Only on WaniKani would users argue against an undo feature …
That already exists: jpdb. Their site is more convenient than Anki, and you can create top vocabulary decks that are gated behind kanji you don’t know, mnemonics and all, which effectively makes WaniKani kind of … a rip off? If only I could go back a year and stop myself from starting WaniKani again …
I wouldn’t go that far. With your subscription to WK, you support more then just the main app. There is Tofugu or the forum, which has also tons of information on it. So for me at least, its far away from a rip off. We are discussing a needed feature, not if WK is worth it’s money.
Yes! If WaniKani were to add an undo button they need to fix the issue of people wanting to get the answer correct instead of actually showing proficiency in Japanese. After all, isn’t the only reason someone would abuse the button is so they can get a little dopamine hit after “correctly” answering the question?
Let’s say instead of the text-box turning green for a correct answer after using the undo button, it would instead turn yellow or a more ‘neutral’ color. Maybe they could have a separate section on the summary page (if/when it comes back) for correct answers without the undo button and correct answers with the undo button.
Or they could put a message at the end of the session saying, “You didn’t undo any mistakes during this session! The Crabigator congratulates you!” (Cheesy I know, but that’s what WaniKani is known for.)
By doing this WaniKani:
Adds an undo button and pleases a big part of the community.
Would deincentivize the dopamine hit of a “correct” answer after using the undo button (therefore leading to less and less abuse).
Would even motivate people who wouldn’t use the undo button with positive messages on their achievement.
What did I just read
Probably the biggest flaw of the wanikani community is the almost cult like subgroup in it that will defend and try to rationalize everything wanikani does like it’s some perfect tool.
It’s quite sad to see some people give legitimate suggestions and then people come in with the olympiad level mental gymnastics to explain why they’re suggestion would never be a good idea and why wanikani is perfect the way it is.
I think this leaves out users who do want extra functionality but are either unaware that userscripts are possible on WK or unaware that the forums exist. Not that this is a number that we can deduce, but I think it is more than we can get from just actual script usage.
Then as was later pointed out, a number of users may also be using 3rd party apps which have the undo function and might favor mobile reviews for that reason.
This! Besides, making it a hidden in settings would help. If we go by the logic that people are more likely to abuse/use things that are within easy reach, then ideally this would put it out of reach of lazy users. As for those lazy users though who don’t want to go through their reviews, is it really that much effort for them to have jisho open in a split window and then copy and paste each item? I recall someone doing that. If the problem is that ease of abuse, then how in the digital age is it not almost equally easy to have 2 windows open? Anyone who knows about extensions could possibly have even an easier time as well if they let a translation extension read WK.
To use WaniKani successfully as a tool for learning, it requires some level of dedication from the user. Why should the team care about lazy users who would cheat themselves? Are they more likely to keep their subscriptions than users who want to become some level of fluent in Japanese? Even if they do cheat their way through the whole system, they would probably retain something at least from repetition. If they want to do things that hurt their very optional kanji learning, what’s the problem?
I think the funniest thing about this all too is that the WK team refuses to teach about nuances directly and have stated as such that they don’t want to put any notes about nuances in the meaning notes. Now they’re finally implementing sentences in order to show how words can be used instead of just having one sentence that people often complain about for its liberal translation that might include something along those lines.
The most important reason I need Double Check within hours after the new UI update, and refused to do WaniKani without it – typo tolerance that accept non typo, i.e. accidentally right.
Another main reason is the lack of auto-show info.
No, but that doesn’t always work either.
Not to mention that some synonyms are invisible from view.
Personally, I would encourage using Yomichan to check.
Why not just have wanikani open if you were trying to cheat? Doesn’t that solve the problems?
I was just checking in to say something similar.
I was doing my Renshuu grammar reviews and realized that they even have a dictionary with words, kanji, grammar, and sentences that you can open in the middle of any quiz without any penalty. Maybe because it’s a smaller platform, but I haven’t heard of anyone claiming to have cheated or speedrun it for the sake of doing so. Even in the case of having arguably some of the easiest ways to cheat, it becomes the user’s burden and whether they realize it only hurts their own learning process.
Well actually, this thread is meant to be a discussion. So i would like you to let people argue about it, even though you have a different opinion.
Well since you nicely asked:
I hereby formally give everyone permission to argue on this public forum 
I really like that argument. If you want to learn a language, you maybe tend to use a book for it. The answers are mostly sitting on the next page or in a section at the end of the book. If you want to cheat, you obviously can. But whats the point. Why should you do that if you want to learn. Same for the undo feature i think. Why should you abuse it. There were some great recommendations here on how the system could work.
I really would like to have the WK team to leave a comment about it, to see what their thoughts are about it.
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