So I’ve been thinking for a while that it’d be cool to not just learn my kanji, but also build up my Japanese 12 key input muscle memory on my phone while going through lessons.
I noticed on the Wanikani android app, it simply doesn’t allow me to use the Google 12 key during the reading input phase of the review. It forces the QWERTY for some reason…
On the Wanikani website on the phone, I can do the 12 key just fine…
Of course, switching between the input methods is pretty annoying.
Was thinking it’d be nice if it could pop up the 12 key for the reading phase…
Or if there was a way to have reviews where you go through all the meanings first, then you can switch to the 12 key, and do all the readings afterward.
If you didn’t know, the mobile apps are all created by third-party developers and are not affiliated with WaniKani. If you go to the dedicated thread (if there is one) for the mobile app you use, you can probably make your requests there.
To your situation, I think it makes sense to use the standard keyboard for WaniKani. WaniKani uses a library called wanakana to convert from romaji into kana automatically. This is good for two reasons:
You can do reviews even when you don’t have an IME installed.
You don’t get a hint from an IME’s kanji/word predictions.
I know this doesn’t particularly help with your desire to learn to use 12 key input, but hopefully the reasoning I gave makes sense.
That all makes sense. I probably should continue by poking around the third party api crowd. Here’s hoping something like doing meaning first is possible.
When I do reviews on my phone, I always use the 12-key input for reading. I just don’t look at the suggested kanji, so that I am not cheating myself. As for switching between the keyboards, it does take some getting used to and it is objectively less efficient than just using one keyboard. But I would rather have interleaving of reading and meaning in my reviews than save the extra minute of time spent on switching between keyboards. Often it takes me longer to think of the reading or meaning than it does to switch the keyboard, anyways. So I guess what I’m saying is, I just got used to it, and I think it’s efficient enough!
I should mention that I have an iPhone and I do reviews on the web browser. Your situation for keyboard switching might be different, idk how android works.
i’m not using the app. it has some script functions implemented, but not the ones i want. browser (using firefox) allows me to do whatever i want, exactly like my pc at home.
I totally understand your desire for using 12-key keyboard for Japanese input. It is faster and less error-prone after all.
But after 6 years in Japan and typing on three different languages on a daily basis, I concluded I prefer having one keyboard that does everything than changing the keyboard all the time. So I just use SwiftKey multi-language mode and type Japanese through QWERTY, it works better for me.
