend the more colloquial, figurative, and derived meaning.
A word of caution: I believe relating the literal 'profit from labour' to the figurative 'prospects' is the most sensible, but I do not have authoritative evidence. This is however based on the observation that 1) the gain of neutral tone in the second character of compound words usually indicates derivation, and 2) the remaining literal sense of 出息 chū xī/xí is rather limited to Buddhist contexts. Regarding the etymology of 出息 as we mean it today, I found a dubious article that claims it is related to the State of Xi, which I think is too far-fetched.

What is described above is not a unique phenomenon. E.g.: 買賣 mǎi mài means literally 'the collective act of buying and selling'. But 買賣 mǎi mai means figuratively (and somehow colloquially) 'a transaction'. See the first point in my answer to another question here.

So, if you say someone is 有出息, you are commending their effort and regarding them as succeeding in a certain aspect. If you say 沒出息, you mean otherwise. Essentially you think they are unpromising, or good-for-nothing. Perhaps you think they haven't worked hard enough to prove otherwise.

Reference for points 2. and 3.: 教育部重編國語辭典修訂本


Why is 不 sometimes put between the syllables of a 2-syllable word?

There are only two potential particles, and they are 得 and 不
When a potential particle is inserted between a verb and its result complement, it turn that verb from an active verb into a potential verb
Examples:

看見 = See
看得見 = can see
看不見 = can’t see

~

聽到 = hear
聽得到 = can hear
聽不到 = can‘t hear

When an adverb 不 or 沒 is placed before a verb, it funcutions as  ‘not’ and ‘have not’ respectively.
Examples:

看 = to see
不看 = not to see

~

有看 = have seen
沒看 = have not seen


What's the difference between 蓓 (bèi) and 萌 (méng), both nouns that mean "bud"?

Generally:

萌 is a verb meaning to bud.
蓓 is a noun meaning bud.

蓓 is usually just a compound character only found in the word 蓓蕾.


How to say: subway line is not in operation

今天部分蓝色地铁线路中止/暂停运行。

Operation has a lot of similar meanings. But 操作 is not appropriate here since it's usually used with machines or computers. For a subway line, 运行 is much better because 行 means moving. 运营 is OK but it's usually used for companies or long term activities.

And in Chinese there is no predictive so you need to add a predicate like 停止、中止、暂停.


铁观音　Tie Guanyin Tea / tat-kuan-yin Tea / Iron Buddha Tea
乌龙茶　Oolong Tea
黑茶　Dark Tea
红茶　Black Tea
龙井茶　Longjing Tea / Lungching Tea / Dragon Well Tea
君山银针　Junshan Silver Needle Tea
碧螺春　Biluochun Tea
牡丹绣球　Peony Jasmine Tea
黄山毛峰　Huangshan Maofeng Tea
岩茶　Rock Tea
冻顶乌龙　Dongding Oolong Tea
菊花茶　Chrysanthemum Tea
台湾阿里山乌龙　Taiwan Alishan Oolong Tea
大红袍　Dahongpao Tea (Wuyi Mountain Rock Tea)
普洱　Pu'er Tea
祁门红茶　Keemun Black Tea
茉莉花茶　Jasmine Tea
陈年普洱　Aged Pu'er Tea
立顿红茶　Lipton Black Tea
台湾冻顶乌龙　Taiwan Dongding Oolong Tea
绿茶　Green Tea
太平猴魁　Taiping Houkui Tea 　(A kind of Green Tea)
西湖龙井　Xihu Longjing Tea 　(A kind of Green Tea)
大白毫　White Milli-Silver Needle Tea
信阳毛尖　Xinyang Maojian Tea　 (A kind of Green Tea)

Source : http://www.dxmtea.com/captions.asp?id=585, and multiple others

So your package showed 铁观音 (Tie Guanyin Tea) 神品(Shen Pin, This is a brand maybe) 藏香 (Stock Flavored) 真空无氧包装(Vacuumed and oxygen-free packaging) 茶叶新鲜原味(Fresh and Original Flavor Tea).

铁观音 is a kind of Oolong Tea here, this package assumes you already knew it's a name of tea.


What is the most efficient method in memorising written characters so as to expand written vocabulary?

The only thing I found valuable when I was studying Japanese 30 years ago was write small sentences until I was able to memorize them. I'm trying that with Chinese now and that's also very efficient.


Reduplication of Adverb + Adjective in 很细很细

Wayne Cheah wrote :

  What is the purpose of "很细很细" -- same as "very, very small..."

And that should be the answer. I would give more examples to support it

很细的针 a very small needle

很细很细的针 a very very small needle / a small small needle

很遠的地方 a far away place/ a place far away

很遠很遠的地方 a very very far away place/ a place far far away

很大的手 Very large hand (a big one)

很大很大的手 very very large hand (a huge one)


Characteristics of Northern and Southern accents

If you're looking for specific characteristics of particular accents, there are a couple I have noticed that have been fairly reliable.

I'm usually able to tell whether someone is from Shanghai (or a nearby Wu-dialect area) based on the way they pronounce the word 能 (néng).  Instead of the standard [nəŋ], they often say [nəɲ].  Note the [ɲ] (a palatal nasal sound) rather than [ŋ] (a velar nasal sound).  You can hear the differences on the Wikipedia pages that I linked.  If you happen to listen to ChinesePod, you may notice that Jenny typically pronounces 能 this way.  The reason for this particular pronunciation is because in Shanghainese and other Wu dialects, [ŋ] and [ɲ] are allophones of the same consonant and [ɲ] always occurs after the vowel /ə/.

Tianjin folks sometimes pronounce initial w- as [ʋ] (a labiodental approximate sound that sounds somewhat like [v]).  There was some discussion of this sound on a post in the Beijing Sounds blog.  I don't necessarily know the real explanation for this, but this sound did exist in Late Middle Chinese (ca. 1200 AD) and is transcribed by linguists as mv- (see note 2 under the table in this link).  All the mv- sounds merged with w- and Mandarin and m- in Cantonese (e.g., 未 is wèi in Mandarin and mei in Cantonese), but it might be that in the Tianjin dialect w- merged with mv- and both came to be pronounced as [ʋ] (this is purely my speculation though).

If we go to more general dialectical characteristics, you can often find free variation of initial n- and l- consonants in the south, particularly in Cantonese-speaking regions.  There is also free variation of h- and f- around south-central China (i.e., Hunan region).  The latter probably has something to do with the fact that many /x/ and /ɣ/ sounds in Middle Chinese shifted to /x/ or /f/ (which correspond to pinyin h- and f-, respectively) in various modern dialects.


How do current Mandarin speakers usually pronounce 阿Ｑ正传?

Generally speaking, in modern practice, Chinese speakers pronouce mixed English letters as is. for example:

  5A级景区

is pronouced as "wu3 ei1 ji2 jing3 qu1"

阿Q正传 is somehow different, because the author had explicitely mentioned in this novelette that Q should be pronounced as 桂 or 贵. (Note that back in the era of this novelette Chinese people were just starting to get familiar with western cultures so there was no established rules as how to incorporate English letter pronouciations in Chinese context.)

What I have experienced, when famous theatre companies present the play of 阿Q正传, they were always faithful to the original novelette and pronouced "gui4" in the play. However in daily speech, people sometimes just follow common practice and forget that this should be a special case.


甲is the first stem of Celestial or Heavenly Stems. We use 甲 as 第一(NO.1) or 顶级(top). Hence, 桂林山水甲天下 means 桂林山水天下第一。

甲天下 means best in the world or No.1 in the world

Anohter example, Lega Serie A is the top football league in Italy, which is translated as 意大利甲级联赛。


What is 佈施? I found it on a bilingual blog

I guess you might want to tag it as religion (or move it to religion section in SE) as this is a question more related to buddhism than chinese language.  From this link:

布施

指把自身所擁有或所知道的施予他人。除了財物的布施 (財布施) 外，還包括佛法的傳揚 (法布施) 和信心的給予 (無畏布施)。

I'll try giving a simple explanation:

It means to give / donate all you have / all you knows (your knowledges) to others.  Other than giving out all your wealth, it includes spreading of buddhism and giving others confident.


Does /Ĩ/ *really* exist in Southwestern Mandarin?

Yes they use /l/.
People from the Southwest sometimes can not distinguish /n/ and /l/ very well.
For example,  牛奶 [milk], in standard mandarin it should be [niu2 nai3]; however, people from the southwest usually say [liu12 lai4]; even if when they are trying to speak mandarin, they prounance like [liu2 lai3].


Why is 就 needed in 美國國務院稱華府仍未就卡舒吉案下定論? If it's needed, shouldn't it precede 仍未?

For question 1

The word 就 actually bears a lot of meaning, you can check it out here.

Commonly, we use 就 as would, for example,

 你   再    吵  ,  你  就    死     定    了.
You again noisy, you would die for sure.    (Literal translation)

But, in formal literature (such as news), 就 is normally treated as a preposition as with regard to. To be simple, you can think of 就 as 對 in such situation.

For question 2

In modern Chinese, adverb comes before preposition.

adverb -> preposition

Since, 就 is a preposition in such situation, and 仍未 is an adverb. It is normal that 仍未 should come before 就.

P/S: You won't want to use 就 as with regard to when speaking, people won't understand it.


To understand the differences properly, you need to know what is 面 and what is 边. 面 is a face whereas 边 is an edge. An edge is like a line guiding you the direction. A face is what is facing you giving you a sense of position.

前/后面 is used to describe the position of something within your visual range. Whereas, 前/后边 is more appropriately used to describe
something beyond visual range when giving directions.

  镜子前面 (in front of the mirror) vs 车站前边 (beyond that bus stop in front)

外/里面 is used to describe location of an object in relation to another object. 外/里边 is used strictly
for giving directions.

  书包里面 (inside the school bag) vs 巷子里边 (in that alley)

左/右面 is used mainly to point to the left or right face of an
object. 左/右边 is used to describe left or right side directions.

  墙的左面 (on the left face of that wall) vs 车道左边 (left side of the
  roadway)

In summary, when you are giving directions, use 边; when you are describing positions, use 面.


Is "(t 某某, s 某某)" accepted notation for showing traditional and simplified characters together?

Never.
Although you may think such notation is convenient, Chinese people really dislike using Latin notations in Chinese books, especially for linguistics.
They use:

"动" instead of "v." for verbs
"名" instead of "n." for nouns
"繁" instead of your "t" for Traditional Chinese.


Sogou IME (on Ubuntu): How to output pinyin with tone marks?

I struggled for many months to work out how produce Pinyin with the tone marks.  Eventually I managed it by installing the Ubuntu ibus (Intelligent Input Bus - core) currently using version 1.5.11.  I also have ibus-pinyin installed but to get the Latin alphabet with the tone marks including ǖ ǘ ǚ ǜ as well as the normal ū ú ǔ ù and of course all the other vowels just by typing the tone number you also need to install ibus-m17n .  This has the input method Chinese Hanyu Pinyin(m17n) as just described and also tonepy(m17n) which gives you a nice trimmed down list of the simplified Chinese characters filtered by the tone number you type when you want to type the characters instead of the Pinyin.  Probably too late for the original questioner but this information is so difficult to find on-line I thought it was worth adding for future reference.


What suffix of location is more natural in Standard Mandarin : 头, 面 or 边?

There are regional and personal differences.
I personally usually use 边. (BTW I am a native.)
面 is also OK and feels neutral to me.
头 sometimes sounds like having a dialectal flavor to me. Also, the different combinations are not always the same. For instance,
里头 feels quite neutral but 东头 feels more dialectal to me.


What is the difference between 认为 and 以为?

以为 carries with it the nuance of thinking or considering something mistakenly.

  我以为你们已经分手了。 - I thought you had already broken up (but it seems you're still together.)

认为 doesn't have any such connotation and can be used generally to mean "to think," "to consider."

  我认为他是我最重要的朋友。 - I consider him to be my most important friend.


Proper way to use sentence-final particles (like 啦 or 喽) in spoken Chinese

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_exclamative_particles

But use of exclamative particles is highly informal, and it is advised that they not be used in formal documents or academic papers, unless it is specifically required to do so (such as the case of narrative telling). Some common examples are shown below.

了   le  modal particle intensifying preceding clause / completed action marker
呢   ne  question particle for subjects already mentioned
吧   ba  modal particle indicating polite suggestion / ...right? / ...OK?
哦   ó   oh
啊   a   modal particle ending sentence, showing affirmation, approval, or consent
啦   la  sentence-final particle, contraction of "了啊" / follows after each item in a list of examples
呀   ya  "softening" particle used in questions; may also be used like 啊 after a vowel, expressing surprise or doubt
嗎/吗 ma  question tag / not for open-ended questions

I should add that each of these characters, with the exception of 了, have the 口 radical. This suggests that they should only be used with the mouth (oral communication) and are informal. They are not generally used in formal papers/documents.

So, in summary, there isn't a "proper time" for when they should be used in colloquial conversation, just only when you think it will give that added emphasis you're looking for... whether it be cute (我们一起吃饭啦！) or demanding（你跟我吃饭嘛...)。 Just like in English how there aren't really specified times you should be using aww you guys are so cute, or pfft that was lame, or gee could ya take any longer??, it's just there to add some flavor.


Where to place 了 when using an auxiliary verb?

I think it's OK with or without 了

因为我喜欢读中文书，所以我开始了自学汉语。

因为我喜欢读中文书，所以我开始自学汉语。

The problem, as I see it, is: How can you know you like to read Chinese books before you have studied Chinese?? You cannot have read any! Kind of grates on logic!

为了能够看懂中文，我开始了自学汉语。
In order to be able to read Chinese, I began to study the Chinese language.


This form of abbreviation is only reserved for special dates. Some popular Chinese holidays take this abbreviated form:

六一 == 儿童节
十一 == 国庆节
五一 == 劳动节

Any date can potentially become "special" following a major event or incident that occurred on that date or for a short period of time surrounding the said date. The abbreviated form is, therefore, used to identify the event:

四一二讲话 the speech made on April 12th or the April 12th speech

This is predicated on the fact that the listener is fully aware of both the date and the event in question. The abbreviated form would be meaningless otherwise.

A dot, "·", may be added between the month and the day in writing, especially when there is a possible ambiguity:

一·二四 January 24th
一二·四 December 4th

The reading stays the same, however.


Do you know the Chinese character which is formed by 王 on the left and 力 on the right?

玏  http://www.zdic.net/z/1e/js/738F.htm
Pinyin: lè

基本字义 (basic meaning)
See : 瑊 http://www.zdic.net/z/1e/js/744A.htm
瑊 - 似玉的美石 (jade-like gemstones)

康熙字典 (Kangxi Dictionary)

本作。 也。今省作玏，謂石之次玉者。
Original character: . Now simplified as '玏'.  It means "lesser gemstones that is similar to jade"

Note:
In my opinion, naming a child '玉' emphasis his or her nobleness and being precious--(賈寶玉 is a good example).  Some modest people might feel that is too boastful, opt for the more humble word  '玏' instead. wishing the child will has noble-like quality, but can also relate to the common people.


What does this mean in English, very few words (Screenshot inside)?

illusional romance

梦幻：梦是睡觉时的妄想，幻是魔术师的表演。二个都是虚假的。

情缘：情通常指男女爱情，缘是缘分(the fate, the lot, the second cause)。

补充：

'梦幻' also means '美好的'(extraordinary, too good to be true)。
For example: 梦幻音乐。 It means wonderful music instead of fake music.

So, it depends on the whole story.
'梦幻情缘' may be a beautiful love when the story is real and good.


a better translation for the expression "psychology is dead"

Friedrich Nietzsche: "Gott ist tot."

Well-known translation: 上帝已死。

  Stephen Hawking: "Philosophy is dead."

Well-known translation: 哲学已死。

Thus I believe the best translation for "Psychology is dead" should be 心理学已死。

PS: Of course, without context, one might hardly understand the meaning, but any other translation won't do either. So an idiom-like expression fits.


Are there published adaptations of the Analects in Modern Mandarin?

Yes. There are "vernacular translations" (白话译文)  putting the Analects themselves in modern Chinese language.  Several of these can be found by searching "论语" "译文".  I have not surveyed how many.


How do I say "most of the time" in Mandarin?

一般
Tuttle Learner's

1 generally speaking, ordinarily
每星期一上午我们一般都开会。
Měi Xīngqīyī shàngwǔ wǒmen yìbān dōu kāihuì.
We usually have a meeting every Monday morning.

Guifan defines this as:

3 形 占绝大多数的
学生们一般都很尊重老师。

占绝大多数的 can also include time here so there's no need to specifically emphasize 时间 unless you want/need to.
You can even opt for a 一般来说 if you're in the mood, which KEY defines as:

generally speaking, generally, by and large

and Guifan gives the following example sentence:

一般来说, 雨天他是不会来的

Which roughly translates to something like:

Usually, when it rains, he won't come.


Can someone please translate what she has on her back?

It says 主幸活, but this is not a phrase, just three Characters representing three concepts
主 short for "天主" (Lord in heaven) or simply "主" (The Lord), meaning God
幸 short for "幸福" (happiness)
活 short for "生活"(n) (living) or "活著"(adj) (alive)
The tattoo implies "believe in God and you will live a happy life"

I suspect she confused "生活"(living) with "生命" (life)
"God. Happiness. Life" make more sense than "God. Happiness. Living(n)"


很 - very
真 - really
挺 - pretty
非常 - >= very, < extremely
相当 - quite
极为 - extremely
太 -  too

These words are describing a 'level'.
挺 = 蛮 = 比较 < 很 <= 非常 = 特别 < 极为

太 is somehow special, means it is much more than you expected.

鞋太大：The shoes are larger than your size, regardless of whether your feet are large or small.

I'm answering this question by my sense as a native Chinese speaker.

蛮 is not that commonly or widely used in north China. (but people all can understand), maybe southern Chinese prefer to use it. And I believe it is widely used in Taiwan.


How to translate "doesn't lift a finger" and "without lifting a finger"?

EDIT
OK,you mean somebody is lazy,there are many idioms to describe such people,such as

游手好闲：指人游荡懒散，不愿参加劳动。
好逸恶劳：逸：安逸；恶：讨厌、憎恨。贪图安逸，厌恶劳动。
坐享其成：享：享受；成：成果。自己不出力而享受别人取得的成果。
坐吃山空：只坐着吃，山也要空。指光是消费而不从事生产，即使有堆积如山的财富，也要耗尽。
不劳而获：获：获取，得到。自己不劳动却占有别人的劳动成果。
饱食终日：终日：整天。整天吃饱饭，不动脑筋，不干什么正经事。

In fact,it's too gentle to use these idioms to describe the lazy ones,using Xiehouyu(歇后语) is a good idea.for example:

懒驴子驾辕 - 不打不走
懒大嫂赶场 - 中间不急两头忙
懒婆娘坐轿 - 愿上不愿下
懒婆娘的针线筐 - 乱七八糟
懒鸡婆抱窝 - 守着摊几过
懒木匠的锯子 - 不错(链)
懒人的铺盖 - 不理
懒驴上磨 - 屎尿多(比喻懒惰的人一到干正事，便寻找借口逃避)
懒婆娘的裹脚 - 又长又臭(比喻文章篇幅长，内容空洞)
懒厨子做席 - 不想给你吵(炒)
倒了油瓶都不扶 - 懒到家了
吃死老公睡崩床 - 懒婆娘
鹰饱不抓兔，兔饱不出窝 - 懒对懒

As for me and my friends,we often use 倒了油瓶都不扶，in the past time,the oil is very precious for every Chinese family to use when they are cooking ,so how lazy someone is if he can allow the oil drain away.


Attack them when they are unready, take them by surprise ： 这个成语有多少方法可以说？

Usually you can use any of them, but "攻其无备，出其不意" is the best one.
The reason is this word is from 《孙子兵法》, an ancient military book by a famous military strategist Sun Wu(孙武), and it is "攻其无备，出其不意" originally in that book.
Also, in 《现代汉语词典》（第7版）, there is "攻其无备，出其不意" under "出其不意" as an example.


I don't know about the phrase "tapping in the dark" because my limited English.

But 摸着石头过河 basically means try to do something via trials and errors. So my translation would be:

No, I have no idea, I'm still learning while doing it/I'm just trying to do what I can.


Different pronunciation for the number 'one'?

In the mainland of China (I don't know how people in Taiwan use this character, sorry), people usually use "yao" when reading numerical serial numbers, digit by digit. One typical application is the phone number. In almost all other cases, only "yi" should be used.

Why can it mean "one"?

The character for "yao" is "幺". Which originally (in classic Chinese) means "young,little". Especially this meaning is used (still used nowadays, very popular here in Chengdu) to refer to the youngest child in a family.

I believe the meaning "one" extends from this meaning, since 1 is the "youngest" element in natural number family (without 0).

Why is it used as "one"?

As Bathrobe pointed out, once this was very popular in military actions, to avoid the misunderstanding as 七, to express the numbers more clearly.


To translate directly:

  Even if making a mistake this time, it is still preferred for the fear of
  missing the moment.

In other words, it means one would rather take this opportunity (perhaps once in a lifetime opportunity) to do something even if it means making a mistake.

For the full lyrics of this song 给我一首歌的时间 by Jay Chou, please refer to this link.


在 in 你在吗? means 'is present'
大考时你在这里吗? = Were you here during the final exam?
大考时你在那里吗? = Were you there during the final exam?
大考时你在(学校)吗? = Were you at the school during the final exam?
大考时你在吗? = Were you present during the final exam? (It doesn't mention where the final exam took place, so you can use 'were present' or 'were there')
Similarly:
他犯案时你在現場吗? = Were you at the scene when he committed the crime?
他犯案时你在吗? = Were you present/ there when he committed the crime?


What semantic notions underlie 女 (woman) with 妖 (goblin, fradulent, gorgeous)?

Here is the entry for 妖 from the Outlier dictionary:

FORM
妖 yāo is composed of 夭 yāo (also yǎo) and 女 “woman; female; people in general,” pointing to the original meaning “gorgeous, lovely.” 夭 gives the sound.
COMPONENTS
女
In 妖, 女 “woman; female; people in general” is a meaning component, pointing to the original meaning “gorgeous, lovely.”
夭
In 妖 yāo, 夭 yāo (also yǎo) is a sound component.
MEANINGS
Character meanings
yāo
1 (orig.) gorgeous, lovely
2 → seductive, bewitching
　3 ⇒ witch
　　4 ⇛ devil, demon
　　5 ⇛ weird, strange

The meaning tree is especially helpful for seeing how word meanings evolved over time. They also cite a reference for this work:

王力 主編，2000《王力古漢語字典》，北京：中華書局，2007年重印。p. 189

The reference might have more of the same if that is what you are looking for.
To answer your other question: 男 is very rarely used as a character component; if something were related to men, you’d more than likely see a 亻component instead. ⿰亻夭 does have its own character: 仸.


How did 爽 (an elephant holding 2 weapons under each armpit), semantically shift to mean aglow, gleaming; "frank"?

I have no idea where did you get elephant from?
This is clearly a guy holding his hand out to a fire in a cold winter.
so 爽 means feeling sweet/great


“挾怨報復”：心懷怨恨而報仇（bear resentment against somebody and retaliate）。
這的確是很常用的詞語，但大部分詞典只有相同意思的“挾嫌報復”。
This is indeed a very common word. But most of the dictionaries list only "挾嫌報復" which has the same meaning.

如果前輩很喜歡“雞蛋裡挑骨頭”或刻意曲解你的報告，是可以用此詞。
If the predecessor is very picky or deliberately twists your reports, you do be able to use this term.

“一朝權在手，便把令來行”：一旦握有權勢，便下命令。(Once the ascendancy is held, the commands are given.)
這和你敘述的情形只有一點相關，就是：他因為是前輩，所以比較有權勢。
但這句不含“故意找麻煩（報仇）”的意思。
“便把令來行”不一定和報仇有關。
There is only one point related to the situation; i.e., because of being a senior, he is more powerful.
But this sentence doesn't mean "deliberately looking for trouble (revenge)".
"便把令來行" is not necessarily related to revenge.

“心胸狹窄，倚勢挾權”：此二詞連在一起是指“度量小的人濫用權勢”。
這和你敘述的情形有兩點相關：
其一，你指正他，但他不能包容，是和“心胸狹窄”有關。
其二，他用前輩的權勢。
這句有一點“報仇”的意思，但不太明顯。
"心胸狹窄，倚勢挾權": These two phrases together mean that "a narrow-minded person abuses the privilege".
There are two aspects related to the case.
1. You corrected his reports, but he couldn't tolerate. It's connected with "心胸狹窄".
2. He takes advantage of the power of a predecessor.
This sentence implies "revenge" a little, but less obvious.

“倚老賣老”：賣弄老資格 (to flaunt one's seniority)。
這和你敘述的情形只有一點相關，就是：他是前輩。
This is relevant only to that "he is a predecessor".

“竊弄威權”：暗地裡玩弄權勢 (to abuse authority secretly)。
這和你敘述的情形只有一點相關，就是：他用前輩的權勢。
This is related to that "he uses the power of a predecessor".

比較這幾個詞語，還是“挾怨報復／挾嫌報復”較適用。
Comparison of these words, "挾怨報復／挾嫌報復" is still more applicable.
Good choice!


Which classifier for window (窗户) is regularly used?

一扇窗户 refers to a window on the wall, while 一个窗户 refers to the object (frame and glass) of the window.

In most cases, 一扇窗户 is the only correct choice, 一个窗户 should not be used even in everyday speaking.

However, 一个窗户 is more appropriate when:

the window is not installed on the wall yet.
the window refers to something in computer interface (窗口).
the window refers to a car window.
the window (窗口) refers to a counter (in a bank etc.).


Modern Chinese dictionaries include several methods for the user to look up a character.

Radicals: This is useful when you don't know how to pronounce a character;
Pinyin in alphabet: This is useful when you don't know how to write a character while you know its sound;
Number for strokes: Based on my own experience, this only shown some characters that are difficult to find the right radical, i.e "承";
The "Four Corner" method (四角号码): It's a method to enumerate every character in 5 digits max, according to the writing of the character. This is useful for someone who doesn't know Pinyin and I have never used it.


Differences between 滑鼠 (huá shŭ) and 鼠标 (shŭ biāo)

They both refer to the physical mouse device. Which translation to use depends on where you are using the term. In Mainland China 鼠标 is used whereas in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and other places 滑鼠 is more preferred.

Reference: 維基百科


Optional components in conditional statements

作為「假使」(if)的句子，如果全部省略假使/假如/如果/要是和就，有的時候會不太容易瞭解，例如下面這個句子就不清楚：

As a IF sentence, if we omit not only 假使/假如/如果/要是 but also 就, sometimes it can become hard to be understood. For example (bad one):

  明天下雨，不去了。(If it rains tomorrow, we will not take the road.)

但是如果加上假使/假如/如果/要是或是就，意思就很明白。也就是說，句型1～6會比較好，而這四個都可以如此構句。

But if we add 假使/假如/如果/要是 or 就, it would sound perfectly clear. In other words, construction 1~6 would be better, and all these four IF-words can be used this way.
這四個假如沒有絕對哪個比較正式，省略的話，也跟正式與否無關。（如果硬要區分，要是比較口語一些）

All these four IF-words are actually not different in terms of formality. And if we omit them, it does not concern the formality, neither. (If we really want to distinguish between them, 要是 is more oral. )


Why this joke is not funny? Because it doesn't have any twist and turn. And the so call wordplay is too straight forward to be called wordplay

The man's wife in the countryside is named Yiku (忆苦 - remembering hardship) and the man's other wife in the city is named Sitian (思甜 - think of the sweet (life))

Most people would deduct that a couple named their daughter 忆苦 to remind her the hard life they endured as a family when she was young. And can't help but sympathize with her.

In short, the joke is stating 'country life is tough, city life is sweet'


It depends on what dialect you're writing in. For example, Cantonese (primarily used in Hong Kong) has slang versions that is different from Mandarin.

In Mandarin

I'm a good boy
乖仔 (this is in cantonese and is a slang). It means, "Good boy!"
我很聽話 (this is universal). It literally means, "I listen." But it in practice means, "I'm well behaved."

Hell yeah:
棒死了 (this means "fresh to death!")
The important word is "棒", which means "awesome."
Alternatively, some people use "酷" as a slang. This literally means "Cool" and sounds like "cool" in Chinese.

I so great
我好勁
The important word is "勁," which means "strength" or "great"
This is slang term. But if someone read this, they would laugh.


Having 人 in the name is not uncommon, especially the first character of the first name

  "人 (X) " = 人中之(X) "  = (X) among man

Examples:

苗人鳳 - phoenix among man

狄人傑 - elite among man

張人龍 - dragon among man

蒒人貴 - noble among man

聶人王 - king among man

It is less common to have 人 in the second character of a first name,  because 人 is pronounced the same as '仁', which is a far more popular second character in first name

Many people might not want their child to have to correct people all the time by telling them it is '人' not '仁' in his name

But it is not unreasonable to use 人 as the second character of a first name

  (X)人 = (X)之人 = 'a man who (X)'

Examples:

張學人 - a man who learns

陳正人 - a man who is just

陸敬人 - a man who is respectful

Of course, 張學人, 陳正人 and 陸敬人 might have to tell people all the time that their names are not 張學仁, 陳正仁 and 陸敬仁 (all legitimate names)


The Wikipedia article on Abing says,

  Abing's most famous piece is entitled Erquan Yingyue (二泉映月, engl.: The Moon's Reflection on the Second Spring), which is named after a spring in Wuxi (which is today part of Xihui Park). It is still played as a standard erhu piece, although it necessitates a special set of strings that are tuned lower than normal erhu strings.

The entry on Xihui Park mentions:

  The Second Spring under Heaven was the inspiration for the blind erhu player Abing's most famous composition, the Erquan Yingyue.

Second Spring under Heaven

  The Second Spring or Second-best Spring under Heaven (Chinese: 天下第二泉, Tiānxià Dìèr Quán) is the name of a spring in Xihui Park at the foot of Mount Hui. The park is located in western Wuxi in eastern China's Jiangsu province.1

So the title is:

The Moon's Reflection on the Second Spring

where the "Second Spring" refers to the name of an actual spring The Second Spring Under Heaven, which can be found in Xihui Park, Wuxi, Jiangsu, today.

Also in the article for Second Spring under Heaven it talks about the English name of this piece and its translation:

  Hua Yanjun, a famous folk musician also called Blind Abing, spread the fame of the Second Spring in his song The Moon Over a Fountain 二泉映月.[8] Although the usual English translation does not clarify what "fountain" is meant, the more literal translation would be "The Moon Reflected in the Waters of the Second Spring."

Here you can also see possible name translations:

The Moon Over a Fountain
The Moon Reflected in the Waters of the Second Spring

I personally think that the aforementioned The Moon's Reflection on the Second Spring is the most faithful translation though. But, Moon over a Fountain gets a lot of Google hits and there are even recordings of this song on Spotify by said translation.


I am sorry to tell you. No, the Year is in the wrong format.
In Chinese, Years are read in the formate of 4-digits. It should be 二零二零年 八月 二十九日.
The only exceptions are 2000"两千年", 2001"两千零一年" ~ 2009"两千零九年". These are not as official as "二零零零年", "二零零一年" ~ "二零零九年". The 4-digits format is always preferred.
"日" can be omitted, but usually not. But "年" is rarely omitted.
二〇二〇年 is also correct but 〇 is semi-Chinese. I mean it is officially correct, but not appealing. 二零二零年 is more often used.
Finally, the suggested translation is:
二零二零年 八月 二十九日


untranslated characters and their meaning

Though I am not quite familiar with the Holy Bible, as far as I can tell, it says it is quoted from Luke 1:26, while the text actually says

  Are not all angels ministering spirits sent to serve those who will inherit salvation?

Of course, this is actually Hebrews 1:14, which disagrees with what is referenced.

Thanks to @user3528438, whose comment helped me find the actual quotation.


When is it appropriate to use 在 with a time phrase?

Yes, you can

他去年去了中国度假。= He went to China for a holiday last year.
他在去年去了中国度假。= He went to China for a holiday in last year.

The first sentence stated a fact '他去了中国度假', and '去年' is the time expression that add additional information on what time it took place
The second sentence '在' emphasize the time period '去年'; "去了中国度假" took place "in last year" along with other things.
The follow example may illustrate this emphasis better

"他去年死了" = "He died last year" ('he died' is the fact; 'last year' is a relative phrase that add additional information to it, "when did he die? Last year")
"他在去年死了" = "He died in last year" ('in last year' is an important fact, not two year ago, not three years ago)


整 should be used after the measure word, so 三百八整人 is not correct.

However, 三百八人整 is weird too. 整 is usually used at the end of the phrase to prevent from adding new numbers to change the whole meaning, especially in financial affairs. Such as

三元 -> you can change it to 三元五角八分
三元整 -> you can't change it to 三元整五角八分, which is wrong expression.

Originally 三百八人 can't be changed to 三百八人零点五人 and so on, so need not to add 整 after that.

BTW1: It also can be written as 正 in financial affairs.
BTW2: As @user58955 said, 三百零八人 is more natural than 三百八人.


Use 超过 or 胜过(more positive)

  今年我旅游很多, 超过去年


What is the difference between 怎么 and 怎么样 ？

There are good explanations on the Web. I do not think I should copy them here. Please check
怎麼
and
怎麼樣.

In addition, there is a good article (pdf format) published by an associate professor, 蔡維天. I copy the abstract here.

本文的題旨在於討論漢語疑問副詞的一個歧義現象：「怎麼」有時可當成「為甚麼」來用，如「她怎麼沒來？」。這種用法主要出現在助動詞之前，應屬句子頂層結構的一種現象。我們認為此處「怎麼」其實是整個句子的述語，問的是這個句子所表達事件的來由。相較之下，位於助動詞和動詞之間的「怎麼（樣）」則為修飾動詞組的狀語，表一個動作的樣貌或途徑。動詞之後的「怎麼樣」則為整個句子的補語，問的是事件的結果。從本體論的觀點來看，「怎麼」、「怎麼樣」在句法結構上的高低分布正反映出一種因果關係，也就是助動詞前的「怎麼」表「前因」，動詞後的「怎麼樣」表「後果」；中間則夾著表樣貌、途徑的「怎麼（樣）」。若以句法－語意介面的角度觀之，凡此種種不同的語意解釋正是由於「怎麼」、「怎麼樣」所處的句法層次不同，而產生的結果：也就是說，表原因的「怎麼」修飾事件，是整個句子的述語；表結果的「怎麼樣」修飾動作結束後的狀態，是動詞組內的補語；表樣貌、途徑「怎麼（樣）」則修飾動作本身，是動詞組的狀語，而和主語的主體意識（agentivity）相關。此外，表原因的「怎麼」在句法上的分布也和「為甚麼」相當一致，可採「無擇約束」（unselective binding）及「相對性近距原則」（relativized minimality）等概念加以規範。

The aim of this paper is to examine an ambiguity of Chinese wh-adverbs:
zenme ‘how’ is sometimes construed as causal rather than method or manner,
as in Ta zenme mei lai?‘Why didn’t she come?’ We show that causal zenme
typically appears before modals, behaving very much like a matrix predicate.
By contrast, its postmodal counterparts are interpreted as method or manner
preverbally, and as result postverbally. From the viewpoint of ontology, the
structural distribution of zenme（yang）embodies a “cause-effect” relation, and
in-between, we have agent-sensitive concepts such as method and manner. In
terms of the syntax-semantics interface, it is demonstrated that the various
interpretations of zenme（yang）are conditioned by the syntactic projections it
occurs in. Namely, premodal zenme takes the whole sentence as its comple-
ment, which corresponds to an event. This results in the causal reading.
Postverbal zenmeyang, on the other hand, serves as a complement to VP,
corresponding to a resultant state. Hence the resultative reading. Furthermore,
when method/manner zenme（yang）serves as a VP-adverbial, it modifies an
action, thus sensitive to subject agentivity. Finally, we find that causal zenme
actually patterns with weishenme ‘why’ with respect to their syntactic behav-
ior, which can be accounted for by adopting the notion of unselective binding
and relativized minimality.


Mostly  wei  can be used when you answer the phone , while it's too oralize to use over text. But someti
mes you can see it like this：

他正在打电话：“喂？”

他不耐烦的说道：“喂，哪位？”

I prefer it is better to use 你好 or 您好 as a alternative word. (Actually I use 您好 cause It's polite to when you talking or writing.)

If you want to write a letter or email , adding a adj. word such as 尊敬的 can be better.

Well, 嗨 is accepted in China and it is normal in the big city, most of people know the means of ‘hai’ ‘hei’ and use it frequently(like me...wave to the other so that he can see you.) , But If you lived in the countryside , 您好 is a better way.


武大郎 is a single personal sesame cake maker and vender, he had no shop, and he had no employees. He died of murder by his wife, and revenged by his younger brother 武松， this is a famous story written in book 水浒. And 武大郎 is famous for his characteristic of short.
And 武大郎开店 in the allegorical saying has the explanation ( you can see it as answer for this riddle) of 长子免进（or 高我者不用）, which means He will not hire who is taller than him.
So this is a metaphore of describe someone being jealous of man of talent.


How do I translate the first two lines of Befriending the Learned? 入國而不存其士，見賢而不急

The original text is:

  入國而不存其士，則亡國矣。見賢而不急，則緩其君矣。

could be translated word by word as:

If one governs the country but doesn't preserve his able and virtuous persons,
the country will perish.
If one sees (discovers) the able and virtuous persons but doesn't hurry up (to appoint them),
they will neglect their monarch.

  治国而不优待贤士，国家就会灭亡。见到贤士而不急于任用，他们就会怠慢君主。


門口不像日本有隔出玄關範圍的高低差

Some object is omitted

(這)[門口] [不像日本(的門口)(那樣)] [有] [隔出玄關範圍的][高低差]

(This)[door], [unlike Japan('s doors) (which)] [have] [that separate the entrance area ][height difference]

This door, unlike Japanese doors which have a height difference that separates the entrance area

It implies 這門口沒有高低差 (this door has no height difference)

Break down the sentence by topics and comments:

[這門口] [不像日本門口那樣有高低差]

[不像日本門口那樣有高低差] is the comment on the topic [這門口]

Modify the comment sentence 不像日本門口那樣有高低差:

不像日本門口那樣有高低差 --> 不像日本門口那樣有[隔出玄關範圍的]高低差

[隔出玄關範圍的] is an adjectival phrase that modifies the noun 高低差


Why's flesh (⺼ ) the semantic component for 肩, 脖?

If CUHK is proclaiming that 肩 resembles a shoulder, I can't see the resemblance.

商甲乙6638合集14199商甲後2.17.13合集13917商甲鐵215.4合集4786商甲甲759合集35191
The top left of 「肩」 was originally a picture of the shoulder bone (scapula), most easily illustrated with those used in oracle bone divination from oxen:

(Left) Oracle bone from the Shanghai Museum*. (Right) Binary image of this oracle bone given in 《甲骨文合集》32028.
*Credits to Herr Klugbeisser, CC BY-SA 3.0, original photo at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oracle_bone#/media/File:Orakelknochen.JPG.

Later on, the character became more stylised and abstract. 「肉」 (flesh > body part) was added, perhaps to enhance character recognition of what might otherwise highly resemble 「戶」 or 「耳」.
戰國・楚簡乙4.61新蔡葛陵楚墓竹簡秦簡日甲75背睡虎地秦簡隸定
The bone-shape was later firmly corrupted into 「戶」.
東漢隸武梁祠畫象　楷

References:

季旭昇《說文新證》
小學堂
國學大師

郭沫若《甲骨文合集》
中國社會科學院考古研究所《殷周金文集成》


It's saying fly away, of course.

Chinese also contains similar expressions such as: 长(了)腿 (grew legs) or 长(了)脚  (grew feet) to mean 跑了 (ran away) like:

垃圾总是不翼而飞,难道自己长了脚?
垃圾跑进墙缝中 难道长了脚?
难道鞋子长脚了吗?

I would imagine the author was going for the same idea here and is just substituting 生翅膀 for 长脚 (because ears can't exactly 'run away'(?), if that makes any sense at all...)


我在包里

is a literal translation of

  I'm in the bag

which means "I'm drunk" in English. While the Chinese sentence does not have any relationship with 'drunk' at all.

Here are some phrases that mean I'm drunk in chinese:

我喝醉了

我喝多了

我断片了 (I'm so drunk that lost my memory)


Why do the onomatopoeias describing the cry of frogs sound so different in Chinese and English?

Instead of directly answering your question I'm going to post this picture:


Your intuition is correct.「頓」and also「餐」are measure word for meals, while「碗」is a measure word for bowls (of rice).

Since「飯」refers to both meal and cooked rice, the statement of how much you ate is inferred from the measure word.

To add: I would suggest that「碗」does not really refer to plate of food, as Chinese does not present meals that way. The western notion of plates of food should be measured by「份」(a share; portion) or「盤」(tray; plate; dish). These two are also used to count Chinese dishes.


Is there a difference between 患者 and 病人?

患 = contracted (of disease); 者= the one who

  患者 = the one who contracted (disease) = patient

The term 患者 describes 'a patient of a specific disease'. For example: '癌症患者' (cancer patient), '皮膚病患者'(skin disease patient).
We cannot use '患者' without referencing the disease

  病人 = sick person/ patient

The term 病人 is a general term for 'sick people/ patient'. You can use this term to designate a unwell person without mentioning the disease. For example "病人需要更多的休息" (sick people/ patients need more rest). *-doesn't matter what kind of sickness
It can be used interchangeably with 患者 when referring a patient of a particular disease. For example 癌症病人 (cancer patient), 皮膚病病人(skin disease patient)


Because she born on 9th Sep of Chinese traditional calendar, it's a Chinese traditional festival, which we call it "重九"(double nine).


There is data on this matter.  http://www.zainea.com/f0_m%26f.pdf present data showing that English speakers who study Mandarin typically use more tonal range in Mandarin than in English but substantially less than native Mandarin speakers do.  Hardly surprising.  And it is known that musical training helps.

http://www.scilt.org.uk/portals/24/library/slr/issues/24/24_5_tsai.pdf

says:

  Chen (1974) compared the pitch range between English and Chinese
  speakers. The results showed that Mandarin needs a pitch range 1.5
  times wider than English, and that native English speakers do not have
  this range naturally. The author claimed that native speakers of a
  non-tonal language need to widen their pitch range to successfully
  acquire a tonal language. Wong and Perrachione (2006) studied a group
  learning Mandarin tones, and found that “large individual differences
  were observed. Learning success was found to be associated with the
  learner’s ability to perceive pitch patterns in a nonlexical context
  and their previous musical experience”. Experienced teachers have also
  reported that students with musical training learn Mandarin faster.

The only advice I found was for students to try harder. Too often, though, "trying harder," without explicit guidance, only reinforces habits you already have.  No one that I found suggested either

1) students with musical experience should see the known data on what pitches native speakers actually use, so the students can aim for a much closer match to native pronunciation than most ever hear about today. As monalisa says, a native speaker's pitches vary.  Data shows even a single first tone can drop its pitch slightly at the end!  But research shows the physical pitch in the sense of "fundamental frequency" of the sounds is truly a key part of perceived Mandarin tones.

2) students without much musical experience should spend some time using tuning forks or a keyboard to learn to hear pitch better.

I think this is neglected because too many teachers in the US are just convinced American students can never have very good Mandarin pronunciation anyway, so they don't want to worry about "fine points."

Tuning forks are helping me now, and i will pass on the little bit I have learned.  It seems best to focus on one note for the high level tone.  This is not surprising: Studies show people are consistently better at using the low part of their vocal range and need more training to extend their high end.  A tuning fork is extremely convenient.  Pitch sources free on-line and on phone apps sounded bad to me -- I did not try paying for better ones.  Electronic tuners seem like overkill.  I don't have a piano.  Pitch pipes make less pure notes than a natural human voice (they produce more harmonics), so they are a bad model.

Left to myself, I radically misjudged both the pitches i was using and what I should do about them.  My voice is not really very low, only I stay very much in the low end of it in English (this may indeed be due to Clint Eastwood).  Overreacting to this, I initially aimed far too high for high tones (A440).

The standard textbook advice is: find the high end of your natural speaking range. They do not say how, and anyway this is wrong.  No one outside of Chinese opera uses the actual extreme high end of their natural (i.e. non-falsetto) range in speech.

Data on page 210 of https://books.google.com/books?isbn=1139452150 suggests I should better aim for something close to G190 for my first tones, more than an octave below what I had first tried.  The more I practice, the better that pitch sounds to me.

Tuning forks are surprisingly hard to find so I will point out that many adjustable forks cover the whole range that  https://books.google.com/books?isbn=1139452150 found for one male voice, and do not go as high as Middle C (256--261 depending on which scale it is for).  But most sets of non-adjustable tuning forks start at middle C and go up.  What  https://books.google.com/books?isbn=1139452150 found for one female voice uses tones above and below middle C. Of course keyboards cover all this range and much more.

Of course this is training, it is artificial.  In actual speech i will not (and should not) have a fixed pitch for first tones or any other tones.  But today I spoke with Chinese friends for the first time since I began work with the tuning forks.  I heard their tones more accurately than I had before.  And I could copy their tones more accurately, or adapt them more appropriately to my own vocal register, than I did before.


Request for a 成语 to describe a person with all of 貌, 才, and 德

No, I don't think there is an idiom describing all of the three.

In Chinese, it is very common to use parallelisms, such as "他才貌兼具，德艺双馨".
I used little different terms from yours and parallelize them together to avoid literal duplication.


Unfortunately your interpretation is not quite correct.

This sentence is in ancient Chinese. 也 means nothing but to indicate the end of a phrase or sentence, and 夫 here indicates an exclamation. There were originally no punctuations in an ancient Chinese article, and these are just like punctuations. Using more than one such word (也夫) indicates stronger exclamation.

莫: no one, 吾: me, 知: understand, 也夫: exclamation, may be translated 'Alas!'

So putting together,

Alas, no one understands me!

or

唉，没有人了解我！


How to say 'moved to [place]' or 'enrolled at [place]

去年 (last year) 我 (I) 搬 (moved) 到 (to) ... (name of place)。

Qùnián wǒ bān dào ...

去年 (last year) 我 (I) 开始 (started) 在 (at) ... (name of university) 读书 (study)。

Qùnián wǒ kāishǐ zài ... dúshū

去年 (last year) 我 (I) 被 (by) ....(name of university) 录取 (enrolled) 了。

Qùnián wǒ bèi ... lùqǔle.


Students’ primary occupation is ‘student’ so a part-time job is a secondary occupation. So do housewives. Because most part-time jobs are secondary occupations so they are usually translated as 兼职.
If a person only has a part-time job which is his primary occupation, then translate part-time as 兼职 is not accurate for him. In this case, you can call it 半职 or 半职工作. A full-time job is 全职 or 全职工作. However, 半职 is not often used. Please use 兼职 whenever possible.
Legally speaking, in the US, full-time jobs are defined as 21 hours or more per week, and in China, 24 hours per week. This is officially called 全日制工作. And a job less than this amount of hours is called 非全日制工作.
Ref：全日制劳动者


安慰 (anwei) is used for mental care, similar in meaning to "comfort/consolation".
照顾 (zhaogu) is used for daily care, like that of parents towards kids, nanny towards a baby, nurse towards patients, etc.

Typical use:
他生气了，我安慰他。(He's upset, so I comfort him.)
他生病了，我照顾他。(He's sick, so I took care of him.)


What does " backtick escapes " mean in chinese?

A "backtick", also known as a "backquote", is a punctuation mark that appears to be translated as 反引号 and refers to this symbol:

`

In the programming context, "escape" often refers to an "escape sequence", which is translated as 转义序列. I'm guessing that "backtick escapes" is used to mean 反引号转义字符.

[edited per user58955's comment]


What are ways to create "simplifed" Chinese characters?

Wikipedia's Simplified Chinese page has a section that outlines all the types already. Quoting it a bit:

There are four methods used:
Structural simplification of characters
Under this method, there are the following:

Replacing a character with another existing character that sounds the same or similar (e.g. 乾、幹 → 干)

Using printed forms of cursive shapes (e.g. 長 → 长)

Replacing a component of a character with a simple symbol (e.g. 對 → 对)

Omitting entire components (e.g. 習 → 习)

Further morphing a character after omitting some components (e.g. 歸 → 归)

Preserving the basic outline or shape of the original character (e.g. 飛 → 飞)

Replacing the phonetic component of phono-semantic compound characters (e.g. 鐘 → 钟)

Replacing some arbitrary part of a character with a phonetic component, turning it into a new phono-semantic compound character (e.g. 曆 → 历)

Replacing entire character with a newly coined phono-semantic compound character (e.g. 驚 → 惊)

Adopting obscure ancient forms or variants (e.g. 電 → 电)

Adopting ancient vulgar variants (e.g. 陽 → 阳)

Re-adopt abandoned phonetic-loan characters (e.g. 後 → 后)

Derivation based on simplified character components
This is where components that have been simplified are also simplified when they are used as radicals; e.g. 單 → 单 so therefore 彈 → 弹
Elimination of variants of the same character
E.g. 夠 → 够, 豬 → 猪. Note that the goal here is to reduce the total number of characters, which means that sometimes the simplified version has more strokes, e.g. 搾 → 榨
Adoption of new standardized character forms
E.g. 奧 → 奥, 虛 → 虚. These are structurally the same after simplification.

For more information see https://zh.wikisource.org/zh/%E7%AE%80%E5%8C%96%E5%AD%97%E6%80%BB%E8%A1%A8


“秋千” in the acient times of China was written as "鞦韆"。——at that times, in order to pick up fruits from the high trees or patch up something higher, the old Chinese people usually binded themselves with ropes from animals'skins and it made themselves wave from one place to another. And now we use a common rope instead of skins, so “革” is removed.
For more please refer the Chinese version：荡秋千的来历


What is the origin of the word 雪茄 (cigar)?

From Chinese wikipedia:

  “雪茄”这中文译名为徐志摩所译，音译之余，也取其灰白如雪，因以为名。

(Loose!) Translation:

  The Chinese translation 雪茄 was created by Xu Zhimo. In addition to the similarity of the sounds, the name also comes from the fact that its ash is white like snow.

My dictionary confirms that it is a loanword from English. If wikipedia is to believed, it probably didn't come through Cantonese since Xu Zhimo is from Zhejiang.


I am a native speaker. I don't think it is originally a Chinese proverb.

A more idiomatic translation would be:

  敢问耻一时，不问耻一生。

or

  问则耻一时，不问终身羞。

I suspect it is Japanese in origin. When I searched it, a lot of Japanese results came up and many people asked how to translate the Japanese proverb "聞くは一時の恥 聞かぬは一生の恥". The Japanese sentence looks quite idiomatic to me, because "聞かぬ" is an archaic form. Modern Japanese would say "闻かないの".


How did 綿蠻 come to mean "(the chirping of) a small bird"?

From Shijing:

  《詩・小雅・綿蠻》

  綿蠻黃鳥，止於丘阿。道之雲遠，我勞如何。飲之食之，教之誨之。命彼後車，謂之載之。

  綿蠻黃鳥，止於丘隅。豈敢憚行，畏不能趨。飲之食之，教之誨之。命彼後車，謂之載之。

  綿蠻黃鳥，止於丘側。豈敢憚行，畏不能極。飲之食之，教之誨之。命彼後車，謂之載之。

Firstly, some conceptual advice on interpreting characters: Please keep in mind that characters are not words; they only represent words. Character phonology is very important when interpreting pre-Qin texts, of which the Shijing is one.

You should always be mindful that a character has both meaning and sound, and sometimes, characters are only used for sound.

  If you're a Japanese learner, you should be aware of ateji, which is based on the same principle.

Character definitions

  《說文》：“緜（綿），聯微也。从糸，从帛。”

「綿」(Zhengzhang OC: /*men/, thin, fine threads) is comprised of semantic「糸」(silk threads) and semantic「帛」(silk/fabric).

  《說文》：“蠻，南蠻，蛇穜。从虫，䜌聲。”

「蠻」(/*mroːn/, Southern ethnic tribes) is comprised of semantic「虫」(poisonous snake, now written「虺」, the cultural symbol of some ancient Southeastern Tribes) and phonetic「䜌」(/*b·roːn/).「閩」( /*mrɯn/, /*mɯn/, Min ethnicity), with the same semantic「虫」, is almost certainly cognate to「蠻」.

Stringing the above together,  you get a reading which is approximately /*men mroːn/, where「蠻」is almost definitely only used to represent sound.

How did 綿蠻 /*men mroːn/ come to mean “(the chirping of) a small bird”?

Two interpretations, which may be related to each other:

綿蠻 (/*men mroːn/) is short for 綿綿蠻蠻, where

綿綿 means fine, delicate.

  《淮南子・繆稱訓》：“福之萌也綿綿，禍之生也分分，福禍之始萌微，故民嫚之。”

蠻蠻 (/*mroːn mroːn/) is the topolectical name of a bird.

  《山海經・西次三經》之首，曰崇吾之山，在河之南，北望冡遂，南望䍃之澤，西望帝之搏、獸之丘，東望䗡淵。有木焉，員葉而白柎，赤華而黑理，其實如枳，食之宜子孫。有獸焉，其狀如禺而文臂，豹虎而善投，名曰舉父。有鳥焉，其狀如鳧，而一翼一目，相得乃飛，名曰蠻蠻，見則天下大水。

Together, this forms delicate > small + bird, i.e. small bird, extended to mean chirps of a small bird.
綿蠻 (/*men mroːn/) is a phonologically-shifted reduplication of「微」(微微, /*mɯl mɯl/).「微」means tiny, slight.

  王國維《觀堂集林・爾雅草木蟲魚鳥獸名釋例下》：“蟲之小者曰蠛蠓 (/*meːd  moːŋ|moːŋʔ/)，鳥之小者亦曰綿蠻，殆皆微字之音轉。”

  Small insects are called 蠛蠓 (/*meːd  moːŋ|moːŋʔ/), small birds are called 綿蠻 (/*men mroːn/), they are both phonological shifts from「微」(/*mɯl/).

Contextually, the reduplicated word meaning small was only used to describe birds, hence it became associated with birds to get small birds > chirping of small birds.

References:

《王力古漢語字典》
《漢語大詞典》


Ha.. found it by looking up the Chinese Edinburgh Festival site. Guess I should have searched around more before asking here. Answer is:

  艺术节

节 means festival in most situations where the English word would be used, so Edinburgh Festival is 爱丁堡节, film festival is 电影节。


Simple answer is : they are interchangeable
Both 等待 and 等候 are compound word verb with the same meaning, just coined differently

等 = wait; 待 = stay
等待 = stay (passively) and wait (for thing to happen or people to come) = 'to wait'

~

等 = wait; 候 = wait/ expect
等候 = wait and expect (thing to happen or people to come)= 'to wait'

As of the minor difference in usage:
Since the component 候 has the meaning of (expect), whatever you 等候(wait for) is very likely to happen. e.g. 等候春天到来 (waiting for the arrival of spring)- Spring will certainly come
While things you 等待 (wait for) may or may not happen,
For example:
等待春天到来 (waiting for the arrival of spring) - Spring will certainly come
等待耶稣再臨 (waiting for Jesus to come again) - Jesus  may or may not come again, so just wait and see
If you say 等候耶稣再臨, then you are kind of expecting he will.


How common are the following Chinese names: 王朋 & 李友 & 高文中 & 白英愛? My Chinese coursebooks are full of them!

王朋 and 李友 sounds like 'Tom' and 'Joe' in English.
高文中 is not as common as the two above.
白英愛 sounds like a Korean name to me, very fashionable, There is a Korean pop star called 李英爱,  as I know Chinese people do not tend to use 爱 in their name in old tradition.


About this question, you can consult Guobao Wang's summary:

  1.只有横折钩类与撇相遇：先写横折钩，例刀、力、万 、方、乃、杨。

  2.其他横折类与撇相遇：都先写撇，例如及（横折折撇 ），几（横折弯），九（横斜钩）、匕（竖折弯）。

translate into English:

1.Only when uppermost and rightmost lines with a left hook cross with right-to-left diagonals(ノ): uppermost and rightmost lines with a left hook is written first. For example: "刀", "力", "万", "方", "乃", "杨".

2.In other situation uppermost and rightmost lines cross with right-to-left diagonals(ノ): right-to-left diagonals is written first. For example: "及", "几", "九", "匕".

Anyway, maybe the following links will offer you more information about stroke order rules.

1.现代汉语通用字笔顺规范(official version);

2.现代汉语通用字笔顺规范.pdf;

3.现代汉语通用字笔顺规范;

4.《现代汉语通用字笔顺规范》电子版;

5."火"的笔顺.

Besides, the website 汉典 is perhaps useful to you.


How to type zero initial in the common Shuangpin Pinyin keyboard layouts?

The Chinese Wikipedia page https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%8F%8C%E6%8B%BC list three different strategies for handling zero initials in 双拼:

  零声母方案：指全拼中无声母的音节在双拼中的处理方案，即全拼中有几个音节没有声母，双拼中需要把这个零声母实质化，于是就有了零声母方案。

  固定一个字母做零声母 + 韵母所在键，如微软双拼、智能ABC、紫光双拼
  以韵母首字母为零声母 + 韵母所在键，如拼音加加(注：拼音加加实际上兼容两种零声母方案。)
  单韵母、三韵母为韵母首字母 + 韵母所在键，双韵母为韵母首字母 + 韵母末字母，如自然码、小鹤双拼

Which are:

Use a fixed letter + final (Microsoft, 智能 ABC, 紫光)
Use the first letter of the final + final (拼音加加)
Use the original form of two-letter finals. For others, use the first letter of the final + final. (自然码, 小鹤双拼)

For 'ang', 1. would be some fixed letter + the letter for 'ang'. 2) would be 'a' + the letter for 'ang' 3) would be 'a' + the letter for 'ang'

2 and 3 differ when the final contains two letters. For example, 'an' would be 'a' + 'n' in 3, but 'a' + (the letter for 'an') in 2.


How to ask about career intentions/aspirations

Use 你長大後 (when you grow up) only when you are asking a child or teenager.
You can use 你将来 (in the future) to ask people of all ages.
"想做什麼?"(want to do/be what) , "想當什麼?" (want to be what) and "想干什么" (want to do/be what) can all refer to "what career do you want to have?"
In different context 你将来想做什麼 and 你将来想干什么 can both refer to "what do you want to do in the future" e.g. "I want to study martial art in the future"


Is 公安 an informal expression when used in the title?

We don't call "公安" short for "公共安全".
In life, "公安" always means the police.


One crude method for testing Taiwanse vs. Chinese usage is by running a verbatim

site:.cn
site:.tw

Google query.

Here are some results:
各式各样 site:.tw about 761’000 results
各式各样 site:.cn about 24’100’000 results
but maybe Google isn't good with sc vs. tc:
各式各樣 site:.tw about 12’300’000 results
各式各樣 site:.cn about 315’000 results
There doesn't seem to be much of a difference in usage amounts overall.


What is the difference between 有名，著名 and 闻名?

For me, as a native speaker, I use

有名 for person, i.e. Kobe Bryant 很有名。
著名 for place or books i.e. 那是一个著名的景点。
闻名 for a brand name i.e. 孔老夫子古今闻名。


Both "我知道它，但是我忘了" and "我知道这个，但是我忘了" sounds unnatural to me. I have no idea what you are talking about until I saw the English explanation: I learnt it sometime ago, but have now forgotten it. To me, the most natural way to say this is to say it with details, like "我知道这个，但是我忘记具体的内容" (I knew this, but now I forgot all the details) or even "我记得我看到过这件事，但是其他的都忘记了" (I know I have seen this, but I cannot remember anything else about it).


Corrected according to Tang Ho's comment.

曹魏
洛神赋
刻不容缓
王重阳
刮骨
急流勇退
纸上谈兵
母凭子贵
计上心头
重于泰山
借力打力
刽子手
竭尽全力
亲力亲为
重蹈覆辙
柔情似水
历历在目
暗无天日
弥补
感人至深
匠人
明白
千载难逢
兴师问罪
时来运转
法家
万里长城

A. 母仪天下
B. 历久弥新
C. 子时
D. 魏王
E. 子欲养而亲不在
F. 匠心独运
G. 洛阳纸贵
H. 目中无人
I. 量力而行
J. 弃暗投明
K. 征兵
L. 白手兴家
M. 计穷力竭
N. 重见天日
O. 问斩
P. 刻骨铭心
Q. 全军覆没
R. 匹夫无罪
S. 千千万万
T. 缓急轻重
U. 柔软
V. 手下留情
W. 强人所难
X. 英勇
Y. 山不厌高，水不厌深
Some notes:

Not an idiom. It is a four-character word coined in a costume drama. (According to Tang Ho it is a common expression.)

E. The original text in 韩诗外传 should be 子欲养而亲不待也.
J. It means 'leave the reactionary camp and cross over to the side of progress'. Often used to describe someone leaves the enemy and joins (surrenders to) 'us' (from the narrator's point of view).
L. For me 白手起家 is more often heard. 白手兴家 seems to be Cantonese. Here it can only be 白手兴家, for in question 16 起师问罪 is used very seldom (it is even not in an idiom dictionary).
O. I think it should be understood as 'sentence to (问) capital penalty (斩)'.
T. 轻重缓急 is more often heard.
Y. Another version gives 海不厌深. Here it can only be 水不厌深 due to question 16.


I tried some research and, according to another dictionary (新华字典),

  汎
  拼音fàn 注音ㄈㄢˋ

and 说文解字,

  浮皃。从水凡聲。孚梵切

and another live audio,

I think it should be pronounced as fàn.


I would reword the three sentences as follows instead:

她父母来我家与我家人见面。
她父母来我家和我家人见面。
她父母来我家跟我家人见面。

In this case, they can be used interchangeably as each one of them means "and".
Here are the minute differences:

与 [yǔ] is more elegant and formal, and is usually applied to similar items of abstract and contrasting nature. E.g. 天与地 (heaven and earth), 是与非 (yes and no).
和 [hé] is more general and informal, and can be applied to list dissimilar items and more often on objects. E.g. 汽车和现金 (car and cash), 蓝宝石和翡翠 (sapphire and jade).
跟 [gēn] is used more often in speech, and is usually applied to similar items and more often on humans. E.g. 他跟她 (he and she), 我跟你 (you and I).


To add or not to add adjective after 一樣。

Yes, 高 is superfluous. There is no need to say two 高 in a sentence.

I'd rather say 我跟他一樣高. Although you can also say 我跟他身高一樣, the former one is a little bit shorter.

If you say 我跟他一樣大, one might not know what kind of '大' it is. In this case, one might add 年齡 to the sentence. But if the context is known in conversation, it is no need to add 年齡 to the sentence.


Transcription in Chinese characters
"ai shi bu ke ni de" is 愛是不可逆的.

Grammar
Both are grammatically correctly and literally correct. In textbook grammar, it is a pattern of subject + "是" (verb to be) + an adjective (a phrase ended with 的).

龜是硬的。 Tortoise is hard.
鬼是恐佈的。 Ghost is terrific.

不可逆的 and 不可逆轉的 are phrases ended with 的. Actually they are negation of 可逆的 and 可逆轉的 correspondingly.
可 is commonly used in translation of -(a)ble in English.
In more advanced usage, 是 and 的 are optional. We could write 愛不可逆 and 愛不可逆轉 as well.

Usage
"不可逆的" is accurate translation of irreversible. But Chinese readers may not get its meaning. Or they may conceive that love is something that cannot be resisted or disobeyed.
While 愛是不可逆轉的 is grammatically and literally correct for translating "love is irreversible", it is not so comprehensible for Chinese readers.
逆轉 usually describes that a situation is reversed, from good to bad, or from bad to good. If one is in love, it is 愛. If one is no longer in love, it is 不愛. 愛 could change to 不愛. 逆轉 is problematic when it describes 愛.
You make a nice elaboration in your comment. "'Love' or the emotion is something that when given by somebody is difficult to take it back or to reverse that decision once taken."
In search for better translation, your comment reminds me a line "愛是可發不可收" in the lyrics from a Cantonese song 愛在深秋, sung by Alan Tam (譚詠麟), written by lyrist Andrew Lam (林敏聰). 可發 is "able to give" and 不可收 "unable to take it back". But it is poetic and somehow ambiguous.
There are some more idiomatic phrases like 覆水難收. 覆水難收 literally means "Spilt water can't be gathered up". We use it to describe "What is done can't be undone". But I would hesitate to write 愛是覆水難收.  It looks like that "love is put to the end and is not recoverable"
Chinese would use "split water" to describe something that unable to get back. It would be more understandable to write 愛如潑水不可收, literally "love is like split water and one cannot take it back.
Alternatively, we can write 愛過無法磨滅. (Once) loved, (there is) no way to remove (the fact, its trace, its memory).

There are many words to describe "irreversible". But "love is irreversible" has implicit meaning and it is very difficult to translate it directly without misleading.


Difference between 家 and 家里? Also 家人 and 家里人?

家 = home

家人 = family; family members (See  Different terms for 'family' and 'family member')

家里 = 1. in my home (example: "他家里没有养宠物" ="there's no pet in his house") 2. in the family (example: "我家里有父母和两个姐妹" = "In my home, I have parents and two sisters"  or  " I have parents and two sisters in my family )

家里人 = people in my home = family; family members


How "bad" is a Taiwanese accent on the mainland?

It is not "bad" at all.

People speak mandarin in Mainland China and Taiwan can understand each other without difficulty.

There are some word usages differences though, but usually it is not a problem.


Chinese version of the idiom "The word on the street"

"流言" (liú yán)

  一时间 流言 四起,亚洲陷入困境,资金加速流出,这些国家的本土银行纷纷倒闭。

  Once the rumor got started that Asia was in trouble, these people started withdrawing their money faster and faster and it caused failures of domestic banks in these countries.

"谣言" (yáo yán)

  布莱尔，如果你真的,编造了丹·汉弗瑞和那个老师的 谣言 ，她可以告你诽谤。

  Blair,if you started that rumor About Dan Humphrey and the teacher, She has a legitimate case for slander.

"小道消息" (xiǎo dào xiāo xī)

  这些 小道消息 被当作一派胡言而一笑置之。

  These rumors are regarded as nonsense and laugh at them.


"that" in Mandarin joining clauses or sentences?

The word "that" in your third example actually doesn't introduce a relative clause. Rather it's being used as a subordinating conjunction. In this situation, the word "that" is generally optional in English, and it also is similarly omitted in Chinese:

They said [that] they would come.
他们说他们会来。
Tāmen shuō tāmen huì lái.

Relative clauses generally describe a noun or noun phrase (known as the antecedent). In Chinese, while 的 de is often used to indicate possession, it more generally is used to link a description to a noun or noun phrase, and thus can similarly be used to introduce a relative clause. When the noun or noun phrase being described is understood in context, it is omitted, leaving simply description + 的.
Let's look at your first example:

He is the one that I saw.

The relative clause is "I saw", which is simply 我看见 wǒ kànjiàn. In English the noun being described cannot be omitted when "that" is used to introduce the clause, which is why the word "one" appears to serve as the placeholder. In Chinese, it can be omitted, so "the one that I saw" ends up being simply 我看见的 wǒ kànjiàn de, thus:

He is the one that I saw.
他是我看见的。
Tā shì wǒ kànjiàn de.

If instead there was a specific noun, such as "person" instead of "one", you would have:

He is the person that I saw.
他是我看见的人。
Tā shì wǒ kànjiàn de rén.

Applying the same principles to your second example:

It's the one that I want.
它是我想要的。
Tā shì wǒ xiǎngyào de.

EDIT - Addendum:
Note that in English the noun being described can be omitted if you instead use a relative pronoun to introduce the relative clause rather than using the word "that". So instead of "He is the one that I saw" and "It's the one that I want", you could say "He is who I saw" and "It's what I want". The former have what are known as bound relative clauses while the latter have free relative clauses. The word "that" can only be used in bound relative clauses.
I just wanted to add this note to let you know that when you see a free relative clause, you can translate it to Chinese similarly, e.g.:

I like what he sees. (i.e., I like the one that he sees.)
我喜欢他看见的。
Wǒ xǐhuān tā kànjiàn de.


我的微信用不了了，我只能用支付宝。
我的微信不能用了，我只能用支付宝。
我的微信没法用了，我只能用支付宝。
我的微信有问题，我只能用支付宝。
我的微信有点问题，我只能用支付宝。


角 came from 銀角, which was historically a currency that represented a fraction of the silver coin (銀元). 元 came from 圓, a description of the coin's circular shape. A theory for 角's use is that since the basic meaning of 角 is a horn; by extension it came to be used to describe "things that looks like horns". And from there, "corners" 角落, "angles" 角度, etc. Dividing a circle up like pizza slices creates a "角"; hence, the divisions of one 元 (圓) came to be called a 角.

As Carmelos said, 毛 came from a simplification of 毫 - it is the bottom radical of the latter. 毫 in turn comes from one of the traditional Chinese unit for small numbers: 分 厘 毫 絲, corresponding to the modern 10-3 (it is still used for millimetres, 毫米/公厘). A theory is that 毛钱 was a type of coinage in the Song dynasty that had very small values, as its name suggests. The term persisted in that meaning of a "small denomination coin", and thus became synonymous with the modern small 角 coins.


Etymology behind the phrase 恭喜发财 (Kung Hei Fat Choy) and its usage during Chinese New Year?

恭喜 (congratulations for joyous occasion) : "Bless you" is the standard opening for giving good wish to others, for example: 恭喜你大學畢業(congratulations on graduation from university), 恭喜你新居入伙 (congratulations on moving in to a new home). So "恭喜发财" (congratulations on getting rich) is just one of many things you can bless people with, no more common than "恭喜你新年快樂"

From https://zhidao.baidu.com/question/591040765.html
In 1826, an English man went to Guangzhou and worked in an American trade company. He wrote a book called 《洋人在广州》(Foreigners in Guangzhou). In that book he mentioned the Chinese who traded with the company would greet them with the Chinese phrase "恭喜发财" during the Chinese new year. (the common goal among merchants is making money after all). After the publication of the book, greeting people with "恭喜发财" in Chinese new year became more popular in Guangzhou. And presumably, this practice spread to the rest of the country too.

I suspect the reason "恭喜发财" is so popular is partly due to gambling was a national pastime in China at the time. Common folks could only openly gamble  during the new year period. Wishing someone getting rich implied wishing him good luck in gambling, beside congratulate the other on making a lot of money from the previous year (you wouldn't find out how much you made until you'd done the year end accounting)
I also suspect the reason "恭喜发财" is particularly popular among Cantonese,  is partly due to a jingle (順口溜): "恭喜发财，利士來" (congratulations on getting rich, give me red pocket money)


They are not quite the same.

人和 is a reference to 天时地利人和, where 和 means "harmony" rather than "unity". So it means "people in harmony".

仁和 is "humane and harmonious", both are good social and personal qualities.

The difference isn't that important if we take it out of context. They are all positive words that fit well for a company name.

Update. In answer to your last question: No.

The naming style is quite common in 1930s. It might serve as a sarcastic device -- A company bearing such a beautiful name are acting so evil. But even this would be an over-interpretation. Every company wants a good name. If I am writing a 1930s novel, no matter what I believe, I would use the same naming styles.


Yes the terms 疯狂的(adv/adj); 疯狂(adj/adv); 狂(adj/adv) has other connotations beside being mentally ill.

  recklessly / beyond imagination / out of the word (unrealistic)

  Example:

  疯狂的计划 / 疯狂计划 (crazy plan; reckless plan ; plan beyond imagination  )

~

  uncontrollably / earnestly / enthusiastically

  Example:

  疯狂地殴打 / 狂殴 ( crazily beat someone; uncontrollably beat someone)

  疯狂购物 / 狂购  (shop crazily ; shop uncontrollably; shop enthusiastically)

~

  strange / weird

  Example:

  疯狂科学家 (crazy scientist/ weird scientist)


Please explain the meaning of the sentence

You should supply more context.

有时候 Sometimes 灭掉 eliminate/destroy 不如 not as good as 引导 lead/guide。

In a political context maybe:

It is better not to seek to destroy your adversaries but to guide them.

Or if the context is bad habits:

It is better to seek guidance rather than try (yourself) to eradicate a bad habit.


谁在叫阮的名 一句比一句痛

(Who calls our name. Calling one sentence is more painful than the former one.)

  亲像在问阮甘会惊寒

(Just like asking us whether we are cold.)

  不需要别人来讲 阮心内嘛知影

(There is no need for other people's words. We know in the bottom of our hearts.)

  是你的声 是你的声

(It is your voice. It is your voice.)

  谁住在阮的梦 一住就一世人

(Who lives in our dream. Once it lives, it lives for entire live.)

  尚惊日头会将咱拆散

(The most fearful is that sun will separate us apart.)

  虽然离开那呢远 阮犹原会知影

(Although the departure is far. We still can know.)

  是你的影 是你的影

(It is your appearance. It is your appearance.)

  叫阮的名 阮用一生斟酌听

(Calling our name. We spend our entire life to listen carefully.)

  当初细汉未赴乎你了解 你是阮的生命

(At the beginning of the time when I was a child, It is too late to let you know that you are our lives.)

  叫阮的名 阮需要你来作伴

(Calling our name. We need your company.)

  人生的路途阮爱你牵阮走

(We want you to hold our hands to pass the road of our lives.)

  谁在叫阮的名 一句比一句痛

(Who calls our name. Calling one sentence is more painful than the former one.)

  亲像在问阮甘会惊寒

(Just like asking us whether we are cold.)

  不需要别人来讲 阮心内嘛知影

(There is no need for other people's words. We know in the bottom of our hearts.)

  是你的声 是你的声

(It is your voice. It is your voice.)

  谁住在阮的梦 一住就一世人

(Who lives in our dream. Once it lives, it lives for entire live.)

  尚惊日头会将咱拆散

(The most fearful is that sun will separate us apart.)

  虽然离开那呢远 阮犹原会知影

(Although the departure is far. We still can know.)

  是你的影 是你的影

(It is your appearance. It is your appearance.)

  叫阮的名 阮用一生斟酌听

(Calling our name. We spend our entire life to listen carefully.)

  当初细汉未赴乎你了解 你是阮的生命

(At the beginning of the time when I was a child, It is too late to let you know that you are our lives.)

  叫阮的名 阮需要你来作伴

(Calling our name. We need your company.)

  人生的路途阮爱你牵阮走

(We want you to hold our hands to pass the road of our lives.)

  叫阮的名 阮用一生斟酌听

(Calling our name. We spend our entire life to listen carefully.)

  当初细汉未赴乎你了解 你是阮的生命

(At the beginning of the time when I was a child, It is too late to let you know that you are our lives.)

  叫阮的名 阮需要你来作伴

(Calling our name. We need your company.)

  人生的路途阮爱你牵阮走

(We want you to hold our hands to pass the road of our lives.)

  叫阮的名 阮用一生斟酌听

(Calling our name. We spend our entire life to listen carefully.)

  当初细汉未赴乎你了解 你是阮的生命

(At the beginning of the time when I was a child, It is too late to let you know that you are our lives.)

  叫阮的名 阮需要你来作伴

(Calling our name. We need your company.)

  人生的路途阮爱你牵阮走

(We want you to hold our hands to pass the road of our lives.)


Omitted 了 for multiple verbs in sequence

You should use "了" when you are implying an event has happened in reality.

"了" is not about past. It's a marker, rendering verb's result to reality realm. Verbs can be in imaginary state, you know...

ex: "I would have done that..."

Ask your self:

"What chinese bare verb mean? How to translate 她在图书馆看书?
Is she reading right now? was reading? will read? The correct answer is : it's all at once!"

The best translation will be using some kind of indefinite forms (maximum ambiguity). Imagine that a freind of yours tells you about a girl:

"So I walk in and she is like.. reading in the library"

Ask a question about this picture: "Did it take place or will it take place? Are you telling me about factual past or telling me about probable future? Have you walked in and saw her or will you walk in and see her"

Now, about your sentence:
有一天，她在图书馆看书，一个男生从她身边走过，看到她的手套掉在地上，那位男生很有礼貌地帮她捡起来 (no 了, no 就)

The translation should be indefinite in some sence:

"There is a day once, and a girl reads in a library and the other guy passes her by. He sees that she drops a glove, he picks it up."

Do you see the mood here? It looks like a fairy tale of some sort, it's not real.

Now, if you add 了 at the end, it comes with 就 (since it's a stiff structure here). i.e. 了 is linked with 就 and not with the rest of the sentence, and thus addition of THIS 了 will not render the whole sentence from a fairy tale realm to this world.

有一天，她在图书馆看书，一个男生从她身边走过，看到她的手套掉在地上，那位男生就很有礼貌地帮她捡了起来.

Now translation changes a bit: the first part stays the same and we can't tell if it's an imaginive or real situation (took place in the past), but the last part translates like this:

"He sees that she drops a glove and then就 he picks了(for real) it up. (He will do it if situation is\was\will be real"

Now, unless you add 了 to  the first part of the sentence 有一天，她在图书馆看书，一个男生从她身边走过，看到她的手套掉在地上 you can't tell that situation took place or will take place.
You know 有一天 makes you think that a fairy tale is about to start, so lack of 了 reality makers makes sence! The last 了 is not a marker for the whole sentece but for 就_了 part, there it just stresses logical consequence of the actions (real or imaginary), but it never answers to the question: "Is the WHOLE story a reality or are you imagining things?"


What is the difference between 山顶and 山巅?

Yes, they are both peak.
For me, 山顶 is more general word for peak. But 山巅 is more powerful, usually is used in  the literature.
You can say 山顶 for a hill or a mountain, but you don't know if there are other higher 山顶s around. But 山巅 is supposed to be the highest among the nearby region.


What is the difference between 本来 and 原来?

In my opinion, 1,2,3 can be both. 4 should be filled with 原来.
原来 could be used when you don't know something and then you find it out all of sudden. For example, 原来是你啊！ 原来是你干的啊！
本来 can't be used for this sense.
Most of time they are  interchangeable.
In your update sentence, 本来 is preferable, and 原来 is not that good. But if you put 原来 in the middle (丁鐺："是的，我原来要去百代試音的，但是我弄錯了日期，是明天,) that will be ok. This might be because if you put 原来 at the beginning of an sentence, that sounds you have found something all of sudden, which you didn't know. But actually you want to convey the sense originally.
I guess the key might be they are interchangeable within a sentence, but not at the beginning of a sentence!

丁鐺："是的，本來我要去百代試音的，但是我弄錯了日期，是明天。

Update
I feel this dictionary definition are accurate:
本来

原来，原先。

杨朔《京城漫记》：“这地方在北京南城角，本来是京城有名的风景区。”
2 . 原有的。
本来面目。
3 .指人本有的心性。
黄人《〈小说林〉发刊词》：“心理之辟，尤在昧厥本来。”
4 .表示理该如此。
本来就该这么办

原来

1 . 当初；未经改变的。
周而复《上海的早晨》：“阿英给奶奶提醒，立即退了回来，把脸盆放在床上原来的地方接水。”
2 . 副词。表示发现从前不知道的情况。
魏巍《东方》：“郭祥勉强睁开眼睛，原来担架停在一面悬崖下。”

I think this should help you a lot if you can understand those definitions in Chinese.


Tl;dr: Placement depends on whether the wh-word is the subject or object of the sentence, and whether emphasis is intended.

Given both Chinese and English follow the SVO structure (hence their comparability), fronting in English (or the in-situ-ness of Chinese) is best observed when the wh-word is the object of the sentence:

Wh-word
Chinese
English

Subject
a. 誰偷了蘋果？
Who stole the apple?

Object
b. 瑪莉看見了誰？
Who did Mary see?

In Chinese, it is unideal when there are two doer-action pairs in a single sentence. For simplicity, let us consider Which picture he took did she post? instead (the she–post part is still grammatically identical to the original sentence - no loss of generality). Now following the logic in 1., since which picture he took is the object, shouldn't that be placed at the end of the sentence? Yes and no, depending on whether emphasis is intended. Therefore,

Emphasis
Chinese
English

–
a. 她發佈了哪張他拍的照片呢？
Which picture he took did she post?

+
b. 哪張他拍的照片是她發佈了的呢？
Which picture he took is the one she posted?

In fact in sentence 2b. (both Chinese and English), the picture has become the subject. Also, notice how the 是～的 has been insidiously added in sentence 2b. That is precisely for emphasis. Without it, the sentence would sound awkward. (In fact, to aid your understanding, you may consider 哪張他拍的照片是她發佈了的*照片*呢？: the analogous structure of this hidden 照片 is the one in English, which is normally omitted in Chinese.) Have a look at example 5 of this link.

Of course you may argue sentence 1b. can also be phrased as 誰被瑪莉看見了？, apparently violating the in-situ rule. But technically this sentence is in the passive voice, which also changes the object of its active voice analogue (誰) into the subject.


Does 上不去 mean "can't get on" or "won't get on"

In this context, the first one is correct - "I can't get onto the highway"

  我上不去

我(subject: I)

上(verb: get)

不(potential particle: indicate 'unable')

去(result/ direction particle: onto)

  上去= get onto; 上得去=（can get onto); 上不去= (can't get onto)

see comment from user6065 explaining potential complements (there's only two: 得 and 不)

  For the other, the phrase just meant that the subject would not get on

For this interpretation to be correct, the phrase had to be "我不上去"

In other context, "上去" could mean "go up" or "advance"

Example:

"上(二樓)去" = "go up to (second floor)"

"上(前面)去" = "advance to (the front)"

"上(高速公路)去" = "get onto (the highway)"


Google Translate English to Chinese roman letters

No that does not seem to be possible. However, if you take a look at below the translation, it'll tell you the pinyin pronunciation:


How to modify a two-character verb that has an object using 得?

'吃饭'， (eat rice= having meal) is a compound word verb, and it is also an intransitive verb (verb that doesn't take object). To illustrate the difference between [single character verb + noun] and [two characters verb + noun], I would change the example to '吃水饺' (吃 + 水饺)

[(吃水饺)- (吃得)- 很快]
[(保守机密) -(保守得)- 很嚴]

As you can see, you can modify '保守' with '得' the same way as '吃'
Although  "保守机密保守得很嚴" is technically correct in grammar, it is too wordy. Native speakers would do the following instead

Shorten a compound word verb to a single character, in the case of '保守', the shortened form is '守'. Your sentence would become "守机密守得很嚴"

In many cases, the object noun can also be shortened -->"守密守得很嚴"

Only repeat the first character of the compound word verb. For example: "攻击敵方陣地攻击很如火如荼" --> "攻击敵方陣地攻很如火如荼" (omit 击)

The best way is to use a simpler structure [(adv) + (verb) + (noun)] --> [(如火如荼地)(攻击)(敵方陣地)]

For Intransitive Verbs (verb that cannot take noun), don't repeat the verb after 得 and directly go to the adverb

Example: 战斗 (to battle) is an 'intransitive verb'
Simply write "战斗得很激烈"
"战斗战斗得很激烈" . "战斗战得很激烈" or "战斗斗得很激烈" are all wrong
Another example: '伤风' (get a cold) is an 'intransitive verb'
Simply write "伤风得很严重"
"伤风伤风伤得很严重" or "伤风伤得很严重" is wrong


As fefe has mentioned, you could use “在”…左右 /上下/ 附近 to describe a range near some position, somewhat like describing locations.

  最低氣溫在 0 度左右；
  蛋白質凝固的溫度在 65 度上下。

It is not needed for exact values.

  現在室溫 7 度；
  冷凍室的溫度是 -20 度。

For estimated values, you may also use 約 (about) to indicate uncertainty.

  最低溫約為零度。

It is worth noting that Celsius is omitted in all examples above, since Celsius is usually the only tempreture scale employed. Other scales, such as Fahrenheit and Kelvin, only exist in special contexts like academic research. You may use …°C (pronounced “度 C”) or 攝氏…度 if explicitness is needed.

Here is an example video for daily usages. In this weather forecast (YouTube video) of Next TV, Taiwan, the reporter uses

  白天最高溫降到只有 24 度左右。

to express the tempreture lowers to tempretures near 24°C.

Sidenote:
Please note that she also uses

  最低溫下探 17 度。

to indicate the lowest temperature would touch a lower bound of 17°C. This is mainly used in Taiwan for weather and stock reports. It is not used in China and usually would be interpreted as lower by 17 degrees rather than lower to 17°C.