rich_f wrote:

One thing I've noticed with Misaki-- she tends to say んが instead of plain old が. You can hear it more pronounced if you slow her down to about -7 or -8. (She talks pretty fast at 0.)

I haven't listened to the audio to hear what you are talking about first hand, but I do remember that in the past, one of my Japanese teachers has told me that が should actually be pronounced sort of nasally, like a slight ん　with it. That may only be in a certain dialect though.

Last edited by Zarxrax (2008 May 10, 11:09 am)

Well, I found a "trial" copy of Show (It is the 16/500 version) and I have to say, for some reason it sounds absolutely atrocious. We're talking Microsoft Sam bad. So, my question is, if anyone knows the answer: I am running TextAloud v2.228. If I upgrade to the latest, will the problem be fixed? Or is Show just horrible?

rich_f wrote:

That's not tinny... that's 7 kinds of awful.

Did you change the encoding options?  I think it defaults to 32 kbps and 11.02 kHz, which is horrible.  I changed it to 256 kbps and 44.10 kHz, and the mp3s it produces sound identical to both the wav files and speech generated within the TextAloud program.  Well, I mean, it's probably not technically identical, since it's compressed, but you'd have to be a machine or some kind of freak of nature to tell the difference.

taijuando wrote:

I have a Mac and a really slow PC in a closet somewhere.  Is my only alternative to go back to the PC?

There's ドキュメントトーカ for Mac. I haven't tried it, but the web page samples don't sound too good.

Well, as it turns out my computer just doesn't like the software very much. It occasionally will let me use all the feature and occasionally won't. However, it always lets me use the firefox bar, so I can have Show read me news articles from goo.ne.jp.

So, guess I can't complain.

Well, it'd definitely be useful while you're on the ship, unless you have some native Japanese speakers in the crew.

I'm not too worried about converting wavs to mp3s. I don't have anything right now I want to listen to that badly, to be honest. I use it more for sounding out new vocab so I get the vowel length and pitch accent right.

Sorry to change the subject, but I was wondering if anyone could offer some advice about Production vs. Recognition.  When adding new cards, from whatever source, how exactly do you decide whether to add the card as a Recognition or Production card (by which I mean going from kana to kanji)?  Or are most people simply adding the fact and then testing themselves both ways?

Also, is there a simple way in Anki to see recognition cards first, before reviewing production cards (or vice versa)?  I'm often on the train doing my reviews and can't very well whip out a pen and paper and start jotting down sentences, but doing recognition reviews is a cinch.  If I could see those cards first, I could do the rest when I get home.  Other times, I might want to plow through a bunch of production cards first before I head out.

You don't have to write out sentences, you can just trace them with your finger in the palm of your hand... or on the head of the guy next to you.

The whole idea isn't to kill 8,000 trees, but to be able to go from kana->kanji.

Picking sentences to go kana->kanji is pretty easy for me-- I only pick ones where I'm learning new kanji readings. If I already know the readings (like in the case of grammar sentences), then I go one way only.

@Serge-- Ghinzdra has double-checked the Misaki voice's abilities with his Japanese teachers. He wrote that up a few pages back in the thread. The voices are not perfect, and they're no replacement for the Real Thing, but for those of us who don't have a native speaker nearby, they do well in a pinch to get pronunciation down. If you haven't had a chance to play with one, you really should check out the demo. They've come a long way in the last few years.

Like any other tool, you use it when you need to. No need to use it all the time, just use it when you have trouble pronouncing something, and don't have a Japanese person handy. I find it's pretty handy for sounding things out. I use it maybe 10-20 times a review session, which is about 100 cards. I just dump text into the reader-- I don't mess with making sound files over and over.

And if you're paying attention, you can tell when the software changes a reading pretty easily. A lot of times, I find simply inserting a comma between some of the offenders will straighten things out.

Last edited by rich_f (2008 May 14, 12:53 pm)

Honestly, I would say take both the Production and Recognition cards and use both. It will only help you, really.

Some say that doing it one way will take care of the other on it's own, but why wait? I say do both. It definitely won't hurt.

nest0r wrote:

Hmm. You should go back and read about customizing the TTS if you're having difficulty with readings. I recommend only using sentences that you have kana readings for. Also, try Misaki if you have issues with the voices you're using, as her sentences sound very natural, though you shouldn't just listen to the TTS for that sort of thing, as the AJATT page suggests, make sure to get plenty of listening and samples from elsewhere.. Don't be too literal in interpreting the AJATT method Serge, make sure you pay attention to the oblique suggestions, and also, try to find your own way. Good luck!

rich_f wrote:

@Serge-- Ghinzdra has double-checked the Misaki voice's abilities with his Japanese teachers. He wrote that up a few pages back in the thread. The voices are not perfect, and they're no replacement for the Real Thing, but for those of us who don't have a native speaker nearby, they do well in a pinch to get pronunciation down. If you haven't had a chance to play with one, you really should check out the demo. They've come a long way in the last few years.

Like any other tool, you use it when you need to. No need to use it all the time, just use it when you have trouble pronouncing something, and don't have a Japanese person handy. I find it's pretty handy for sounding things out. I use it maybe 10-20 times a review session, which is about 100 cards. I just dump text into the reader-- I don't mess with making sound files over and over.

And if you're paying attention, you can tell when the software changes a reading pretty easily. A lot of times, I find simply inserting a comma between some of the offenders will straighten things out.

Thank God I'm past the stage where I need all of that... and even if that wasn't the case I would think twice before allowing TTS software to teach me a language. And why would anyone have 'trouble pronouncing something' in such a phonetically straightforward language as Japanese is really beyond my understanding.

But by all means -  please feel free to go ahead and mess up your sentences pitches...

nest0r wrote:

hehe, If you've realized what I'm doing, then you're intelligent enough to know why, ie what about your remarks inspired me to do so, and that's enough for me.

I happen to like the friendly spirit of this forum so I'd rather not take any guesses at your motives... :-) Always happy to inspire, though... :-)

Speaking of the AJATT method, after following "most" of the posts in this thread, I still
can't seem to get a grasp of the method by which the flash cards are created. I can't seem to find a proper way of creating flash cards having sentences in Anki, since I can't seem to find a method that suits me. So any suggestions might help. By method I mean, how does one create the cards in Anki? For example -

Card (production)

Q - Kana, English Translation, Audio
A - Kanji Sentence
Extras - Vocabulary Definition (Japanese or English)

Card (recognition)

Q - Kanji Sentence
A - Kana Reading, English Translation, Audio
Extras - Vocabulary Definition (Japanese or English)

And of course, by using the method mentioned above, one can drill vocabulary, and kanji and maybe pronunciation, but what about grammar? Will it be good enough just to highlight the important grammar points per card without any explanation for it. Or is it advisable to add grammar notes ? Won't that be just overloading the card with too much information ?

Sorry for asking too many questions. ^_^;;

Everyone has a different approach to doing these card sets. A lot of what you do varies based on what you're comfortable with. If you need a lot of hand-holding, then you'll be more likely to cram more data on a card. If you don't, you won't. Depends on you.

What I do:

Production: Sentence full of kanji. Whatever I want to highlight may be underlined or bolded. May not.

Translation: English translation of the sentence, followed by readings of kanji I don't know. Like this: 予定　　よてい. I don't put a translation in, because I should be able to guess it from the sentence. (Haven't had problems with this.) If I need a translation, I'll put it in.

Reading: Reading of the sentence in kana.

I always create a card the goes Recognition-> Translation + Reading. When I'm learning new kanji, I'll create card for Reading-> Recognition + Translation.

When I'm learning grammar, I'll make a note of grammar points in whichever language works best on the Translation part of the card. I usually only go one way with those cards... but sometimes I'm lazy and I create 2 anyway.

Experiment. See what works for you. There's no 'right' or 'wrong' way to do it.

I do find that going from kana->kanji helps me write out kanji a lot, and going from kanji->kana helps with reading. I haven't messed with dictation, to be honest.