Early Start

Just a simple idea that occurred to me… I’m sitting here and I have ten minutes before my reviews come up, but I also have ten minutes before I have to be getting on with other things. Needless to say, I’m like “ahh man, I’m totally going to have to wait hours now before I can do my reviews AND I’ll have to do something else with these ten minutes.”

It would be really useful if there was a small button somewhere that would allow you to start your upcoming reviews if they are within a 15 minute window.

They already effectively shortened the wait times several months ago, when they had every review calculation roll back to the beginning of the hour you did it. So if you do a review at 12:59, the calculation for when your next review is starts by taking 12:00 and adding however many hours to that. Before that, they had only rolled back to the nearest 15 minute interval.

BTW, just to point out the obvious, if they did what you’re suggesting, then you’d be sitting there waiting for the button to appear too.

And let’s not forget that the biggest problem people face is too many reviews piling up, so…

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I understand what you’re saying, but if I had the time to sit around waiting for the button to appear then it getting it 15 minutes early would be irrelevant anyway.

This is effectively the problem I have because there’s only short periods where I can do my reviews. As a result I’m finding that my reviews and lessons appear in chunks of 100 once in the morning, and once in the evening. By missing these 15 minute windows it just adds another 10 to those chunks.

Which is not to say you’re wrong at all, I just thought it might be a useful idea. Although now I see it’s probably been discussed countless times anyway.

I would say rather than changing the platform, just go watch a video in Japanese or read an NHK easy news article if you want to feel like you’re not wasting the time.

I don’t really mean the accumulation of too many reviews in one day, very few people have enough apprentice items for that to be a serious concern. But I’m talking about the people who go “I didn’t stay on track and now I have 1200 reviews”. That happens all the time.

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I agree. Although I think it’s going to be a while before either of those are viable options :wink:

It’s a little boring to just say “do something level-appropriate”. But you can go read an imabi article or review whatever textbook you’re using.

Are you using kaniwani?

Me: “Of course I am, that’s what we’re talking about! Kan-- ooooh.”

Seems pretty interesting - I will look into adding that to my repertoire, thanks! :slight_smile:

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I wonder though, for people (like me) whose schedules are pretty much tied to the hour mark… If I could offset my reviews by, say a half hour, then I could do them before work and not have to wait until my shift is over or I go on break. For example, have a review at 3:30, then the next one at 7:30, and so on, instead of having one at 4 and 8. That way, if I have to leave at 4, I can still do my reviews on time.

This would be very specific to what type of schedule a person has, though.

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I think doing your reviews at 3:30 is considered as finishing them at 3, so your cycle would be 3 and 7 anyway? You already get one hour for free.

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Eh, not quite what I meant. Imagine if, instead of rounding to the nearest hour, WK rounded to the nearest half hour. So 3:45 is 3:30, 3:06 is 2:30, etc. Maybe it makes sense for me because I usually have time before the next hour begins, not after.

Aaah ok, I see now. Just found out that the one hour bonus only occurs for intervals in days anyway. If you control the time you take new lessons you can control the 4 and 8 hour intervals, it’s just a problem that this time shifts by 12 hours every level. You either have to get up early or stay up late to go maximum pace.

But I agree, maybe choosing your own “start of an hour” might be useful.

It’s been a few months since I stopped doing strictly timed lesson and review regimens, but that’s not my recollection of how it worked when I was in the midst of my run to level 60.

Hmm I found it in an old topic, maybe things changed. Pretty sure I waited for 4 hours for the first review just now, however.

It’s possible they adjusted it, but it would have to have been in those last few months. I had everything timed very precisely back in the day.

I’ll test it in a bit.

Update: I just did some lessons (6:40PM). Per the Ultimate Timeline, they are going to appear in the 10:00PM review, 3 hours and 20 minutes from now, so it’s still rolling back to the start of the hour on lessons.

I think we mean the same thing, you always have rollback to the previous hour, but you have to wait 4, 8 hours. But then, my understanding is that you only have to wait 23 hours, 2 days 23 hours, etc. in addition to the rollback. Right?

1 day 23 hours, but otherwise you are right. Everything starting with the “one day” interval is actually one hour less.

Oh, the days/weeks gaps have always been actually one less hour than a full day or week. That is unrelated to the rollback. As far as know it’s been like that for a long time.

Hmm the WK guide picture misled me.

https://cdn.wanikani.com/assets/guide/srs-visualization-52d3aef3a55899264f830741d9d30982cd6c42838afcd79d3d595279b1bbc296.png

It used to be 3 (2 days 23 hours) for the last stage of apprentice for kanji and vocab. It changed in late 2016. They just are terrible at updating the site info pages.