Does Wenlin describe any Chinese dialects besides Mandarin? How about Cantonese?
For version 3.0, we’ve added some Cantonese pronunciations of single characters, as footnotes near the bottom of character dictionary entries, but they are only transcriptions, not sound recordings. Otherwise, Wenlin still only describes Mandarin pronunciation. Mandarin (also known as Putonghua or Guoyu) is the most widely spoken dialect of Chinese. We eventually plan to provide more support for Cantonese and other pronunciations in addition to Mandarin. As is well known, written Chinese is essentially the same throughout China, in spite of huge differences in the spoken dialects (some of which are really mutually unintelligible languages). Modern writing generally uses Mandarin vocabulary and grammar. Wenlin is especially useful for learning to read and write Chinese characters, so it is worth considering even if you are interested in a dialect other than Mandarin.
We’ve added some Cantonese pronunciations of single characters, as footnotes near the bottom of character dictionary entries, but they are only transcriptions, not sound recordings. Otherwise, Wenlin still only describes Mandarin pronunciation. Mandarin (also known as Putonghua or Guoyu) is the most widely spoken dialect of Chinese. We eventually plan to provide more support for Cantonese and other pronunciations in addition to Mandarin. As is well known, written Chinese is essentially the same throughout China, in spite of huge differences in the spoken dialects (some of which are really mutually unintelligible languages). Modern writing generally uses Mandarin vocabulary and grammar. Wenlin is especially useful for learning to read and write Chinese characters, so it is worth considering even if you are interested in a dialect other than Mandarin.
