Typing n's in a phrase like 何年

I wonder if anyone has any knowledge they can share with me on typing Japanese on an roman-character keyboard.
To type 何年 (なんねん / nan nen), it seems I have to type nannnenn. Is this what everyone else would do? It just seems like a lot of n-spam which I frequently mess up when I’m trying to blast through my reviews. WK assumes I’ll never learn this phrase because I keep goofing the typing.

Something I recently learned which saves a tiny bit of time, is that you can type “si” instead of “shi” to get a し. I hope that helps someone else.

Thank you

3 Likes

Yes. That’s the way

4 Likes

You can circumvent this if you press enter after you type the first phrase, and then type the second.

Like: なん + ENTER + ねん + ENTER

1 Like

You can also type “ti” for ち and “tu” for つ. (There are more, but those are the time saving ones, anyway.)

Once they became habit, it screwed up my ability to type romaji a bit.

8 Likes

What the other guys said, and also that you can press spacebar to get an n to become a kana.

Not sure I’d recomend that, you might jinx yourself trying to write しゃ and instead write しあ :stuck_out_tongue:

1 Like

I use all of those shortcuts, and I don’t have any problem typing diphthongs.

3 Likes

I would expect that probably comes from Nihon-shiki romanization where し/シ is romanized as ‘si’ same with ち/チ as ‘ti’. It’s not really a shortcut per se, it’s just a different romanization system.
.

1 Like

Neat, thank you!

1 Like

Very interesting, thanks for the link. I guess I was only familiar with the Hepburn style.

1 Like

You might not have any problems, but some people might.
I know on my first lesson with a double N it screwed me, but it never happend again, on the other hand some people might still get screwed by it.
Whenever I do screw up writing kanas it’s entirely my fault and thank you Override script.

1 Like

Yeah, it’s good to know both Hepburn and the native Japanese romanization system as you likely may encounter both. My Japanese teacher uses the native Japanese romanization that’s taught in schools so it occasionally throws me off seeing the ‘ti’ and ‘si’ when she romanizes words.

If you ever go to Japan you will likely encounter both depending on the sign like this one that uses Kunrei-Shiki:

Kokuhu obviously being the native Japanese romanization where in Hepburn it’d be Kokufu.

1 Like

Thank you, I appreciate you :heart:

1 Like

Won’t pressing enter count as an answer input in Wanikani and end up messing your review? I ask because I only use WK on my phone.

I also got held back for a bit before I learned you had to type “du” to get a づ in 近づく

1 Like

It would work in an IME, but as you suspected it wouldn’t work in WaniKani.

3 Likes

If you don’t type the n a second time, I think it auto-adds it as well, but I generally also do this.

This sort of thing is where it’s a bit more useful to have a Japanese-style understanding of the kana.
Since たちつてと are considered part of the ‘t’ line, and therefore they’re ta ti tu te to, だぢづでど are, naturally, da di du de do.
Even if the pronunciation is counterintuitive.

3 Likes

nan’nen is also an option.

I tend to use nannnen, though. Or nannnnnen and then have to go back and retype because I got over-excited…

Only at the end of the word.

4 Likes

You can also type an ん with “xn”, which may or may not make more sense to type “naxnnexn” than “nannnenn”. You can type x+something to get small versions of some other kana, also. “tu” = “つ” “xtu” = “っ”, “tei” = “てい” “texi” = “てぃ”.

3 Likes

Interesting, thank you. I think you can also use L+kana for some small versions. My friend from Osaka always writes なぁ~

Aye, that’s what I do - I think of as “l for lower-case”. Unfortunately, that doesn’t work with WaniKani’s IME - “la” is rendered as ら.