Hello,
I'm rather new to the forums so I hope it's ok if I post this link. If not, just let me know, and I'll delete it.

This past month I've been working on a web application called Read The Kanji (http://www.readthekanji.com), which is an easy to use web application to test one's ability on reading kanji compounds by just typing in the correct reading. Just set your JLPT and start using. No need to login, but registering (very simple as email is not required at the moment) and logging in will let the system track some basic stats for you.

It isn't the most feature laden application at the moment, but I think it is definitely a useful study supplement for this year's test, and I'm hoping to gather any feedback I can to make it even better for the next JLPT go round (it's in July next year, right?).

So if anyone here would like to give it a try and tell me what they think about it, I would definitely appreciate it. And if you could provide feedback as well, either on this forums or email, I'd be even more appreciative.

Good luck to everyone on this year's test and in their kanji studies!

Very Nice!!!

If there is a way to look at the entire list with meanings and readings, that would be very helpful for studying. On that list, if there is a way to hide already learnt words, that would be fantastic.

I love the website - it's simple, and the stats page is informative.
Makes studying reading fun!

Thank you for setting this up.

Just made an account and have to agree, it`s very nice, especially when you have a spare few minutes to kill. It`s also good that you have to type in the reading yourself, unlike most apps where you have to do it in your head, I find that actually writing the answer and thinking it in your head can sometimes lead to quite different results.

Looking forward to seeing future versions and thank you for making it.

すごいよ！

Absolutely amazing. I love it! Thank you so much for making it!

Edit: The more I play with this, the more I love it. You're done a really great job on this. I hope you'll continue to support and improve it.

Looks good but you might want to tweak the randomization a bit. I went to the site, changed the level to JLPT2, and the first and third words I got were both 琴.

I like it, but can you have an option to show or hide the definition? I'd rather try to write the reading as well as guess the meaning? Good job.

phauna Wrote:I like it, but can you have an option to show or hide the definition? I'd rather try to write the reading as well as guess the meaning? Good job.

It's there already - check under "Prefs"

Wow, thanks for the kind words, I'm glad you all think it is useful!

kfmfe04 Wrote:Very Nice!!!

If there is a way to look at the entire list with meanings and readings, that would be very helpful for studying. On that list, if there is a way to hide already learnt words, that would be fantastic.

I love the website - it's simple, and the stats page is informative.
Makes studying reading fun!

Thank you for setting this up.

Could you describe a little bit more about the list you have in mind? Do you mean something to go along with the stats page that displays all the kanji? Like have a "view kanji" mode and a "view words" mode? Or do you have something else in mind?

Jarvik7 Wrote:Looks good but you might want to tweak the randomization a bit. I went to the site, changed the level to JLPT2, and the first and third words I got were both 琴.

Thanks for this, I'll look into it. Let me know if it happens again or if the order seems kind of fishy.

Cool. I like it!

joeellis Wrote:Could you describe a little bit more about the list you have in mind? Do you mean something to go along with the stats page that displays all the kanji? Like have a "view kanji" mode and a "view words" mode? Or do you have something else in mind?

Well, I just thought it would be nice to have a way to "study" lists of vocabulary. For me, personally, I don't need it for JLPT3 or JLPT4 because I know most of the vocabulary already. But when I hit JLPT2 or JLPT1 and don't know most of the vocabulary, it becomes hard to study (too many fails).

Off the top of my head, I thought It would be nice to just have a scrollable list with 4 columns: Kanji, reading, meaning, show/don't show checkbox that I can scroll and study batches at a time, but I'm not sure how this would work with so many vocabulary in JLPT1 and JLPT2.

Another possibility is, on the stats page, when I mouse-over a Kanji, show all the compounds so I can study them all at once - this might be more straightforward/useful.

Maybe some other users will have some good suggestions on the best way to study batches of new vocabulary from within your application...

kfmfe04 Wrote:Well, I just thought it would be nice to have a way to "study" lists of vocabulary. For me, personally, I don't need it for JLPT3 or JLPT4 because I know most of the vocabulary already. But when I hit JLPT2 or JLPT1 and don't know most of the vocabulary, it becomes hard to study (too many fails).

Off the top of my head, I thought It would be nice to just have a scrollable list with 4 columns: Kanji, reading, meaning, show/don't show checkbox that I can scroll and study batches at a time, but I'm not sure how this would work with so many vocabulary in JLPT1 and JLPT2.

Another possibility is, on the stats page, when I mouse-over a Kanji, show all the compounds so I can study them all at once - this might be more straightforward/useful.

Maybe some other users will have some good suggestions on the best way to study batches of new vocabulary from within your application...

Ahh ok I see what you mean now. Let me explain a bit how the program works, and then I'll come back to the vocabulary list question.

The program as it is now is set up according to the Leitner system, so as you successfully answer each word, it advances into a new group, pretty much the same idea as how this site works. The program makes one difference from the Leitner system however. Due to the nature of the application in that there are not a fixed set of cards (just an endless quiz), I added another group called the failure group, which contains all the words that have been seen, but failed. When the program goes to choose a card, this failure group has a much higher priority over the other groups that are chosen, and the priority increases the more failure cards are in the failure group. Hopefully, this makes sense

My logic was that *ideally* with the correct settings, if you have enough failed cards, eventually the priority will become high enough in the failed group that it will sort of loop through your failed words and you won't really advance any further as the system will just stop picking out new cards. Therefore, the program would (again, ideally) force you to eventually learn the cards you don't know. So if you started out on the 2kyuu level, and knew absolutely no 2kyuu vocab or kanji, over time you should still be able to progress, albeit a bit slowly. In theory, it's an it's-ok-to-fail-cause-you'll-get-it-eventually-so-just-がんばる type of system

Back to the lists question, my thinking is that having a strict list of vocabulary words is, like you mentioned, rather unwieldy given the volume of 2kyuu and 1kyuu vocab words. This is why I set the system up in this current way, it kind of abstracts the user from the enormity of the lists and just handles a little at a time. However, I do agree that it does feel like something better could be done. Perhaps some sort of view which you can view your weak words, rather than all of them at once? I'm definitely going to give some thought to it, and if anyone has any suggestions, I'd love to hear them.

As for the displaying the kanji compound on mouseover on the stats page, that's a great idea. It could easily go under the current stats as there is still some empty space there. Thanks!

Website is really clean and easy to use. Looks very useful.

I wonder if you could set it up for students of the Chinese language too:
So have simplified Hanzi (with the Chinese readings)?

Thanks.

Meh, any chance for a plugin for anki with pretty kanji statistic like these?

I would like to see the kanji in the stats area on one page instead of broken up into 5 pages.

Terhorst Wrote:I would like to see the kanji in the stats area on one page instead of broken up into 5 pages.

Yeah, originally I was thinking of doing this, but it was pretty difficult to get on one whole page and be able to actually read the kanji. Also, it was a bit heavy to the database at the time. But I'll try to see what I can do about it, maybe I can get it to work...

Nice site - I like it a lot already. Another way to get my kanji fix for the day...

Is there any chance you could have a user preference to turn the romaji off? Other than that, the application has worked very well for me so far, so thanks!

tokidokibenkyoushimasu Wrote:Nice site - I like it a lot already. Another way to get my kanji fix for the day...

Is there any chance you could have a user preference to turn the romaji off? Other than that, the application has worked very well for me so far, so thanks!

Sure, I'll add that in to the next version

A great little app!!
Some little problems with words with more than one reading,
(行く = いく / ゆく, 一日 = いちにち / ついたち, 七 = しち / なな) but I'm lovin' it!


I think I found a little mistake though.

==========================
お姉さん - おねえさん
(Hepburn: oneisan / Nihon-shiki: oneisan)
older sister
==========================

Isn't "お姉さん" translitterated in Hepburn as "oneesan"..?

Edit:
Well.. I just noticed that it takes hiragana input so that fixes it!

alantin Wrote:A great little app!!
Some little problems with words with more than one reading,
(行く = いく / ゆく, 一日 = いちにち / ついたち, 七 = しち / なな) but I'm lovin' it!

Yeah, I noticed that. That was pretty annoying actually.

Damn this app is addicting!!!

Luckily, it doesn't require as much brainpower as writing for RevTK so I can watch TV and do ReadTK at the same time...

Hi joeellis,

I appreciate your work and it's a nice site! I haven't had much time to play with it, but I wonder why someone might use this instead of Anki with JLPT lists.

I think, having to write the pronunciation makes you much more active than if you were just reviewing with anki. Actually I think the strong kinesthetic component in this app makes it (atleast for me) way superior to anki with the JLPT lists in regard to learning the vocabulary as individual words.

I think it is perfect for a kinesthetic learner but perhaps for someone, who has little or no kinesthetic aspect in his learning style, it would be of not much use.

playadom Wrote:Yeah, I noticed that. That was pretty annoying actually.

It would be better if it just accepted either in these cases.

Yeah, in proper hepburn it should be oneesan.

I tried this out a couple days ago. I just dismissed it because of the typing in romaji. (though now realizing the absurdity of it) Now that I know it takes kana as well, I may have found my laze-your-way-to-vocab tool.

SOLID!!!