I'm currently in a debugging phase, so if you find an error, please email me at
Press F1 while entering text for help
If you can't see the Japanese, try going to this page and click on 今すく入手. IF the automatic download chokes, just click it again until it works and install. A bug in the English client prevents japanese chars from being displayed in text fields.
Update history -
9-19-04: As you can probably tell, 時間がない。 School and work are eating up my time, I can't really post to about.com's Japanese forum but I'll still try to update this program. (I have to, I have all that Japanese 3 vocab!!) All I've done in the last two weeks are to add a wordlist with ようこそ book 2, chapter 1 words. The program sees it as Chapter 8. Official chapters in my program are 3-8, but there will always be a couple extras for my own personal study purposes, and they probably won't make much sense to anyone else. Chapter 9 (will go up as I add book ch 2+) and Chapter 10 are words I suck at and kanji writing practice, which is really just the hiragana for the kanji words I suck at, which I translate on paper then check. Nothing worth noting except to alleviate confusion.
9-6-04: Woohoo! I get to skip ahead to Japanese 3. That'll mean updated wordlists in the future. Meanwhile, I made a small update to my program to make it more sensible with verbs. They now appear as "to eat" or whatever. They can still be entered in as "eat" or "to eat", though. Future updates planned are:
- Feature to limit repetition of one word compared to another
- Support for multiple english entries, i.e. 起きる being "get up" and "wake up"
- Much later, support for custom word lists, and the following release of the source code.
8-24-04: Major update, added the verb/adjective conjugation feature! It took around 5 hours to code, but it was worth it. It can be accessed by entering 99 as the chapter. It'll give you the english word and the desired conjugation, and you have to enter in such. For example, it could give you "write" and "polite volitional." You can enter in either かきましょう or 書きましょう to get it right. I did slip a couple non-verb forms in this chapter, like "to think _", but keep in mind, this program is also for me to study. =p
8-23-04: Added chapters 6 and 7. Also opened up chapter 99, but it currently has no content. It will be the sloppy and confusing grammar/verb forms section. (lets face it, grammar/verb forms are difficult to flashcard) I plan to create a separate conjugation practice program in the future. Finally, made english input more friendly by ignoring uppercase/lowercase in answers.
8-20-04: Made it so "to " can be entered before words, such as 買う correctly being "to buy" or just "buy". This feature doesn't differentiate between verbs and nouns, though, so 本 will be legal as "to book", lol. Also added chapter 5.
8-16-04: Changed it so Kana Hint becomes Kanji Hint in Kana mode. Realized it was needed when I got to a chapter with two とるs.
8-14-04 to 8-15-04: Coded base of program. It took about 4 hours, and had all the current GUI features, until I mention a change in a later update. This would have been sooner, but I had work...sigh. Also added chapter 4 wordlist.
8-13-04: Coded chapter 3 wordlist and the wordlist base variables.
The applet below requires you to have true Japanese text support. You will need either Windows XP, 2000 or ME might work, or a Japanese version of Windows. (i.e. Win98 japan)
Instructions for enabling Japanese text support in XP can be found at: This page
The program will look like this if you did it right.
The applet below requires you to install the Java 2 plug-in from Sun's page. Afterwards, go to the Java Control Panel and enable the browser plug-in for Internet Explorer. (Browser --> Microsoft Internet Explorer)
If everything's in Japanese for you, that version of the tab/button you need to press is: ブラウザ --> Microsoft Internet Explorer (though if I needed to explain that, you will struggle here)
One more note: THIS PROGRAM ASSUMES YOU UNDERSTAND AT LEAST HIRAGANA/KATAKANA! I will NOT NOT NOT ever include a Romaji mode. Why?
- Romaji is a crutch, and a bad crutch at that. You'll read like a Japanese kindergardener for the rest of your life if you rely on it. (only the kindergardener will have more proper pronunciation)
- There are too many forms of Romaji for me to pick without users of the other types yelling at me. Mainly revolving around おう and えい. Personally, I romaji the way I'd type, except I wouldn't double n's. (since ん is typed nn)
- Possible miseducation of mixed-kana words like けしゴム.
- Japanese is most beautiful in Japanese.
But just to show that I'm not completely mean, here's a link for a great "reading kana" learning program!
JAVASensei Homepage
Another useful Japanese learning website is Yookoso, an unofficial tribute to the textbook series and the home of an expansive links section. However, since my program is based on the same book, the same audience should find this link useful.