ABSTRACT
CKI has been a bottleneck for Chinese information processing. Although the speed of CPUs and printers has increased, users must keep their typing at a relatively slow speed (50-300 characters/words per min for a normal/ professional typist). Given the fact that the efficiency of CKI is already higher than that of English keyboard input (Chen and Hu 1994), and the successful design and marketing of the Chinese information processing system, one of the remaining problems is that each must include several CKI methods to obtain as many users as possible. On the one hand the user can choose the method he/she prefers, but on the other the system designer must offer several options, since no method can be regarded as superior over another. This is confusing for the beginner. Which method is the best and which is the most suitable for him/her?
