4 ms·

Hah, and there's the kicker. In Japanese the most common input method is phonetic, either with a latin alphabet keyboard or a hiragana keyboard. The IME kicks i

by donatj 10y ago

Hah, and there's the kicker. In Japanese the most common input method is phonetic, either with a latin alphabet keyboard or a hiragana keyboard. The IME kicks in and has you select the ideogram you mean, so in reality it would save you no time typing and actually cost you time.

smallnamespace 10y ago
I highly doubt that's true, based on my experience with Chinese pinyin IMEs. A Japanese phonetic IME should have enough local context to guess which Kanji is correct. You type, then go back and quickly proofread later.
- donatj 10y ago
  It's been about 10 years, but I used the IME in Windows 2k quite extensively. http://blog.gatunka.com/img/Convert3.gif http://blog.gatunka.com/img/Convert3.gif I recall this window strongly, with ~10 items in it being common. Playing with it now in OS X perhaps it's improved in recent years.
  - smallnamespace 10y ago
    Again just talking about my experience with Chinese, but the IME guessing quality has really improved markedly over the last decade. In fact, you can often just type initials for your entire sentence and the IME will guess correctly all the way through. It's like being able to type 'w a y u t?' and getting 'What are you up to?' filled in for you. I'm pretty sure Chinese is even more homophonic than Japanese, which is why I'd expect the Kanji inference to work better.
sdrothrock 10y ago
> The IME kicks in and has you select the ideogram you mean, so in reality it would save you no time typing and actually cost you time. I don't think anyone does it kanji-by-kanji. In reality, it's really autocomplete as it exists with English keyboards. You type the first few bits in hiragana or romaji, then autosuggest comes up with commonly-used words and you select the one you want. In addition, hiragana input on mobile devices is FAR faster than romaji input, so I'm not sure how you lose time.
- fenomas 10y ago
  Yep, and add in that with swipe gestures, the hiragana keyboard only needs ~10 keys, making it much less fidgety to hit the keys on mobile. Typing Japanese on mobile phones is pretty fast and painless. Easier than English on a regular keyboard, though not quite as fast as English "swipe" style input (whatever the term for that is?).
bhrgunatha 10y ago
> in reality it would save you no time typing and actually cost you time. There's often (always?) a reaction when new forms of communication are introduced to language. Usually the older generation railing against the "degradation" or "misuse" of the language the way they learned it. For example txt and emojis currently in English. Similarly with e.g. Chinese and modern IMEs. Because there are frequently many characters that match phonetically, to save time, typically younger people just pick the first one that's suggested. Mostly due to internet and phone/tablet use.

by donatj 10y ago

smallnamespace 10y ago

I highly doubt that's true, based on my experience with Chinese pinyin IMEs. A Japanese phonetic IME should have enough local context to guess which Kanji is correct. You type, then go back and quickly proofread later.

donatj 10y ago
It's been about 10 years, but I used the IME in Windows 2k quite extensively. http://blog.gatunka.com/img/Convert3.gif http://blog.gatunka.com/img/Convert3.gif I recall this window strongly, with ~10 items in it being common. Playing with it now in OS X perhaps it's improved in recent years.
- smallnamespace 10y ago
  Again just talking about my experience with Chinese, but the IME guessing quality has really improved markedly over the last decade. In fact, you can often just type initials for your entire sentence and the IME will guess correctly all the way through. It's like being able to type 'w a y u t?' and getting 'What are you up to?' filled in for you. I'm pretty sure Chinese is even more homophonic than Japanese, which is why I'd expect the Kanji inference to work better.

sdrothrock 10y ago

> The IME kicks in and has you select the ideogram you mean, so in reality it would save you no time typing and actually cost you time. I don't think anyone does it kanji-by-kanji. In reality, it's really autocomplete as it exists with English keyboards. You type the first few bits in hiragana or romaji, then autosuggest comes up with commonly-used words and you select the one you want. In addition, hiragana input on mobile devices is FAR faster than romaji input, so I'm not sure how you lose time.

fenomas 10y ago
Yep, and add in that with swipe gestures, the hiragana keyboard only needs ~10 keys, making it much less fidgety to hit the keys on mobile. Typing Japanese on mobile phones is pretty fast and painless. Easier than English on a regular keyboard, though not quite as fast as English "swipe" style input (whatever the term for that is?).

bhrgunatha 10y ago

> in reality it would save you no time typing and actually cost you time. There's often (always?) a reaction when new forms of communication are introduced to language. Usually the older generation railing against the "degradation" or "misuse" of the language the way they learned it. For example txt and emojis currently in English. Similarly with e.g. Chinese and modern IMEs. Because there are frequently many characters that match phonetically, to save time, typically younger people just pick the first one that's suggested. Mostly due to internet and phone/tablet use.