is there some way to just get rid of "half-width kataka

[dudnaito]

Why can't it just be hiragana by default. I use a single button to switch from english to japanese, but it just plain sucks when i'm inputting 100's of cards on anki, and every single time i switch to japanese, it goes right back to being "half-width alphanumeric," something whose function i'm still not aware of.

Frigging just got windows 7; would've thought someone would complain about this. I have to literally mouse click every single time i switch back to japanese, which is after every single card.

[Javizy]

http://www.google.co.jp/intl/ja/ime/

[dudnaito]

my japanese isn't great. Any descriptions?

[Javizy]

It's the Google IME, which is much more user-friendly than the MS one. Give it a try. Also google Rikai-chan if you can't read Japanese. I think it works with Chrome now too, so you don't have to use Lagefox.

[dudnaito]

yeah it's called rikaikun. it's AWESOME.


This thing's been downloading for 20+ minutes now with 100 mb internet in Japan. Thing is taking crazy long. Is this normal?

[dudnaito]

dang, got an error code

[Jessi]

I'll have to try that Google IME! This is the first I've heard of it

Dudnaitoさん,

How are you switching from English to Japanese? I was having the same problem that you were until I realized that I didn't ever really have to switch back to English: I could input romaji/English using the half-width alphanumeric, and then just use a single key combination to switch to hiragana input. Would this work for you, I wonder?

[salivia_baker]

Am I glad to use XP. I put in to have Hiragana by default when switching to the Japanese keyboard. and the keyboard settings also remember for the current textfields. I.e. for Anki the first is Hiragana the second is German. makes it much easier.

The only thing that bothers me that for writing in Japanese I have the English keyboard layout. annoys the hell out of me when I cannot find the right keys for punctuation.
Does anyone know how I can switch the keyboard settings? normally you can do that when you add Japanese as language but I only get the option between english and english keyboard (so not really a choice there)

[dudnaito]

I'll have to try that Google IME! This is the first I've heard of it

Dudnaitoさん,

How are you switching from English to Japanese? I was having the same problem that you were until I realized that I didn't ever really have to switch back to English: I could input romaji/English using the half-width alphanumeric, and then just use a single key combination to switch to hiragana input. Would this work for you, I wonder?

perhaps. i'll try that. Frankly, i don't see the point of the other functions besides hiragana. Even when i type in Katakana words in hiragana, the computer will automatically change it to katakana anyway. What is this alphanumeric thingy? I'll experiment myself, but if you have some free time, would you mind giving me something a tad more detailed? Thanks so much.

[Javizy]

I'll have to try that Google IME! This is the first I've heard of it

Dudnaitoさん,

How are you switching from English to Japanese? I was having the same problem that you were until I realized that I didn't ever really have to switch back to English: I could input romaji/English using the half-width alphanumeric, and then just use a single key combination to switch to hiragana input. Would this work for you, I wonder?

perhaps. i'll try that. Frankly, i don't see the point of the other functions besides hiragana. Even when i type in Katakana words in hiragana, the computer will automatically change it to katakana anyway. What is this alphanumeric thingy? I'll experiment myself, but if you have some free time, would you mind giving me something a tad more detailed? Thanks so much.

I'd really give Google a try. These are a few advantages I noticed.

It recognises lots of names of TV shows, films, etc
It converts lots of slang words that MS IME is too dasai to know
It provides suggestions as you type, so you can automatically finish long words and phrases
The options allow you to change spaces and roman characters to half-width

They don't sound like much, but they make a world of difference. I just generally seem to have less of a nightmare getting to the right conversion.

I agree about the katakana thing, especially since you can just press F7 to convert what you've typed to katakana whenever you want (F8 to hiragana, F10 to Roman).

[Jessi]

Javizyさん,

You are right! This is amazing!! I only wish I had known about it sooner~ My co-workers say they have already been using it for awhile..
Thanks for sharing!

dudnaitoさん,

You know how you can change the input mode in IME? (In order, they are Hiragana, full-width katakana, full-width alphanumeric, half-width katakana, half-width alphanumeric, and direct input). It might be easier to just keep IME open all the time and use hiragana mode when writing in Japanese, and direct mode when writing in English (I said half-width alphanumeric before, but that was a mistake). The keyboard shortcut is Alt + ~ for switching between the two, I believe. If you do this, you won't need to switch from English to Japanese and back every time. I hope this makes sense! Let me know if you need more help

[dudnaito]

just wanted to inform you guys that the damn thing finally installed correctly as i was being bombarded by error codes before. I'm still not sure what makes this any diff. from the word IME, but give me a couple of hours to jiggle with it and see what it's all about.


Thanks a lot for letting us know about this feature though Javizy. I love it when people tell me about new and great technology. Kinda like how i tell people chrome is better than firefox....i think

[dudnaito]

pretty awesome.

it seems to remember in what program, what language i use.

For example, in anki, it knows that i start off by default with korean, then japanese hiragana in the answer side.