Chinese Idiom Chain

📖 About This Tool

The hard part of an idiom chain is rarely thinking of one, it is settling whether it counts. Someone says "that does not connect" and the game stalls. This tool settles it for you: it checks the phrase against the library, checks whether it can follow the previous one, tells you the last character when it cannot, and then answers with an idiom of its own.

Two rules are available. Same character demands that the opening character be identical to the closing character of the previous idiom, the strict form used in classrooms. Same sound only asks that the reading match, so a pair that fails the strict rule may still connect, which plays far more smoothly and is how the game is usually played. Same sound is the default.

Long chain suits anyone setting a task. Give a starting idiom, or leave it empty for a random one, pick a length between five and thirty, and a whole chain appears at once, ready to copy into homework or a classroom game. With no repeats ticked, no idiom appears twice, so long chains never loop back.

Lookup solves a different problem: you remember the phrase contains a certain character but cannot recall the whole thing. Type the character and every idiom containing it comes up, or type initials such as mddg to match by pinyin abbreviation. Every entry carries pinyin and a gloss, and pressing hint lists everything that fits the current end. The library holds common four-character idioms and runs entirely locally.

Wubi assigns each character at most four keystrokes derived from its components, so a skilled typist enters text far faster than by pinyin input, which requires choosing from candidates. The 86 scheme is the one most people learned and the one this tool defaults to; the 98 revision rearranges a small number of radicals and is included for anyone who learned that version instead.

Keys are shown with the component breakdown, since the point of looking a character up is usually to learn how it is split rather than to memorise a code. A one, two or three key short code is marked where one exists, and those short codes are what make fast typing possible. The component table lists the radicals on each key with the traditional mnemonic phrase. Coverage is a few hundred characters, concentrated on common usage; an absent character is reported rather than guessed, and codes for rare characters should be checked against a full table.

✨ Features

• Back and forth: you play one, the tool answers one.
• Validation: confirms it is a real idiom and that it connects.
• Two rules: same character or same sound, switch any time.
• Long chain: pick a length and generate, optionally without repeats.
• Lookup: search by character or by pinyin initials, with pinyin and gloss.
• Hint and export: candidates when stuck, results copied or exported to CSV.

🚀 How to Use

1. Choose same sound or same character to set how strict the game is.
2. Type your four-character idiom and press enter or go.
3. If it cannot connect the tool names the closing character, otherwise it answers.
4. For a ready-made run, switch to long chain and choose a length.
5. Copy or export CSV to keep the result.

⚠️ Notes

• Library scope: common four-character idioms only, rare ones are reported as absent.
• Same sound: compared on toneless pinyin, using the reading recorded in the library.
• Long chain: the length is a ceiling, the chain may end earlier.
• No repeats: with it on, the chain stops at the point where nothing fresh remains.
• Nothing is saved: refreshing clears the chain, so export before leaving.