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Ubuntu 22.04 Chinese (simplified) pinyin input support

rated 0 times [ 12] [ 0] / answers: 1 / hits: 12010 / 1 Year ago, sat, august 13, 2022, 10:41:57

There are well over a decade's worth of mutually incompatible instructions for setting up basic pinyin input on previous versions of Ubuntu. People make lots of claims about needing to do now obsolete rubbish, which means that many people (including me) end up spending many hours only to end up with a broken install.

Is there a simple procedure to set up Chinese pinyin input for simplified characters that doesn't require many hours of trial and error and leave the system half broken?

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answered 1 Year ago arkcker · Accepted Answer

Note: These instructions are ONLY meant for vanilla Ubuntu and ONLY for 22.04 for basic pinyin input for simplified characters.

Ubuntu has never provided an easy, well-documented option for adding pinyin input support. However, to get basic pinyin support in 22.04 you can simply:

Open Settings, go to Region & Language -> Manage Installed Languages -> Install / Remove languages.

Select Chinese (Simplified). Make sure Keyboard Input method system has Ibus selected. Apply.

Reboot

Log back in, reopen Settings, go to Keyboard.

Click on the "+" sign under Input sources.

Select Chinese (China) and then Chinese (Intelligent Pinyin).

You should now have a little "en" (or whatever the language code of your Ubuntu install is) at the top right of your main screen which you can click on and get a list of available input methods, including Chinese (Intelligent pinyin). Open anything that can receive text (like gedit, openoffice, vim, FF,...) and try it out. You can also change between them with Super/Win + space.

Reboot to make sure it is still there after a reboot.

Be happy that you didn't lose any more time on this ridiculously trivial issue that is still a massive pain in 2022!

If you don't need extra bells and whistles then do NOT bother with fcitx (and the supposedly excellent "google pinyin"), uim or any other exotic option! They are extremely hit-and-miss trying to install, and finding a guide that is relevant to 22.04 is almost impossible. Some claim to have "tested with 22.04" but they have done upgrades of previous versions that they had working, not fresh installs.