I haven't tried using rikai to make cards with a single key-press yet. I can see how that could help me save a lot of time, so thanks for letting me know! I feel there'll probably be a little too much information (more definitions than I want) and I'll have to create another deck for this purpose as well, but we'll see. Despite the fact that my schedule isn't busy at all lately, it's very easy too spend too much time making and reviewing flashcards, so I'll give it a try.
That being said, can you do that with visual novels? Because I haven't heard of anything like that. If we're talking about a game or visual novel where text hooking isn't an option and I have to alt-tab and look things up in a dictionary all the time, then yeah I'm definitely making flashcards because every single look up takes significant time.
However, there are a few visual novels out there that are fairly beginner-friendly. If we're talking about a tool that allows me to instantly check the reading and meaning of what I haven't internalized yet, then I won't be wasting time with time-consuming look ups anyway. That means I most likely won't be reading at a snail's pace, even if it's still a relatively slow endeavor. So maybe I should still srs a few words, but focus on the more challenging stuff instead? Like words with unfamiliar kanji readings, words that seem more difficult to remember in general, and words that might be useful to know later (e.g. when watching anime) but I don't seem to encounter very often?
Another reason I've been thinking about focusing more on reading and listening is that I've noticed Anki helps me with readings and meaning (to a lesser extent) when I have enough time to process everything... but when it comes to listening, it doesn't seem to help me THAT much. There's definitely a difference between decoding kanji readings/meaning without sound and processing words as soon as you hear them. I'm definitely getting better at recognizing words that I've already studied them, but I still need to stop and think about the meaning. It's like "Oh, I think I've already seen this word in my reviews... what does it mean again? Hmmm...". But sometimes I miss words I've already studied, as if I'd never seen them before.
Maybe this is because I've made a lot of progress in a very short span of time (i.e. less than a year), but I feel it's very easy for Anki to take away more time from reading and listening than it should. I can easily spend 6+ hours every day on Japanese, but when 1h+ of that goes into reviews and half of the remaining time goes into making flashcards... you get my point, right?
That being said, can you do that with visual novels? Because I haven't heard of anything like that. If we're talking about a game or visual novel where text hooking isn't an option and I have to alt-tab and look things up in a dictionary all the time, then yeah I'm definitely making flashcards because every single look up takes significant time.
However, there are a few visual novels out there that are fairly beginner-friendly. If we're talking about a tool that allows me to instantly check the reading and meaning of what I haven't internalized yet, then I won't be wasting time with time-consuming look ups anyway. That means I most likely won't be reading at a snail's pace, even if it's still a relatively slow endeavor. So maybe I should still srs a few words, but focus on the more challenging stuff instead? Like words with unfamiliar kanji readings, words that seem more difficult to remember in general, and words that might be useful to know later (e.g. when watching anime) but I don't seem to encounter very often?
Another reason I've been thinking about focusing more on reading and listening is that I've noticed Anki helps me with readings and meaning (to a lesser extent) when I have enough time to process everything... but when it comes to listening, it doesn't seem to help me THAT much. There's definitely a difference between decoding kanji readings/meaning without sound and processing words as soon as you hear them. I'm definitely getting better at recognizing words that I've already studied them, but I still need to stop and think about the meaning. It's like "Oh, I think I've already seen this word in my reviews... what does it mean again? Hmmm...". But sometimes I miss words I've already studied, as if I'd never seen them before.
Maybe this is because I've made a lot of progress in a very short span of time (i.e. less than a year), but I feel it's very easy for Anki to take away more time from reading and listening than it should. I can easily spend 6+ hours every day on Japanese, but when 1h+ of that goes into reviews and half of the remaining time goes into making flashcards... you get my point, right?