K so I'm using the google IME and I can switch between English input and Japanese IME by using Alt+Shift but whenever I do the Japanese IME defaults to writing in English and it seems theres no way I can get it to default to writing in Hiragana and when the Japanese IME is open I have to manually go and click on which input method I want.

Help??

The options/settings don't seem to be very helpful

Why would you switch between English and Japanese IME, when the Japanese IME can let you input romaji too?

Ya, I just leave mine on JP Direct Input, then alt+tilde to switch to hiragana.

Some programs don't display text the same using JP Direct Input. I switch between English / JP using Alt+Shift too, but nest0r has just solved the prob for you — Alt+tilde (~) is the magic key combo you need to switch to hiragana (no option I know of to leave it on hiragana by default though, anyone else help here?)

brilliant! you legend Thanks. Don't know why the hell it was so unclear as to not even tell me how to switch like that but it works like a charm.

This forum is the best thing to happen to Japanese learning I swear Such a helpful place.

Can someone explain this to me again? I am using the Google IME, but there it just seems to randomly switch back and forth between romaji and hiragana.

If I capitalize the first letter of a sentence it lets me type in romaji, but any punctuation puts in back in Hiragana mode. (I am on a Mac if that makes any difference.)

torida Wrote:Some programs don't display text the same using JP Direct Input. I switch between English / JP using Alt+Shift too, but nest0r has just solved the prob for you — Alt+tilde (~) is the magic key combo you need to switch to hiragana (no option I know of to leave it on hiragana by default though, anyone else help here?)

For some stupid reason you can't. You can remap the keys though.

Personally I use ctrl+caps lock to go from romaji to hiragana.

Why use a key combo? Just use something like "keyremap4macbook" to remap a dead key to be kana/eisuu toggle like on a Japanese keyboard. I have the right option key set as that.

I also have had some problems with my IME lately and I have NO idea what's going on. I doubt anybody can help me with this, but at least I wanna try.

It's difficult to describe the problem, though.
For example, until a while ago I could type はてな when I wanted to have a "?" if I type it now the only thing IME is offering me is this: はて名
Yesterday it happened again. I always used かお in order to get a few 顔文字, now the it's only offering me crap when typing it like ヵ尾　(first choice) 顔 is not even in the list!!!! What's going on???????????????

torida Wrote:Some programs don't display text the same using JP Direct Input. I switch between English / JP using Alt+Shift too, but nest0r has just solved the prob for you — Alt+tilde (~) is the magic key combo you need to switch to hiragana (no option I know of to leave it on hiragana by default though, anyone else help here?)

Windows can let you select which one you want to leave default (I'm pretty sure)

@chochajin I know practically nothing about this topic but it sounds somewhat similar to a problem I had with Microsoft IME awhile back. I had downloaded some new IME dictionaries that were used for all sorts of かおもじ and included preset phrases with some of them.

I noticed a few days later though that for some reason, whenever I would type anything using kana or kanji, it would give me complete gibberish. I couldn't even convert わたし to 私 correctly. Everything was just a one big mess. In the end, I ended up deleting the dictionaries I had DL'ed, and my IME went back to normal. I'm not sure if the IME just got confused with what dictionary was being referenced or what, but I tried selecting certain dictionaries to use and all sorts of other stuff, but it didn't fix the problem.

Like I said, my experience with IME is very beginner/limited. Just throwing in my experience because it sounded somewhat similar :/

Edit: I never switch between JP and English input either. No point as Jarvik7 said because JP allows romaji input anyway. Mine's set to romaji input default, and I have it worked so ctrl + caps lock switches to hiragana, alt + caps lock takes me to katakana, and alt + ~ switches me back to romaji.

I don't mess around with IME because I honestly don't understand the program much, but I do think that Windows can let you set whatever default you want, as another poster said.

2nd edit: I looked around on my IME. There's a lot of stuff you can change if you go to the properties menu. I think Tobberoth was right about not being able to set hiragana as the default input. Mine says hiragana is the default input method, but it doesn't work for some reason.

I think it only works if you set your keyboard to kana direct input instead of romaji direct input. Which is useless for me since I don't have a JP keyboard and I'll never remember which keys correspond to which kana

chochajin Wrote:For example, until a while ago I could type はてな when I wanted to have a "?" if I type it now the only thing IME is offering me is this: はて名

Your IME woes seem unfortunate and I hope you figure them out, but why would you use six keystrokes for something that requires only Shift+/?

JimmySeal Wrote:

chochajin Wrote:For example, until a while ago I could type はてな when I wanted to have a "?" if I type it now the only thing IME is offering me is this: はて名

Your IME woes seem unfortunate and I hope you figure them out, but why would you use six keystrokes for something that requires only Shift+/?

That's probably the problem. The IME is *too* intelligent. It's like 'Enough! Just type the damned question mark yourself.'

JimmySeal Wrote:Your IME woes seem unfortunate and I hope you figure them out, but why would you use six keystrokes for something that requires only Shift+/?

That's because it doesn't work like that on a Germany keyboard! ....