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The
Internet provides a rich source of material for Japanese teachers
and learners. In this issue we present a useful guide on computer
use in Japanese, to enable you to access Japanese websites. |
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In
order to use Japanese on your computer, you first need to set
up the computer. You may think that you have to buy expensive
software, or that you cannot use Japanese on your old computer.
But this is not so! Today, you can use Japanese on almost ANY
computer (unless you are using a super-old or extremely unique
system). There should be no problems with and no charge for
setting up your, or your school's computer to use Japanese,
so you can go ahead without hesitation.
The method for installing Japanese depends on which OS (Operating
System) you have. |
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Windows
2000/XP |
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If
your PC is running on a relatively new OS, i.e. Windows 2000
or Windows XP, there will be no problem because these OS are
designed for world wide use and have built-in features which
provide multiple language support, including Japanese. However,
in order to use Japanese, you first need to install Japanese
fonts and input method from the Windows CD-ROM, and set Japanese
as a “default language” (If you are using your computer in a
network, you may need to log-in as the “Administrator”, so please
ask your technical support person).
After setting up Japanese, you can read and input Japanese in
almost all software. You can even install Japanese native software,
as if you had Japanese Windows, but with English menus (however,
some of this software is not officially supported.) |
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Windows
95/98/Me/NT |
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If
you are using these older OS, you can still use Japanese by
downloading Global IME from Microsoft's
website. The download is free of charge and will not cause any
conflict with your system.
There are two versions of Global IME. “Global IME for Office
XP” is for computers with Microsoft Office XP. If you don't
have Office XP, you will need “Global IME 5.02”.
After installing Global IME, you can use Japanese in SOME Microsoft
software, i.e. Internet Explorer, Outlook (Express), Word 2000
or Office XP. You cannot use Japanese in other software, including
Office 2000, apart from Word. Though Global IME allows a Japanese
environment for web browsing, e-mail and word processing, it
doesn't mean that your computer has become fully multilingual
(like Win 2000 or XP). Global IME is provisional add-on software
for temporary multilingual purposes, and its use is restricted.
So, if you are planning on buying a new computer, you should
buy one with Windows XP or Windows 2000.
Manuals of detailed procedure with illustrations are available
from the following website: |
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You
should be able to set up your computer to use Japanese yourself
by following these manuals. But if only a technical support
person without any knowledge of Japanese is allowed to set up
the system in your school, you can just print out one
of these manuals from the website and give it to him! |
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Macintosh |
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Mac OS X fully supports a multilingual environment as default,
so you just have to add a keyboard menu for Japanese input from
“System Preferences” - “International” - “Keyboard Menu” and
tick ことえり.
If you have an old Mac OS (before OS 9) you have to install
the “Japanese Language Kit”. In OS 9 it is
included in the system so you can install it from the system
CD-ROM, but for older versions you have to purchase it, and
it is now hard to find in the commercial market. |
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Click image to enlarge |
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| <Fig.1> |
Now your computer
supports Japanese. Let's make sure that you can read and write
in Japanese. Run the Internet Explorer and open for example,
YAHOO! JAPAN
(http://www.yahoo.co.jp/)
Can you display Japanese characters on your computer? If you
only see junk symbols like e^e O i, ,> , , c, go to “View”
- “Encoding” on the toolbar of your browser and select “Japanese
(Auto-Select)”<Fig.1>. In
order to input Japanese into the text field, click the language
icon (which is probably [EN], showing that the currently used
input method is English), and select Japanese IME<Fig.2>.
You will find the IME bar to appear. When you want to input
Japanese characters, click the left end of the IME bar and select
“Hiragana”. If the icon changes from [_A] to [あ],
you can input hiragana, and other Japanese characters<Fig.3>.
(Depending on your version of Windows, some of these items may
look different from these pictures.)
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| <Fig.2> |
<Fig.3> |
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Even
though you can now use Japanese on your computer, you may find
it difficult to read authentic Japanese web pages, because since
these pages are made for Japanese native speakers, they contain
a lot of unknown kanji and vocabulary.
To help overcome this, there are some useful tools on the Internet,
which help you read difficult Japanese sentences. |
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れじぶるN.C. http://www.nicer.go.jp/ |
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This
site puts furigana on the kanji on a Japanese web page. To reach
れじぶる
, you first open the top page of the 教育情報ナショナルセンター
(National Information
Center for Educational Resources), then go to 「大人」
and click 「学ぶ」<Fig.4
- 1 >, then
select 「れじぶるN.C.」
.
Input the URL (website address) of the site you want to read
into the text field of 「読みたいページを決める」<Fig.4
- 2>, then
in the section 「読む方法を決める」select
the level and the way furigana is displayed <Fig.4 - 3>
(you can change these parameters later). After you click the
button 「このページを読む」<Fig.4
- 4>, you
will see the page with furigana <Fig.5>. |
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Click
image to enlarge |
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| <Fig.4> |
<Fig.5> |
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Rikai.com
http://www.rikai.com
POPJisyo.com
http://www.popjisyo.com/ |
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These
sites give furigana and an English translation for words on
a Japanese web page. Go to the top page of Rikai and select
the “Japanese to English” version. Input the URL (website address)
you want to read into the text box and press “GO!”. When you
put the cursor on a word you don't understand, the popup shows
up, indicating hiragana and the English equivalent for the word,
and also a brief explanation of each kanji <Fig.6>.
In fact, if you copy and paste ANY text into the text box, (e.g.
from e-mail or document files), you can obtain the hiragana
and English for the text in the same way.
POPjisyo.com <Fig.7> was formally known as Jisyo.org (you
can still jump automatically from http://www.jisyo.org/).
It has almost the same function as Rikai, with which you can
add hints (hiragana and English) to Japanese words on the web
page or input text. It is now positioned as a demo version of
commercial dictionary software, so note that there might be
some change in the future. |
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Click image to enlarge |
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| <Fig.6> |
<Fig.7> |
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リーディングチュウ太 http://language.tiu.ac.jp/
Jim
Breen's WWWJDIC Server http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~jwb/wwwjdic.html |
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These
websites can be used to show a Japanese dictionary in the input
text. リーディングチュウ太
(Reading Tutor) is totally designed for Japanese language education
and has several tools for Japanese learners. The dictionary
tool is on the 「チュウ太の道具箱」(toolbox)
. Copy and paste Japanese text into the text box of 「辞書ツール(Dictionary
tool)」 <Fig.8-1>,
and click「日→英」
(Japanese to English) <Fig.8-2>(English and German instruction
is also available on the site). As a result, you will get a
new page with a dictionary for words used in the input sentences
<Fig.9>
When you click on a word you don't understand in 「入力された文章」(input
sentences) <Fig.9-3>, the explanation for the word comes
to the top of the list in the dictionary frame <Fig.9-4>,
and the words you have clicked are listed in 「あなたの単語リスト」(your
vocabulary list) <Fig.9-5>, which you can use when you
review the text or check your comprehension.
You can also check how difficult words are in the Japanese text
according to the criteria of the Japanese Language Proficiency
Test by means of using 「レベル判定ツール」
(Level checker). |
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Click image to enlarge |
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| <Fig.8> |
<Fig.9> |
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Jim
Breen's WWWDIC Server
is similar to リーディングチュウ太,
and can be used for the same purpose, but is much simpler. The
dictionary tool is “Translate Words in Japanese Text” on the
top page. Open this page, copy and paste Japanese text into
the text box and click “Begin Translation”, and you will get
a word list with hiragana and an English translation<Fig.10>.
This dictionary gives only basic information, and doesn't have
learner oriented features like チュウ太.
On the other hand, its restricted explanations don't overwhelm
users with a mass of potential meanings.
Please be aware that because all the Internet tools introduced
above are operated automatically by computer programs, they
may sometimes produce wrong information. For example, in <Fig.10>,
the word 人 is wrongly given the reading じん instead of ひと .
On the World Wide Web there are large numbers of websites written
in Japanese, and most of the Japanese websites are in Japanese
only; bilingual sites written also in English are few. This
means that if you can access Japanese websites, you can get
far more information about Japanese culture, society, language,
current news, subcultural trends and so on.
With help of the tools introduced above, let's go surfing in
the ocean of Japanese! <Fig.10> |
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