The Chinese don't do.

I'm not sure how exactly it works; but 90% of Chinese I know simply can't type. The people who can use a variety of methods, but I suppose the most common is the Microsoft pinyin IME that comes with Windows.

Come off it. If 90% of Chinese people don't type, where does all the Internet content in Chinese come from?

To answer your question, yes they use Western keyboards with IMEs. I couldn't tell you which method is most prevalent though. It's probably pinyin with those who use simplified characters though.

My friend's dad "wrote" the character with a touch pen and the software figured out the character. It was pretty neat.

From the other 10%.

I'm bloody serious; China has a big enough population for it to work out.

Probably!

Is the situation like Maths for us? I always reach for pen and paper to do any calculations, or formulate equations because it's just so much easier than on a computer. Even the equations for any computer programme I write, I'd often work out on paper first.

Eh, you may be right. Bearing in mind that many Chinese don't have regular internet access and content is heavily censored anyway, it's quite a feat that they contribute as much as they do. I expect in the future Chinese will be second only to English on the web, if it isn't already.

But this is ignoring overseas Chinese who probably make substantial contributions as well (and are the reason traditional characters haven't died out yet).
I've tried this but it's pretty hard to write neatly with a computer mouse or touchpad. It might be useful with a stylo.

I've tried this but it's pretty hard to write neatly with a computer mouse or touchpad. It might be useful with a stylo.[/quote]

It was a stylus on a touch pad. It had to be "trained", but once it got your handwriting, he could write as quickly as he could with pen and paper.

Oops, I meant stylus. I said stylo because I've been working on French lately.

In Taiwan, keyboards usually have both Bopomofo and the US Latin set.

Image:
http://ascii-table.com/img/keyboard-467.png

Sometimes other stuff too, specially Cangjie.

With Cangjie added:
http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol9/issue1/Su-Photo.jpg

With both Cangjie and Dayi added:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/c ... yboard.png

Now that I learnt a basic bit of Zhuyin to be able to type with a Zhuyin IME, (Though to be honest I don't really know the Zhuyin; I think in Pinyin and map the Pinyin in my head to the keys rather than Zhuyin.) I look at those "standard" Zhuyin keyboards and they blow my mind. They are essentially in Alphabetical order: like bo po mo fo de te ne le ge ke he etc etc. Little thought seems to be put into keyboard ergonomics. I dunno how people type with those things.