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Talking Thai <> English Dictionary+Phrasebook

for iPhone/iPad/iPod Touch

Software Versions and Changes

All Word in the Hand products, including both our Chinese and Thai phrasebooks and dictionaries on iOS, Android, and Windows, share a common set of version numbers. Here is what changed in each version:

Version 1.0

Version 1.0 is the first version of our Thai software dictionary on the Windows PC platform.

Version 1.1

Version 1.1 is the first version of our Thai software dictionary on the Windows PC platform that is available on CD-ROM.

Changes:

Made several improvements to the Help screens, including an important new section about using Thai verbs and connecting verbs with their objects.
The Help window now remembers the help section you are reading and the position of the vertical divider when you close the Help window, and restores those when you bring up Help again. In most cases it also restores your previous position within the help section as well.
Fixed several cases where clicking on the Help window content did not cause that window to come to the top, and where clicking on the Help button did not maximize the Help window if it was minimized.
Corrected a formatting problem in entries for Thai words that are the names of tone marks and other marks, e.g. "gaa-ran."
Product Activation and Version Check now support proxy servers (with optional proxy authentication). This is useful for restrictive corporate environments where all access to the internet must go through a proxy server. The dictionary software will use the same proxy settings as Internet Explorer (so you should configure Internet Explorer's proxy settings and then re-run the dictionary), and if you need proxy authentication, you can click a new "Proxy Settings..." button that appears in the Activation window and in the Update Tab of the Settings window.
Thai and English vocabulary are the same as in version 1.0.

Version 1.2

Version 1.2 is a major revision of our Thai software dictionary on the Windows PC platform, released at the end of 2010:

Changes:

This release delivers a massive increase in the number of dictionary entries, from 42,000 entries in version 1.0/1.1 to more than 100,000 entries (from 53,000 translations to more than 134,000 translations), including tens of thousands of new, high-quality sound recordings of a native Thai speaker: as always, there is a recording for every single Thai word in the dictionary.
This is just another step in Paiboon Publishing's ongoing, multi-year dictionary production project, and you are able to enjoy the fruits of this labor as it progresses. In this release, new words were added in all letters of the English and Thai alphabet, but in particular there are a lot of new English words beginning with A, B, C, J, K, Q, S, T, U, V, W, X, Y and Z. Stay tuned for additional releases in the future which add more entries to other English letters.
In Dictionary entries, we now slightly grey out words that are not clickable (i.e. words that are not themselves dictionary headwords).

Version 1.3

Version 1.3 is the first release of our Thai software dictionary for the Apple iOS platform (iPhone/iPad/iPod Touch).

Version 1.4

Version 1.4 is a minor Thai software dictionary release for the Apple iOS platform (iPhone/iPad/iPod Touch).

This update adds a handy quick-touch index to the top of the "Consonants" and "Vowels" pages of our built-in, extensive introduction to reading and writing Thai. These indexes let you see each consonant/vowel on the screen at once and touch it to jump to detailed information. Touch the status bar at the top of the screen to return to the top of the page.

This update also adds some more help detail about how your previous locations are labeled in the History screen.

This update also fixes a rare app exit problem that sometimes occurs when you go to the Settings screen to change your main Thai Sound Pronunciation Guide System, and then you go to the History screen and click "Clear History."

Version 1.5

Version 1.5 is the first Thai software dictionary release for the Android platform. It came out in January 2012.

This release delivers another massive increase in the number of dictionary entries, from more than 100,000 entries to more than 150,000 entries (from 134,000 translations to more than 220,000 translations), plus another 28,000 entries (not counted above) containing the names of cities, subdistricts, districts, and provinces of Thailand. As always, there is a high-quality sound recording of a native Thai speaker for every single Thai word in the dictionary.

This is just another step in Paiboon Publishing's ongoing, multi-year dictionary production project, and you are able to enjoy the fruits of this labor as it progresses. In this release, we added words in all letters of the Thai and English alphabets, but in particular we filled out thousands of words in the English letters D, E, F, G, H, I, L, M, N, O, P, and R as the second phase of our dictionary expansion begun in late 2010. Now all letters of the English alphabet are equally detailed. Stay tuned for additional releases in the future which add even more entries to all sections.

Version 1.6

Version 1.6 is a major Thai software dictionary release for the iOS and Windows platforms, which adds the same 50,000 new bold entries introduced in Android version 1.5 (for a total of 150,000 entries, plus an additional 28,000 Thai place name entries: see version 1.5 above for more info). Version 1.6 is also an Android release, adding the features and fixes below.

Version 1.6 came out in February 2012.

In addition to the huge increase in entries on iOS and Windows, this release also adds the following:

On iOS, we now show speaker-shaped playback icons right inline with each Thai word on-screen, so that you can hear any word with just one touch, as you can also do on the Windows and Android platforms. If you prefer the old behavior, which lets you fit more on the screen at once, you can disable the display of the playback icons using the "Show Play Buttons" switch in our settings screen.
A handy new unified Quick-Click Chart in our Help section on Reading and Writing which shows all Thai consonants and vowels at once on your screen, allowing you to click to hear each one or to go to its details in the relevant section.
A large number of small improvements to the Help including a lot more sound recordings for sample phrases, more sample words, and speaker-shaped playback icons in our big charts of Thai vowels.
Some changes to the software licensing system on the Android platform to fix rare cases where legitimate version 1.5 purchasers would not be able to run the app.

Version 1.7

Version 1.7 is a minor Thai software dictionary release for the Android platform that:

changes the size of the text used in the key labels of the Paiboon Keyboard. In most cases the labels will be larger, for better readability, but in a few cases (especially when your device was in landscape mode) the labels were actually too big and have been shrunk a bit to fit inside the key.
changes the sound recording used in the "Vowels and Syllables," "Vowels," and "Quick Click Chart" pages under "Reading and Writing" for the three Thai written vowels that include a built-in final consonant ( ำ, -รร, -ร) so that the sound recording now also includes the final consonant sound as well. Before, the sound recording only played the vowel sound and not the final consonant sound. This change is already present in iOS and Windows version 1.6.

Version 1.7 came out in February 2012.

Version 1.8

Version 1.8 is a minor Thai software dictionary release for the iOS platform that:

works around serious problems that Apple introduced to many apps when Apple released its iOS 8.0, 8.0.1, and 8.0.2 "upgrade." In our case, Apple iOS 8.0 bugs prevented you from accessing five app features: "Find Words Inside," "Real-World Fonts," "Explain Spelling," "Google Thai Word," and "Clear History" (depending on your device, you would see either an app hang or a blank menu). Apple iOS 8.0 also broke our custom app Thai Script/Thai Sound keyboards, which would show up off-center.
supports full-screen operation on iPhone 5 and iPhone 6/6+.
sports a new iOS 7/8 visual style.
fixes an app hang that some customers were seeing in cases when the app status bar switched to double height: this includes using the app while having a phone call on hold, using the app while recording audio with the Voice Memos app, and in some cases using the app while Personal Hotspot (tethering) was in effect.

Version 1.8 came out in November 2014.

Version 1.9

Version 1.9 is the first release of our Thai–English and Chinese-English phrasebook products, first supported on the iOS platform.

Version 1.9 came out in April 2015.

Version 1.9.3

Version 1.9.3 was a minor revision of our Chinese–English phrasebook product on iOS that provided some small improvements in the app Help sections.

Version 1.9.3 came out in April 2015.

Version 2.0

Version 2.0 is a massive upgrade to our dictionary apps: a complete rewrite from scratch, more than three years in the making, released for iOS (September 2016), Android (February 2017 as version 2.2), and Windows platforms.

There are so many new features in version 2.0 that we highly recommend even the most experienced users of version 1.x check out our Five Minute Tour (see app "Help" > "Five Minute Tour"), because you will see a ton of amazing new stuff that you can use immediately. Well worth a few minutes of your time!

Go to Five Minute Tour now (see app "Help" > "Five Minute Tour")

Not only does version 2.0 include tens of thousands of new entries suggested by you (more than 195,000 total entries, compared to 150,000 in previous versions), but it includes a complete, built-in phrasebook (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Categories") (including all the content from our Phrasebook app product and more) with more than 12,000 words and ready-to-use, customizable talking phrases organized into 300+ practical categories.

As always, every single word, phrase, and complete sentence has a crisp, clear, fluent sound recording (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Hearing Words") of a Thai native.

In version 2.0 you can now long-press any playsound icon to hear your word/phrase spoken in slow motion (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Slow/Fast Playback"), but still at the same pitch so you can hear its vowels and consonants clearly! You can choose (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Slow/Fast Playback") between slow2_blue 2x Slow, slow4_blue 4x Super-Slow, and even fast2_blue 2x Fast.

Version 2.0's new Power Search (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Search" > "Search Modes" > "Power Search") mode not only finds the word you typed in isolation, but it finds all phrases and complete sentences containing your word at any position (not just at the start).

All Power Search matches are highlighted and sorted by relevance. You can even search for multiple terms (as in a Google search) to find relevant phrases.

And since the Power Search feature also searches every word of every phrase in Categories as well as the category names themselves, it is the central place to find your word as well as sample sentences and whole categories relevant to your search. We always recommend starting in the Search screen (see app "Help" > "Five Minute Tour" > "Start in the Search Screen") even if your goal is to find categories.

For those who prefer the old way, you can still activate Alphabetical Search (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Search" > "Search Modes" > "Alphabetical Search") at any time. Just touch the magnifying glass icon ( or ) at the top-left of the Search screen.

It's very important to understand that Power Search is not Google Translate (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Search" > "Type Key Words, Not Sentences"): It searches the hand-edited, fluent, correct sentences in the app and does not attempt to translate every possible sentence (usually into gibberish) like Google Translate. To get good results with Power Search, you should type one or two key words (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Search" > "Type Key Words, Not Sentences"), not complete sentences.

Version 2.0 introduces an amazing new technology that makes our phrasebook entries much more useful than anything else available: our hundreds of Super Phrases (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Placeholders") let you customize complete phrases to meet your needs, plugging in everything from dates, times, colors, prices, distances to travel destinations in your native language, your home currency, and familiar units, automatically translating everything to a complete, fluent Thai sentence which you can play with one touch. The app even features a built-in talking, translating units and currency converter and calculator that lets you fluently haggle with a Thai vendor (see app "Help" > "Five Minute Tour" > "Super Phrases and Placeholders") or talk land area with a Thai real-estate agent with both of you working in your native language and units. This is just the tip of the iceberg: for more on this ground-breaking feature, be sure to check out our Five Minute Tour (see app "Help" > "Five Minute Tour" > "Super Phrases and Placeholders") and "Help" > "Using the App" > "Placeholders".

We heard you loud and clear, and included a new Favorites screen (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Favorites") in 2.0 that lets you organize the words and phrases you use often into multiple folders (you can even have folders inside folders, as deep as you want).

In version 2.0 we have added a new Explain Sound (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Explain Sound") feature alongside our famous Explain Spelling (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Explain Spelling"), See Real-World Fonts (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "See Real-World Fonts"), and Find Words Inside (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Find Words Inside") features. Explain Sound is for people who want to learn to speak a Thai word without needing to know Thai Script. It divides your chosen words into syllables and explains their Thai Sound, showing you how to pronounce the consonants and vowels that make up each syllable and showing you similar sounds that are often confused for them, all annotated with convenient links into the relevant sections of our comprehensive guide to Thai "Help" > "Speaking/Listening".

A version of Explain Sound is now integrated into the app Thai Sound Power search (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Search" > "Three Ways to Search" > "Thai Sound Search") (in the blue help tip bubble at the top of your search results) so you know exactly what the text you have typed sounds like. This makes it much easier to get good results from Thai Sound search since you can quickly touch a playsound button to see if you are searching for the correct sound. This also makes it a snap to learn the sounds of Thai and your chosen pronunciation guide system (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Guide Systems"). We believe this will resolve a lot of the difficulties people had with Thai Sound search in the past.

Version 2.0 streamlines the process of switching between (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Search" > "Three Ways to Search") English, Thai Script, and Thai Sound searches. All are found under a unified " Search" icon and by touching one of our new keyboard tabs ( English, Thai Sound, or fs.th Thai Script) you can switch sections, switch the keyboard, and clear the field all at the same time. A single touch is enough. You can paste Thai or English words into the app and it will also switch keyboard tabs automatically.

Version 2.0 expands on the External Links (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "External Links") feature present in the 1.x Android version and brings it to all platforms. You can now activate up to four External Links icons that will take your selected word and search for it in Google, Wikipedia, online Thai and English dictionaries, or any website you choose. We provide a number of pre-configured links to popular websites, so you can easily activate this feature in a few seconds.

In version 2.0 you can Hide Pronunciation Guides (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Hide Guides") to avoid temptation if you're learning Thai Script, you can set Thai and English text sizes (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Changing Text Size") separately if you like, and you can choose a standard or compact (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Changing Text Layout") entry layout to save screen space.

In version 2.0 there are even more Thai and international place names than before, but we show all place names abbreviated to one line (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Search" > "Abbreviated Results (...)") by default so that they do not distract from more common entries. Furthermore, for almost all place names you can now touch a map map icon (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Mapping Places") to see that place using your device's mapping tool (e.g. Google Maps, Apple Maps).

Version 2.0 has so many new features which you can apply to selected words and phrases that we now let you configure which shortcut buttons (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Shortcut Buttons") (which little grey icons like playsound and addcard ) appear alongside entries. You can enable shortcut buttons to access features you use most with one touch, and hide the others to save screen space (you can still access the others with one more touch in the the menu that pops up (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Working with Words") when you touch words/phrases).

Another new time-saver with 2.0 is Auto Paste and Search (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Auto Paste and Search"), which automatically searches for what's in the system clipboard every time you switch to the app. So if you frequently look up words from other apps, you just copy the word and switch apps.

Version 2.0's Help screen features a new "Help" > "Using the App" > "How to Read Entries" section with important facts about how our entries are designed that might surprise you and let even experienced users get a lot more use out of our dictionary entries. Check it out!

We were surprised to found out that many of our long-time users actually didn't know the app contains a comprehensive guide to Thai "Help" > "Speaking/Listening" as well as "Help" > "Reading and Writing", so we made those much more prominent in the Help screens and even added more content (including an often-requested section on "Help" > "Speaking/Listening" > "Telling Time and Date"). Explore to see what's available!

Because we have so many users of Anki and other flashcard tools, we added a new Copy Whole Entry (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Copy Whole Entry") feature which copies your Thai word/phrase along with its English translations, part of speech, etc. to your device's clipboard in a "CSV" format that is compatible with third-party flashcard programs like Anki and spreadsheet programs like Excel.

Version 2.0 introduces support for a paiboonthdc: Custom URL Scheme (see app "Help" > "Using the App" > "Custom URL Scheme") that lets you launch the dictionary app from other apps, or even from study sheets you create yourself in your own documents.

There are even more new features which you can find out about in our Five Minute Tour (see app "Help" > "Five Minute Tour") and the rest of our Help pages.

Thanks for your purchase, and for those of you who have been waiting for this release for years, thanks for your patience too! We hope you agree it was worth the wait.

Version 2.2

Version 2.2 was a major release on the Android platform: the first release with all the massive new version 2.0 features described above.

Version 2.2 was a minor release on the iOS platform that brought forward several handy features and fixes from Android:

Improved layout of Real-World Fonts: To make it easier to compare your desired fonts in detail, we reduced the space between fonts, added show/hide buttons for each font, and made the font size proportional to the text size you currently have selected throughout the app (see Settings > Text Size; enabling "pinch anywhere to change text size" makes this even more useful).
Help Links in Explain Spelling for consonants and vowels now bring you to the exact spot in the consonant or vowel Help pages where that consonant or vowel is described.
has a new app icon that reminds us more of the old colorful icon that many of you said you missed!
restores compatibility with iOS 6 and probably also iOS 5 devices, which crashed on 2.0.
fixes a landscape rotation problem with iOS 7 devices
Improved Icons: adds icons to all second-level Categories, all top-level Help items, and Settings > About for more visual consistency. Adds some more Categories links to make the Swearing and Language Difficulties categories easier to find. Adds some more links from Categories to the Writing sections.
External Links: fixed a bug preventing the sample Google Translate URL (or any URL with embedded slashes in its fragment) from working.
adds a Settings > Keyboards > (pick one) > Key Label Size option to scale the Paiboon keyboard key label size down (not the key size), for those who prefer a more spacious look vs. those who want to avoid using their reading glasses.
has some UI layout and centering refinements in the Paiboon keyboard and several app dialogs. Popup menu radius consistent with iOS 10.
corrects capitalization and text formatting on more than 2,100 scientific names of fruits, animals, etc.
fixes a hang when deleting a favorites folder then going up then back in a certain way.
fixes a problem preventing you from typing S or MLFHR in the Easy Thai Thai Sound keyboard.
fixes a problem that prevented certain double-quoted, two-word searches like "cluster bean" from working.
in Settings > Shortcut buttons, moves help links to the left to avoid overlapping the scroll thumb.
fixes bug where shifted English Paiboon keyboard showed an ABC button rather than a 123 button.
Updated Help: Many improvements, including:
- adds a Privacy Policy at Help > Privacy
- adds details about entry ordering to Help > Using the App > How to Read Entries
fixes a large number of other small issues you reported---thanks!

Version 2.3

Version 2.3 was a minor release on the iOS platform that improved some of the help text. It came out in February 2017.