Hey Everybody,
I’m new to Wanikani and really excited to start! But before I dive in, I want to make sure I optimize my WK learning experience, so if anyone has suggestions for the best and most useful API and apps it would be greatly appreciated. I might not end up using any at all but I’m very interested in knowing what has worked best for others. Thanks in advance!
Cheers
To start with: This thread is where you can find all the stuff you need
/t/List-of-API-and-Third-Party-Apps/5495/1
Personally i mostly only use convenience stuff.
Real Numbers and Real Times show you the real number of reviews and the real times (not just “42+” or “about 2 hours” but “77” and “2 hours 7 minutes”)
Then i also use Wanikani Improve, for it’s auto forwarding feature because i started to always hit return twice after answering when i was sure i was right to get to the next item quickly. Unfortunately i wasn’t always right, and this way you will skip the opportunity to see what the correct answer would have been. But while the script tells you whether you were slightly off or if there were alternative answers and you can recheck the info from the previous item, the info displayed then is not always what you want. This is due to the fact that the script isn’t really updated anymore.
I also use the part of speech script, but now that this is a built in feature for WK (it was just integrated a few days ago), it probably isn’t necessary anymore for you. It still is for me because for now the data is only present for low levels, but that shouldn’t be a problem for you.
I’m sure people will suggest the lesson and review reordering scripts, as well as the ignore button. While these scripts certainly have their merits, they are two edged blades if not used with perfect discipline.
The reordering scripts allow you to level quickly by doing the lessons and reviews for the leveling relevant items first (radicals, then kanji, then vocab) if you don’t have time to do all the lessons/reviews at once. Especially the lesson reordering is useful in this regard, because you can do the relevant lessons first and then the vocab lessons in the next few days. But the danger is (and there have been people falling into this trap) that you only do the lessons and reviews for radicals and kanji, and not for the vocab. This will lead to huge lesson/review stacks, which is discouraging to tackle them. And you will also miss out on learning the other readings, as well as better cementing the reading and meaning of kanji into your head. And you will of course miss out the most important part: vocabulary. With just kanji you can’t read anything, in the end you NEED the vocabulary.
The ignore button allows you to say “yeah, the answer i entered is wrong, but it was just a typo, honestly!”. If you really really made a typo this is fine, but if the button sits there to fix your mistake which will hold you back from leveling another 2 days, it becomes really tempting. Or to fix “yeah, i was almost right, that’s good enough”, while it isn’t. This button can be a boon if used with care and discipline, but it can be a curse if not.
I have the ignore button (Override) since I have the tendancy to type too quickly, without it I would already have been a few level lower. But I confirm that the temptation to cheat is real.
Apart from that I also have Part-of-Speech (still useful I’d say, it’s better to have multiple sources for definitions) and Stroke Order (I like guessing what the stroke order is, it actually doesn’t take much more study time but still helps me to remember how to write a kanji).
Thanks for the response Naryoril! I think i’ll probably stay clear of the reording and ignore button for now as it seems to be dangerous, haha. But real time and numbers seems pretty useful so i’ll probably give them a try.
Bm01- stroke order sounds important, i’ll look into that one
I think I would go insane without the error delay and override mods, because I tend to go as quickly as I can, and typing errors happen regularly. But yeah, don’t abuse the override script, you might regret it later.
tanbogrip said... Bm01- stroke order sounds important, i'll look into that oneIt depends. If you think you'll have to write them in the future, yeah definitely. But I don't think it helps recognition by much, maybe a little.
As Naryoril said, that thread is useful, but unfinished as of yet. I’ll be working on it a little more today as well.
As for what I use and would recommend (I have chrome, so these are extensions):
Wanikani Augmenter - Even if you don’t use the reordering of lessons or reviews it has some cool features including the real numbers of reviews and lessons, a timetable on the dashboard and a lot more cool stuff.
Wanikani forum enhancer - Keeps track of posts you have read and adds a bunch of useful features
WaniKani Notifier - Plays a tone when you get more reviews and shows the number of reviews in the icon
Wanikanify - Changes the words in webpages to vocab you have learned. Not great for grammar obviously, but does help by simply seeing the kanji more
I abused the ignore feature in the past, but now I am forbidding my self from installing that one. Too much temptation. I was too obsessed with leveling up and wasn’t learning anything. Now I am trying to go at a slower pace but I find I am remembering things a lot better. Moral of the story, don’t focus on leveling up, focus on learning the language.
tanbogrip said…Update: I have firefox so i downloaded greasemonkey and I proceeded to download some userscripts for part of speech, real timer, etc. However, they don’t seem to be working. I read that for some scripts you have to click “user script commands” first and then input your api key, but the “user script commands” button isn’t even clickable.
Hey Everybody,
I’m new to Wanikani and really excited to start! But before I dive in, I want to make sure I optimize my WK learning experience, so if anyone has suggestions for the best and most useful API and apps it would be greatly appreciated. I might not end up using any at all but I’m very interested in knowing what has worked best for others. Thanks in advance!
Cheers
Can anyone help me with this? Thanks!