This post is going to be a little less entertainment-centred than the majority of recent posts, instead of games I will describe a couple of really useful utilities related to Japanese.
I myself am studying Japanese., but I am not very proficient with it yet. I do realise that it is a difficult task, yet my ever-growing infatuation with Japan has driven me to make a significant effort and force my grey cells to memorise convoluted structures, forms and writing of Nihon-go.
Having said that, it is not easy. Especially writing is something that is overwhelming at first. In the beginning katakana, hiragana and kanji seem to be impossible to ever memorise, especially the latter. I already know kana, but I still am struggling with kanji. I think that to master more than a couple hundreds one has to spend some time living in Japan, otherwise it is too hard - but maybe I am just looking for excuses to my own inability to properly memorise kanji.
Being a computer geek (to some extent at least), I couldn't overlook the occasion of boosting my learning process with any digital crutch I could use. The following programs and utilities are the result of my searches - I have found them to be useful and thought I would share the compilation, so that you don't have to look for them yourself.
DreamKana is one of the simplest programs to study kana. But its simplicity is its main advantage, right next to being free of charge (don't we all love free software?). Basically it just displays kana characters and asks user to type in their romaji reading. Simple and effective, I know quite a lot of students that used this while preparing for JLPT Level 4. Also, it doesn't require installation, which together with its small size makes it a perfect candidate for portable tool on your USB pendrive.
This program is very similar to DreamKana, but it is more configurable. Its main advantage is the possibility to choose a specific group of kana that user would like to practice. It also shows the hit/miss ratio (good answers vs bad answers), which gives some idea about how well user has already mastered the material. Nice and simple utility. Apparently there are some new versions that have appeared, but I didn't really have the time to check them.
I wouldn't be myself if I didn't put some PSP homebrew in here. Essentially, PSPKanji (which I have already described here) allows user to work with kanji flashcards. It also has kana tables available at the press of the button and quiz options for revising purposes. Recent version has some slight graphical glitches, but nevertheless it is a very useful little program (plus it has very nice visual style). Kudos to Sammy who created it!
This is a very powerful tool - basically a kanji dictionary with lots of configuration options and customised searches, such as based on radicals. Essential program for everybody seriously studying Japanese (or Chinese, too), especially for JLPT, since Wakan has lists of JLPT kanji for each level. Works well under Linux through Wine - tested it under Ubuntu.
This excellent plugin shows pop-up window with the dictionary definition of given kanji that has been highlighted in the browser window. This greatly simplifies finding the meaning of that kanji, which would otherwise take significantly longer. The description is short, but this is a very powerful tool. Its main problem is that it is dependent on the quality of dictionaries used and Japanese-French dictionary seems to be more accurate than Japanese-English one.
Despite its name, this widget only displays hiragana with their romaji readings (well, actually it does English-Portugese/German/French pairs too), and I haven't found a way to force it to display katakana (if you know how to, let me know through comments). User can select refresh intervals, thus being able to have his memory tickled all the time by changing hiragana characters. Personally, I found it very useful while learning kana.
This little widget displays random Japanese words and expressions, many of them taken from common everyday situations. It is not very helpful when revising some particular material, but nevertheless by constant bombarding with kanji allows user to retain some of them. For consideration.
This widget presents the correct stroke order for katakana characters. There also exists a very similar widget for hiragana stroke order. Useful when beginning learning kana, but also when user needs to refresh the correct stroke order later on. A very nice little tool.
I myself am studying Japanese., but I am not very proficient with it yet. I do realise that it is a difficult task, yet my ever-growing infatuation with Japan has driven me to make a significant effort and force my grey cells to memorise convoluted structures, forms and writing of Nihon-go.
Having said that, it is not easy. Especially writing is something that is overwhelming at first. In the beginning katakana, hiragana and kanji seem to be impossible to ever memorise, especially the latter. I already know kana, but I still am struggling with kanji. I think that to master more than a couple hundreds one has to spend some time living in Japan, otherwise it is too hard - but maybe I am just looking for excuses to my own inability to properly memorise kanji.
Being a computer geek (to some extent at least), I couldn't overlook the occasion of boosting my learning process with any digital crutch I could use. The following programs and utilities are the result of my searches - I have found them to be useful and thought I would share the compilation, so that you don't have to look for them yourself.
DreamKana is one of the simplest programs to study kana. But its simplicity is its main advantage, right next to being free of charge (don't we all love free software?). Basically it just displays kana characters and asks user to type in their romaji reading. Simple and effective, I know quite a lot of students that used this while preparing for JLPT Level 4. Also, it doesn't require installation, which together with its small size makes it a perfect candidate for portable tool on your USB pendrive.
This program is very similar to DreamKana, but it is more configurable. Its main advantage is the possibility to choose a specific group of kana that user would like to practice. It also shows the hit/miss ratio (good answers vs bad answers), which gives some idea about how well user has already mastered the material. Nice and simple utility. Apparently there are some new versions that have appeared, but I didn't really have the time to check them.
I wouldn't be myself if I didn't put some PSP homebrew in here. Essentially, PSPKanji (which I have already described here) allows user to work with kanji flashcards. It also has kana tables available at the press of the button and quiz options for revising purposes. Recent version has some slight graphical glitches, but nevertheless it is a very useful little program (plus it has very nice visual style). Kudos to Sammy who created it!
This is a very powerful tool - basically a kanji dictionary with lots of configuration options and customised searches, such as based on radicals. Essential program for everybody seriously studying Japanese (or Chinese, too), especially for JLPT, since Wakan has lists of JLPT kanji for each level. Works well under Linux through Wine - tested it under Ubuntu.
This excellent plugin shows pop-up window with the dictionary definition of given kanji that has been highlighted in the browser window. This greatly simplifies finding the meaning of that kanji, which would otherwise take significantly longer. The description is short, but this is a very powerful tool. Its main problem is that it is dependent on the quality of dictionaries used and Japanese-French dictionary seems to be more accurate than Japanese-English one.
Despite its name, this widget only displays hiragana with their romaji readings (well, actually it does English-Portugese/German/French pairs too), and I haven't found a way to force it to display katakana (if you know how to, let me know through comments). User can select refresh intervals, thus being able to have his memory tickled all the time by changing hiragana characters. Personally, I found it very useful while learning kana.
This little widget displays random Japanese words and expressions, many of them taken from common everyday situations. It is not very helpful when revising some particular material, but nevertheless by constant bombarding with kanji allows user to retain some of them. For consideration.
This widget presents the correct stroke order for katakana characters. There also exists a very similar widget for hiragana stroke order. Useful when beginning learning kana, but also when user needs to refresh the correct stroke order later on. A very nice little tool.
