In the "wall of China" new onyomi readings are only added when you add the word to the wordsection, and not when you add a new sentence. Is this how it is supposed to work?

Well, here's my initial assessment:

Outstanding as a way to show gains in three areas of Japanese literacy: Context, Vocabulary and Kanji readings. Once sharing gets opened up, there'll be an explosion of use.

Some concerns:

1. Kana to Kanji - May not be possible to reasonably implement. However, ever since trying out this AJATT suggestion, I'm getting better improvements on my self assessments. Reason being, if a Kana to Kanji sentence pops up, I write that one down. This tests if I know the appropriate kanji from memory instead of just writing down what I see.

If possible, there can be a "kana" block during the sentence input. A check box can allow that card to be Kanji to Kana, Kana to Kanji or both.

2. The answer button says "Show Kanji" on it. Minor, but not accurate for Trinity.

3. When adding a card, are we supposed to get some confirmation?

4. Bulk adding?

5. Sorting cards, is there a time added tag?

Anyway, these are initial concerns as I've not played with Trinity that much. I'm VERY, VERY far behind in my studies over the last two weeks (damn to the 8th level of Hell the person than stole my thumbdrive). I'm liking what I'm seeing though.

I second Wabisabi.  I did one Kanji from a group of one, and another from one of the larger reading groups (like 40+), and it already highlights both groups and says I know them both on the right.

I'm really enjoying using Trinity to study vocab and sentences!
Here's a couple more things I noticed today.

1) I think the EDICT priority marking with green and blue is a great idea.  When you add a green vocab word from your sentence, it remains green, however, when you click a blue one, it loses the blue dot when it moves up.  Is this on purpose??

2) When you are reviewing a flashcard sentence and decide to click on a specific kanji to study, I'm thinking this should open up in a new window.  That way you can study the kanji, add compounds, etc and then close up when you are done.  Your sentence review that was in progress will still be intact when you come back.   Or at least make it such that when you click the 'back' button from the kanji review, you go back to your sentence review that was in progress. 

Just a couple suggestions!
Thanks for all your hard work.

Chris

PS - (I hope that those of use who help out with beta testing this application will get a discount once the full subscription version comes out - @wink,wink@)

BUG: A sentence with quotes in it is chopped off in the sentence editor. Example sentence: hello "world". It shows up just fine in the manage sentences or sentence review screens, but just displays 'hello ' (without quotes) in the sentence editor.

I think some things about the interface are a little confusing...

For example, in the kanji sections, it says "add compound"...but really something like "view compounds" would be clearer, because after you click you can see the compounds to chose from.  Then in that list, I would add a note like "click to add compounds" or something.

And the "save" button is a little confusing.

johnzep wrote:

Also, I think it would be nice to have review stacks for the writing quiz as well.

seconded.

johnzep wrote:

I added the word 猫 just playing around with the interface...it pulled up a　definition beyond what I was expecting.

"cat (2) ; submissive partner of a homosexual relationship"

It is true. It is usually written in katakana rather than kanji though.

johnzep wrote:

content can move beyond "family-friendly" with the current way the software works...just thought Fabrice would like to know. 

Similar things can be found in paperback English dictionaries. I guess these aren't "family-friendly" either, eh? :-o

anyway...

I guess the 猫 definition illustrates a limitation of the EDICT dictionary that was discussed before...where there is a good definition and less common definitions cluttering things up.

sure you can look up naughty words in an english dictionary...but generally I think it is kept fairly clinical and not overly specific.  If you look up "bottom" in most paperback dictionaries, it would probably include "buttocks" but exclude the ねこ definition above

I personally don't really care about family friendliness...but it seems like something Fabrice and many other users consider.

I've been fooling around with Trinity and it looks great so far.  One small thing - I added 図書館 to my vocabulary list and the kanji for map doesn't appear on the Chinese wall.  There are 7 kanji listed with the ト reading but 図 isn't one of them.  Coding bug?  Database bug?

Different kanji, same problem. 情　(frame 84, RTK2) from　風情　is not listed under セイ.

　吾　(frame 86, RTK2)　from 吾人 is not listed under ゴ.

Last edited by watashimo (2008 March 13, 10:58 am)

watashimo wrote:

With Trinity I've begun to use a different approach. I add a sentences from a newspaper or novel, then save all the new words until I have around 50 new words. Then I'd just drill myself on the vocabulary. The sentences are still in the first box, yet to be reviewed. This gives me a familiarity with the new words before I tackle the senteces.

Ah yes, it's nice you bring that. I too wondered sometimes what to review first, sentences or vocab ? With sentences you have some hints from context, but if you want to really test yourself on vocabulary, you can start with the new vocab first. You may remember what sentences you added recently, but it's not as easy.

It is also possible to leave the vocab behind, and do mostly sentence reviewing, if you wanted to focus on reading. This is because you review vocab as a by product of reviewing sentences.

In fact the initial concept was that the vocab section would contain only the "active" vocabulary and thus would be tested both ways, while the passive vocab could be reviewied within the context of sentence/articles. The idea is not abandoned, it will just need to fit differently, because I found that it required the user to always "activate" words for active vocabulary and this extra step was annoying. One possibility would be that a writing test would consider only the vocab present in your vocab lists and ignore the vocab from sentences. In that way, sentence vocab could be considered "passive" (just reading review, with the help of the context).

By the way, I think that's a good idea to review the vocab first. When you review the vocab first, you warm up to the sentences which are more demanding with the grammar, and the comprehension of the sentence as a whole. So when you review sentences you can focus better on the grammar and the meaning as a whole.

My take on Japanese Definitions

I think a potential problem with Japanese definitions is that you're loosing the "flash" in "flashcards"... I understand the motivation behind Japanese definitions. However you can just as well add a bunch of additional sentences, even the definitions themselves! Why not? When you test those definitions, you can also try to remember what word it was describing.

When you review a flashcard, you should be able to focus on one element, and nothing else. That's the whole point of splitting the information into cards. If you're trying to understand a sentence and then a bunch of other sentences coming from the definitions, also in Japanese, that's not a flashcard anymore, IMHO.

Trinity shows you the associated vocab after flipping the card to help you double check that you've got the readings right in case you have doubts. It's also helpful for those times when you understood the meaning of the whole sentence to satisfaction, but you couldn't translate it then and there (something you don't need to be able to do unless you work as a translator).. in those cases it's nice to refresh your memory of the more precise meaning, without worrying too much about memorizing it at that point, since you will get additional practice in the Vocab tab.


Fun with Trinity

Many learners who begin RtK already know some of the most common characters and readings. With Trinity you can keep the focus on kanji while working on RtK1, but also enjoy producing words and writing words. You go to the Onyomi Groups page, pick a reading you know, and pick a character there you know, one you've studied in RtK recently for example. Then clikc "Add Compound" and see how many words you can read with the amount of characters for which you know a reading. Because there are so many entries in the dictionary, even the priority entries, if you recognise and can read even just 10 characters you will very likely find at least one word (kanji compound) made of characters you know. Now you can practice writing the word containing characters and readings you know.

Alternatively you can pick a super common character like 生 and then fro mthe limited set of other characters you know and can read, you will almost certainly find several compounds to choose from.

Like this you can start learning words in their complete kanji form, even when you 've just begun learning to write and read kanji.