Change up the fonts

[csklenarik3450]

I think having multiple font's to read in Japanese will help on comprehension. As an example I run Windows XP at work and OpenSUSE at home, the appearance of kanji is somewhat different as it can appear more or less bold between systems and even browsers(I also like to do this on my phone before going to sleep). So while at work I have plenty of free time playing with the core words flash cards and doing very well, but then I get home and suddenly I am doing not so well at first until I pick up new aspects to remember on the kanji being used.

Once I realized this I now tend to try to use different systems as much as possible but it would be great if I can at least edit the deck or some kind of other setting so I can try in other font's. With that said I am sure there's a browser plugin that I might try to locate that can do this as well by changing the CSS values but I don't have much experience in that or if it will even work.

As an extra example I've known how to read kana to some extent for quite some time, even if I don't know what is actually being said. But when I am looking at pictures that have some kana in them using a modern/stylized font it can be more difficult to read some of the characters.

[mmmason8967]

With that said I am sure there's a browser plugin that I might try to locate that can do this as well by changing the CSS values but I don't have much experience in that or if it will even work.

The flashcards don't specify the font so the card is displayed using the default browser font on your system (probably MS Mincho or MS Gothic on a Windows system). Therefore the font will look different depending on what default font is used on a given browser and operating system combination.

In addition, the flashcards are given a font-weight of 600 to make the font more bold, but the exact effect depends a lot on which browser your using (along with available font weights for the default font). On my Windows 7 PC using Firefox this font weight doesn't display very well.

If you use Firefox or Chrome you can create a user style sheet to override the flashcard stylesheet. The one I'm using at the moment is like this:-

Code: Select All

@-moz-document domain(japanesepod101.com) {
.fc_content_wrapper.front .source {
    font-size: 24px !important;
    font-weight: normal !important;
    font-family: "Kozuka Gothic Pro R";
    letter-spacing: 0 !important;
}
}

This selects Kozoka Gothic Pro R as the font, sets the size to 24 pixels (instead of 23), uses normal instead of bold, and resets the -1 letter spacing used in the flashcard stylesheet (this gives me a little bit more space between characters). Of course, for the font-family you must specify a font that is installed in your system--I've got Kozuka Gothic Pro but you might not have.

The drawback is that every time you change the user stylesheet, you have to restart the browser. So it's not a good way to do "on the fly" changes.

As an extra example I've known how to read kana to some extent for quite some time, even if I don't know what is actually being said. But when I am looking at pictures that have some kana in them using a modern/stylized font it can be more difficult to read some of the characters.

Personally I found learning to write the kana made it much, much easier to read stylised fonts. I think it's because if you can write the kana, you know how each character is structured. For example, さ and ち look similar on the screen but they're written in very different ways, and they style-ise very differently too.

マイケル

[paloma_ill]

Hi マイケルさん,

Thank you for your great explanation. csklenarik3450-san, did it help you?

Please let me know if your issue was solved. If not, you can send an email to , and our tech team will help you with this
Let me know if you have any other questions!

Cheers,
Paloma
Team JapanesePod101

[csklenarik3450]

Hi マイケルさん,

Thank you for your great explanation. csklenarik3450-san, did it help you?

Please let me know if your issue was solved. If not, you can send an email to , and our tech team will help you with this
Let me know if you have any other questions!

Cheers,
Paloma
Team JapanesePod101

Thanks but I don't actually have an issue needing to be solved, was just making a suggestion to add as a feature for the flashcards, it's a lot of work to go through with the method mason suggested when I imagine it could be done with a CSS selector on the webpage itself. Though I agree with mason about writing it out, and it would help, I also like to just sit like a zombie and let my eyes feed my brain while my mouse does the work.