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I've been using it since day one, no going back now.

It's great to see the technology develop. After all, we've already had this for a year http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm17414227

Damn. I especially liked the glasses thingy, those looked really useful.

Does anyone know where I could purchase the keyboard-kit setup? I've always wanted to learn the drums while writing a novel.

Does this work with 8-bit Google maps? If it does, I'm sold.

Wait a minute... do Japanese use the English alphabet to input kana/kanji on computers?

Animosophy Wrote:Wait a minute... do Japanese use the English alphabet to input kana/kanji on computers?

There's other layouts available that are based on the way Japanese typewriters kind of used to work, but for the most part everyone types everything via romaji. It's taught in school for that purpose, and that's part of the reason Japanese understanding of English phonics is so messed up sometimes. They hit "ti" on their computer and it brings up ち so they tend to think stuff like anytime you see "ti" it must be a "ch" sound. The same goes for "si" which they will always pronounce "shi."

This is kind of a raw nerve for me right now since I have to help 250 students make name cards here at the beginning of the year with romaji versions of their name.

I know an old guy who likes the kana input method because it's basically half the keystrokes. The only problem with that logic is that we tend to move our hands in spurts of 2 or 3 letters at a time. So hitting anywhere between 1-3 keys is about the same amount of time as hitting a single key.

edit: Because I'm a masochist I just switched my work computer to kana input mode. My hands are cramped despite me having been typing really slowly for the past hour.

erlog Wrote:They hit "ti" on their computer and it brings up ち so they tend to think stuff like anytime you see "ti" it must be a "ch" sound. The same goes for "si" which they will always pronounce "shi."

This used to be a little bit of a pet peeve of mine. I was living in Chitose, and every once in a while I would see someone write it in English as "Titose". Or when I'd hear my coworker ask people to "sit down" pronouncing it with a "shi" on the initial sound.

Similarly, I worked for a very short time with a woman who used romanization methods in writing that I wasn't as accustomed to. For example, she wrote "sacyou" instead of "shacho" on anything pertaining to the boss.

This is a little disappointing, the thread seems to have taken a turn away from the original post and into an altogether serious manner of discussion. Let us hope this does not become a trend within internet message boards.

It's been a trend here forever People are almost too helpful

uisukii Wrote:This is a little disappointing, the thread seems to have taken a turn away from the original post and into an altogether serious manner of discussion. Let us hope this does not become a trend within internet message boards.

This is a pretty great comment.


When I clicked on this thread, I initially thought it was going to be about the Godan input method:

http://support.google.com/ime/japanese/a...0298?hl=ja

I tried to use Godan for a while, but it just seemed too slow to use with one hand (two hands would have probably been alright).

Has anyone been using it? Does anyone really like it?

erlog Wrote:This is kind of a raw nerve for me right now since I have to help 250 students make name cards here at the beginning of the year with romaji versions of their name.

I sympathise.

I hope there are at least some resources that aim to identify those kinds of problems in Japan. Kind of dents a hole in the students' language learning. Wouldn't be very nice having to unlearn those kinds of mistakes, heh.

erlog Wrote:I know an old guy who likes the kana input method because it's basically half the keystrokes. The only problem with that logic is that we tend to move our hands in spurts of 2 or 3 letters at a time. So hitting anywhere between 1-3 keys is about the same amount of time as hitting a single key.

??? How did you determine this? The old guy's math makes sense, and is confirmed by research. (romaji input is slower than JIS kana input, which in turn is slower than thumb shift keyboards) http://nicola.sunicom.co.jp/thumb4_1.html (link is in Japanese, but has pretty pictures)

As far as I know, the only problem with kana input is the layout of conventional keyboards: the kana are on more than three rows, and that slows down touch typing considerably (fingers have to now move double the distance for some keys, causing errors), and the characters don't have a logical placement. This problem is solved by the thumb-shift keyboard, the keyboard of choice for professional typists, writers, etc.

Think I'll remember to get me a thumb-shift keyboard in the future, whatever they are.