Table of Contents

1. What is Tagaini-Jisho?
2. Getting Started
   2.1. The GUI
   2.2. The Search Bar
   2.3. Dictionary Entries
      2.3.1. Vocabulary
      2.3.2 Kanji
   2.4. Search Extenders
      2.4.1. Study Extender
      2.4.2. Tags and Notes Extender
      2.4.3. JLPT Extender
      2.4.4. Vocabulary Extender
      2.4.5. Kanji Extender
3. Preferences
   3.1. General
   3.2. Results View
   3.3. Detailed View
   3.4. Vocabulary Entries
   3.5. Kanji Entries
4. Advanced Features
   4.1. Sets
   4.2. Results
   4.3. Study List
   4.4. Practise
      4.4.1. Vocabulary Flashcards
      4.4.2. Kanji Flashcards
      4.4.3. Reading Practise
   4.5. Importing and Exporting Data
5. Troubleshooting
6. Contact

Footnotes

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1. What is Tagaini-Jisho?

Tagaini Jisho is an open source1 Japanese dictionary application. It is designed to help students of the Japanese language in their studies by providing:

• Complete Japanese vocabulary and Kanji Dictionaries, with more than 130,000 entries and stroke order animation for more than 6,000 kanji;
• Powerful search mechanisms, including kanji radical search and other filters;
• Transparent connection of related entries, including transitive / intransitive verb references and Homophones. Tagaini maximises the logical connections between elements of the Japanese language in order to facilitate their memorisation;
• A study list which allows Tagaini to keep track of entries as you learn them. It tracks your ability to remember each entry with flash cards.
• Notes and tags can be applied to entries, allowing you to group entries in a way that makes sense to you;
• Production of printed material, including a handy fold-able booklet to study anywhere.

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2. Getting Started

Tagaini Jisho is a dictionary program. It allows you to search a dictionary for terms and easily find related entries. This chapter covers the basic usage of the application.

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2.1. The GUI

Tagaini Jisho’s GUI consists of two main windows and a toolbar. The toolbar contains the search bar and it’s extenders, which contain advanced options to filter searches.

Above the search bar is the menu bar, which contains several menus for Tagaini’s features.

Below the search bar is the results view, which lists any results of the search. The information is a short description to allow you to chose the result you were after.

Tagaini will remember your searches, and you can go back and forward through them with the left and right arrow at the top left of the results view, next to where it displays the number of results. By default, the results view will only list up to 50 entries. Beyond that, it will put them on a new page. Which page you are viewing is controlled with the buttons to the top right of the list.

Below that is the detailed view, which displays any and all information on a selected entry. The buttons above the view allow you to go back and forward through selected entries. Next to them are the study flags, tag and note buttons.

When you right click on an entry in the results window, it will open a context menu. In the context menu are the same options that are along the top of the detailed view, as well as a Select All option. Right clicking on a kanji in the detailed view has the same effect, except that instead of Select All it has Open in detailed view..., which opens an entry for the kanji in the detailed view. Most kanji in the detailed view are references to an entry about that kanji, so right clicking on them will act accordingly. You may also right click on the magnifing icon, which is a reference to the stated chapter.

Tagaini’s views can also be sized, to make the results or detailed view larger, whilst making the other smaller. To do this, there is a small dotted line above the detailed view’s toolbar, directly below the results view window. Clicking and dragging this up and down changes the size. If you move it close enough to the top or bottom of the window, then it will snap up to the edge, effectivly removing the results or detailed view from the window. This can be handy when practicing sets, which will be covered latter.

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2.2. The Search Bar

The search bar consists of a text field, a drop down list, a button and the Tagaini logo. You can enter words, or terms, to search for into the search and then, when you either press the enter key or the search button, it will search for the terms in the search bar.

For instance, if you enter “しけん” into the search bar it will result in 試験 (test,) 私見 (personal opinion) and 私権 (private right.) If, however, you enter “しけん test”, it will search both terms and only result in 試験 (test) as Tagaini will only display entries with all the search terms.

Every search term is separated by spaces, or " ". To search for a sentence, which includes spaces, you can enclose the sentence in quotation marks, or "". For instance, if you search for to run, then Tagaini will find and list every entry with both the word to and run in it. If instead you search "to run", then Tagaini will only find entries with the words “to run” in them in that order.

As Tagaini matches terms to entries exactly, there is currently no romaji search. So, searching for “watashi” will not result in 私：わたし. To find an entry you must search either its kanji or hiragana reading.

Between the search bar and the search button, there is a drop down list which, by default, says All. It is the dictionary selector. It has two other options, Vocabulary and Kanji. Choosing one will tell Tagaini to only search for vocabulary or kanji. Selecting all will tell Tagaini to search through both the kanji and vocabulary dictionaries.

When searching through both dictionaries, it’s quite common to come across two similar-looking entries, such as two entries for 私 or 駅. These entries will usually come up for single kanji words. This happens because it is displaying an entry for the word, and an entry for the kanji. The two different entries will have information about different things. This is discussed further in the next section.

Another thing that can be put into the search field is a dictionary field value. Doing this allows you to filter through your search results. This can be done by adding :field=value as a search term, so :grade=1 results in every elementary grade 1 kanji being listed in the results view. The extenders provide the same functionality for most of the fields, for instance kanji grade can be found under the kanji extender.

Tagaini also has support for wild cards2. The * character represents an unknown string. Placing it at the end of a term searches for everything beginning with that term, placing it at the beginning of a term searches for everything ending with that term and placing it in the middle of the a term searches for everything that starts and ends with that part of the term. The ? character represents a single unknown character but otherwise works the same way. So 大* represents everything that starts with 大 and *す represents everything that ends with す. If the ? character was used instead then then 大? would be any two character entry where the first was 大 and ?す would be any two character entry that ends with す. Note that the asterik and question marked gotten from IM’s, ＊ and ？, are different from the ascii characters, * and ?, which work as wildecards.

The button to the left of the search bar, which looks like a black box with a white x in it, clears the search bar, resetting it to default, ready to use again.

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2.3. Dictionary Entries

Entries are displayed in two different places. The results view and the Detailed view.

The result view, by default, displays two lines for each entry in a list. The first line contains the kanji and readings, the second line the definitions and meaning of the entry.

In the detailed view each selected entry is displayed with all the information in the entry. Vocabulary entries are different to Kanji entries.

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2.3.1 Vocabulary

Vocabulary entries contain information about different vocabulary, whether it is a word or a phrase. There are several common sections.

• Main Reading - Centred at the top of the view will be the wait the word or phrase is written, with furigana written in red above it.
• Variants - Any variants are listed here, with their reading in brackets.
• The definition block - Here, different definitions are listed. First, it displays the definitions part of speech3 in grey, and then lists different definitions, next to a flag representing the language of the definition.
• JLPT level - The entries JLPT level.
• Kanji - The kanji used in the main reading, and its meanings. This is off by default. The kanji’s JLPT level can also be appended to each reference.
• Transitive／Intransitive buddy - The entry corresponding with the current entries opposite transitive state.
• Homophones - Entries that are homophones of the current entry. A homophone is a word with the same or similar pronunciation.

Any entry referenced in the detailed view will have a little magnifying glass next to it, which is a link to the referenced entry. For instance, in the entry 取る it references its intransitive buddy;

Intransitive buddy: 取れる（とれる）: to come off, to be removed.

Clicking on the magnifying glass at the end of this line would display the entry for 取れる in the detailed view. This does not affect your current set.

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2.3.2 Kanji

Kanji entries contain information about a single kanji, what it means and how it is used. By default, the kanji is centred in the detail view window and its meanings are listed underneath it, also centred. From there there are several common sections.

• On - The on reading, or 音読み（おんよみ）is the Chinese reading of the kanji. It is written in katakana.
• Kun - The kun reading, or 訓読み（くんよみ）is the Japanese reading of the character. It is written in hiragana.
• Nanori - The name readings of the kanji, or 名乗り（なのり）are readings that are only used in names.
• Strokes - The number of strokes it takes to write the kanji.
• Grade - The grade it is taught to in Japanese schools.
• Unicode - The Unicode number, in hexadecimal.
• Frequency - How frequently the kanji appears in newspapers.
• JLPT - The kanji’s JLPT level.
• SKIP - The kanji’s SKIP code.
• Components - The radicals that make up the kanji.
• Compounds - Kanji that are made up with this kanji.
• Seen in - A list of vocabulary that contains the kanji. Following 6 words have been displayed is a link to find all words using that the kanji. Although kun readings for some entries, such as verbs and adjectives, can include any extra kana needed to use the kanji, such as 取る’s る (written と.る,) searching the full reading, including extra kana past the full stop, will not find the kanji entry, only the vocabulary entry. To find the kanji entry you must search for just the kanji’s reading, と in 取る’s case, to find it.

In the detail view, you can click on any kanji, whilst looking at any entry, and a pop up window will be displayed showing a short listing of the kanji, and a stroke order animation. This works in both a kanji entry and a vocabulary entry.

The small window will pop up under your mouse. It shows the kanji’s meaning, some of its readings, Frequency, Grade and JLPT, and components. Most notable, however, is the animation of the kanji being written. It starts as an outline which gets filled in, stroke by stroke. Each radical is written in a different colour.

Moving your mouse over a radical highlights that radical, so the colour becomes lighter. Clicking on a radical, either on the animation or in the components list, will open that radical by itself in the window. Underneath the stroke order animation are animation control buttons, allowing you to stop; pause; play, which it does by default; skip strokes and go back.

Up the top are three buttons. The first, the magnifying glass, opens the kanji’s entry in the detailed view. The second provides an options menu, just as when right clicking on an entry in the results view, and the last closes the window.

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2.4. Search Extenders

There are five search extenders, tabs located directly beneath the search bar. They are marked Study; Tags; Notes; JLPT; Vocabulary; Kanji. Clicking on each of these extends the search bar, bringing up an area underneath it, above the results view, that extends the search functionality to filter your results according to set criteria.

If an extender is set then its tab will include its search criteria and a reset button, identical to the one to the left of the search bar.

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2.4.1. Study Extender

The study extender, the first extender tab, filters through searches according to whether or not the entry is on the study list. The study status defaults to None, so it does not filter results. Changing this to Studied will cause only entries in the study list to be listed in the results view. Not studied causes only results not in the study list to be shown4.

To add entries to the study list, either right click on them in the results view, or use the detailed view toolbar and click the blue flag, Add to study list, which adds the entry to the list with a score of 0. The green flag, Already known, will add the entry with a score of 100.

Each entry is given a colour between red and green according to their score, and it is displayed as the entries background in the results view. As you practice5 the score on each entry in your study list will change. You will then be able to filter entries that you know you know from your searches. When the study status is set to studied Tagaini will only search through entries that have a score within the range of Min and Max, the values from the score section.

The study date section filters entries according to the date the entry was added to the study list. Clicking any of the not set buttons, in this section or the others, brings up a calendar to select a date or allows you to set a number of days／weeks／months／years prior to today’s date. If an entry has been added after the since date and before the until date then it will be listed in the results view in any searches.

The last trained section allows you to set a time range for finding entries according to when you last practiced it, and the last mistaken section allows you to set a time range for when you last marked an entry as incorrect.

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2.4.2. Tags and Notes Extender

Tags and Notes are similar in that they both label entries. They can be added to entries with either the right click menu in the results view or the detailed views toolbar.

Tags are short strings used to identify an entry. Each tag is a single word given to an entry that can be used as a filter. For instance, if you are studying from a text book, you could add the text books name to each vocab entry you need to learn, along with its chapter number as another entry. You can then type tags into the filter and search through just those entries, or view all of them. There is also a drop down list to the right of the text field which contains a complete list of tags, so you can just select the ones you want.

If an entry has a tag, a small tag icon will be displayed on the right side of the entry in the results view, next to the scroll bar and at the bottom of the entry in the detailed view.

To add a tag, you can use the Add tags... button, which looks like a tag with a green bit at the top. White space, or spaces, separates each tag, so writing “genki ch04” adds two tags; “genki” and “ch04”.

Any tags you add with the Add tags... in the current session6 can be found again in the Recently added tags... sub menu of the context menu7, which makes adding tags to a set of entries easier. The Set tags... button brings up a list of all the current tags attached to an entry so that they can be edited. Additional tags can be entered here. Despite the Add tags... button not bringing up tags that have already been set on an entry, adding new ones does not overwrite the existing ones, it just appends them to the list.

Notes are different to tags in that a note can be a sentence or two. You could use notes to describe the relationship between a word or another or any other noteworthy information about the entry. For instance, if a word, such as 降る、appears in a textbook you are studying in a phrase, such as 雨が降る/雨が降ります、in a chapter before the entry itself, you may wish note that in the entry. In the example one may write “Appears in chapter 4 of textbook_name as 雨が降る”.

When you search with the notes filter, the search will match any entries with whatever text you write in the text field, exactly. If, using the above example, you have two different entries on verbs that have been used in phrases and have noted this, if you search for “Appears in” it will find both of these entries, however if they are in separate chapters and you extend that string to “Appears in chapter 5”, then it will only find the one that has that exactly.

To add a note, use the Edit notes... button, which looks like a yellow sickit note pad and a pen. It will bring up a window with any existing notes. You can edit existing notes by selecting them and editing them, add new notes with the New note button, and delete notes.

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2.4.3. JLPT Extender

JLPT stands for the Japanese Language Proficiency Test. It is a test administered by the Japan Foundation and Japan Educational Exchanges and Services for the purposes of evaluating and certifying the Japanese language proficiency of non-native speakers.8

Up until 2010 there have been four levels, with level 4 being the lowest and 1 being the highest. Currently JMDict and kanjidict, the Japanese Vocabulary and Kanji dictionaries used by Tagaini Jisho, have vocabulary and kanji likely to be included in the tests marked as such. This gives us the ability to filter our searches for entries known to be used in the tests. The JLPT extender provides that functionality.

There are four check boxes, each one matching a level. With level 4 selected, every level 4 entry will be listed and any searches will only find level 4 entries. Selecting multiple levels will include multiple levels.

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2.4.4. Vocabulary Extender

The vocabulary extender has vocabulary specific filter options. It can not be used in conjunction with the kanji extender.

The first two text fields relate to the kanji found in vocab entries. The With kanji field will find any vocab entry that contains a kanji. If you enter two kanji then the entry must contain both kanji. Next to it is a checkbox labeled Using studied kanji only. It forces the search to use only kanji from the study list.

Kanji are made up of different kanji, or radicals, so the With components field searches for kanji that include a component. For instance, 私 is made up of 禾 (which is composed of 丿 and 木) and 厶, so searching for 丿, 木 and 厶 in the With components field will find any entry with kanji with those radicals, including any entry that contains the kanji 私.

Below that are four sub menus, labeled Part of speech, Dialect, Field and Misc. Each of these finds entries that belong to any of the groups you select in the menus. The Part of speech menu allows you to search for different parts of speech, such as nouns or verbs; Dialect finds words that belong to different places in Japan; Field finds terms and jargon from different fields and schools of knowledge, such as computer or religious terms and Misc contains anything that doesn’t belong in the other categories, such as children’s language, obsolete terms and slang.

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2.4.5. Kanji Extender

The kanji extender contains filtration options specific to kanji entries and as such cannot be used in conjunction with the vocabulary extender.

The first section on the extender, Stroke count, finds every kanji that has n strokes in it, n being a number between 1 and 34.

The next section, Components, acts in the same way as its counterpart in the vocabulary extender. It searches for a kanji based on the radicals that create it. The difference is in the entries being searched, instead of searching vocabulary entries, which could have multiple kanji, The kanji extender affects searches through the kanji dictionary. As such, only one instance of a kanji will be returned.

The Unicode section, in the middle of the extender, finds the character with the Unicode value 0xH where H is a hexadecimal9 value represnting the number. No two characters have the same value. For instance, the character 取 has a Unicode value of 0x53d6. Putting that in the Unicode field will result in the entry for 取 being listed.

The next section is for finding kanji by SKIP code. A skip code is a way of categorising kanji according to its type. SKIP codes are comprised of three numbers and are annotated X-Y-Z. Each slider in the SKIP code section relates to one of these numbers.10

The last section, School grade, represents which school level the kanji is taught in.

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3. Preferences

The preferences window provides the ability to edit Tagaini’s look, feel and how it handles several things. It can be opened via Program -> Preferences.

It is a window with a menu down the left, containing the different pages. Options for each page are located on the right of the menu.

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3.1. General

The general preferences page, the one that the preferences window opens on, contains general settings that affect the entire program.

The application default font is the font that the application uses to display any information in the interface itself, such as the text “Application default font” and “You need to restart Tagaini Jisho for this change to take effect.” It is the font that all the menus are in.

The dates section specifies which day of the week the week starts on.

The updates section specifies how often Tagaini checks for updates, if at all.

The entries cache section specifies how many entries Tagaini keeps in memory. The default is equivalent to 1000.

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3.2. Results View

The results view page specifies how entries are displayed in the results view.

The results display section specifies the format of each entry. Entries can be displayed on one line, or over two with the definition underneath the reading. The number of entries per page can be changed, as well as how results are sorted; By score, then relevance or just by relevance. Smooth scrolling changes whether or not there is a scrolling animation played, or if it just snaps down to the next entry.

The fonts section allows different fonts to be selected for the different parts of the display. The Main writing section is the first kanji or kana which shows how it is usually written. Readings and alternative writings specifies how readings are displayed and definitions refers to the Romaji text that the meaning of the entry is displayed in. The default font is a Qt system default.

The preview section contains some dummy entries and is displayed according to the results view page and is updated in real time, so changes can be seen as they are made.

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3.3. Detailed View

The detailed view preferences page describes how the detailed view should be displayed.

The fonts section specifies each font used in the detailed view. There are five in all.

• Default text - The font to use with any non-Japanese characters.
• Kana header - The red furigana reading, centred above the large kanji text.
• Kanji header - The large centred kanji text, signifing the main reading.
• Kanji - Any kanji in the display, for alternative writings and referenced entries.
• Kana - Any kana in the display, for alternative readings and referenced entries.

The preview view has a dummy detailed view that updates in real time. Smooth scrolling can be turned on and off in the general section.

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3.4. Vocabulary Entries

The vocabulary entries page has three tabs. The first, display, has two sections. Basic information and additional information.

The basic information section specifies whether or not the entries JLPT level is displayed. The kanji used in main reading section check box toggles on the kanji section and the JLPT level of kanji section toggles displaying the JLPT level next to referenced kanji.

The additional information contains extra information about related entries. Search for transitive／intransitive verb buddy controls whether or a references is included to an entry with an opposite transitive state. The number before Homophones is the maximum number of homophones to reference. Studied only causes only homophones in the study list to be displayed.

The printing tab defines how entries look when printed11. The general section has the header’s (The main reading) font size and the maximum number of definitions.

The kanji section specifies whether or not to show each kanji’s meaning separately underneath the header, and if only to show studied kanji.

The preview shows a single entry, specifically 大変. It updates as changes are made.

The definition filtering allows the filtration of Terms. By default, obsolete terms and archaisms are filtered out. This stops entries marked as such from being found by searches. To filter out additional categories, select them in the displayed section and press the arrow button that points to the filtered section.

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3.5. Kanji Entries

The display tab, the first of four tabs on the kanji entries page, describes which information should be displayed in the detailed view.

In basic information, there are a series of checkboxes relating to different pieces of information in the entry. Each one toggles display of that element on and off.

• Readings - On and Kun readings.
• Nanori - Nanori reading.
• # of strokes - Number of strokes in the kanji.
• Components - The kanji radicals used in the kanji.
• JLPT level - The JLPT level of the kanji.
• School grade - The grade the kanji is taught at school.
• Unicode - The kanji’s Unicode value.
• SKIP code - The kanji’s SKIP code.
• Frequency - The frequency rating of the kanji.
• Variations - Any variations in the strokes of the kanji.
• Original - The way the kanji was originally written.

The additional information section controls how many compounds, words made of two or more kanji, are shown, as well as how many words using the kanji.

The printing tab controls how kanji entries look when printed.

The kanji information section controls what is displayed, whilst Kanji drawing style controls the font of the kanji. Preview is an updating preview, using the entry for 間.

The values in kanji information are:

• Meaning - The kanji’s meaning
• Onyomi - The on reading, or 音読み。
• Kunyomi - The kun reading, or 訓読み
• Components - The kanji’s radicals.
• Only studied components - Only show kanji in the study list.
• n words - Shows n words using the kanji.
• Only studied words - Filter out words not in the study list.

In the kanji drawing style section the kanji’s size is set, along with if it is written in a handwritten font, or in the default font.

The kanji tooltip, which is the tooltip that shows up when the mouse is hovering over a kanji in the detailed view, is a yellow box which displays the kanji; its first reading and its meanings. The options on this page toggle on／off additional information.

• Kanji tool tip enabled - Enables the tool tip.
• Score - Shows the score colour for entries in the study list as the tool tips background colour.
• # of strokes - Show the number of strokes.
• JLPT level - Show the kanji’s JLPT level.
• School grade - Show the kanji’s school grade.
• Frequency - Show the kanji’s frequency.
• Unicode - Show the kanji’s Unicode value.
• SKIP code - Show the kanji’s SKIP code.

The stroke animation tab controls the stroke order animation, on the kanji popup. It has four options and an preview, using 間. The options are:

• Size - The size of the kanji.
• Drawing speed - The speed at which it is drawn.
• Pause between strokes - The length of the pause between each stroke.
• Play animation when the kanji pop up appears - If this is on, then the animation starts as soon as the pop up window appears.
• Loop animation after: time - Loops the animation after an amount of time. Defaults to Do not loop

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4. Advanced Features

Tagaini Jisho is more than just a dictionary. It provides facilities for training and memorisation of vocabulary and kanji. It will remember sets of kanji, has flash card facilities and will print sets for latter viewing.

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4.1. Sets

A set is the list created by a search and displayed in the results view. Tagaini can remember specific sets. If you have made a search that you think you will want to make again, such as all transitive verbs used in computer terminology at the JLPT 2 level, you can create a new set, to make it easier to find again.

The sets menu contains functions for creating and organising sets. Two options allow the creation and placement of sets directly from the menu, New set from current search... and New sets folder..., and the last, organise sets... Brings up another window for organising sets.

As you create new sets with the menu option, it displays them at the bottom of the menu. Clicking on them there will open that set in the results window.

When you create a new menu, it too will appear in the sets menu, as a sub menu. It will then have two options, Create new set here... and Create new folder here.... They will act as the two options in the main sets menu, except they will place created sets and folders as sub items of that folder. These two options always appear at the bottom of the menu.

To organise or reorganise sets, The organise sets window, found in the sets menu, allows you to drag and drop sets into different folders, as well as delete them. Double clicking on a set or folder will allow you to rename it. Right clicking on the set will allow you to delete it and dragging them around will move them to the new position. This allows you to sort them amongst themselves as well as into new folders.

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4.2. Results

Tagaini is a computer application, and some of the best times to study are those long hours spent commuting on trains, in waiting rooms or, for students, between classes. Unless you are drag a laptop around with you everywhere, You wont have access to Tagaini or its study features, so instead you can print out sets.

Tagaini can print two different types of paper media. Lists of vocabulary or kanji, and Pocketmod books, vocabulary and kanji lists formated in such a way that the paper can be folded into a small, pocket sized, book. The print option prints normally formatted lists, whilst the print booklet(s) option prints out booklets. Each option also has a preview option.

What is printed is limited by what is in the results window. If a search has turned up 60 entries, and Tagaini is set to only show 50 of those entries on a page, then Tagaini will only print those 50 entries.

In the Export displayed entries... menu is an option labeled as a tab separated file.... This option exports the first page in the results view as a plain text file, with entries formatted:

漢字      かな      Romaji

or

Expression      Reading     Meaning

This was originally written for exporting to anki12, a flash card program, but will work with any other application that can import entries in this format.

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4.3. Study List

The study list is an invisible list of vocabulary and kanji, used to mark entries for study. Each entry has a score, based on how well you know the entry. This score is represented by a background colour for the entry when listed in the results view. Red represents not knowing it, or having a 0 score, and green represents knowing it, or having a score of 100. The colour gradiates from red to yellow to green as the score gets higher. Entries with low scores are shown first.

The study list is manipulated with the flag buttons in the detailed view tool bar and the context menu given when right clicking on entry references, either in the results view or the display view.

When adding entries to the study list, there are two relevant flags. The blue flag, Add to study list and the green flag, already known. The blue flag adds the entry with a score of 0, whilst the green flag adds the entry with a score of 100.

After an entry has been added, the blue flag changes colour and becomes a black flag, which removes the entry from the study list. Another flag, which was previously greyed out, also becomes available. It is a red flag and marked Reset score. It sets the entries score to 0.

An entries score goes up and down as you practice it.

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4.4. Practise

The practice menu has four different options. Settings; vocab flash cards; kanji flash cards and reading practice. The flash card options are sub menus, each with by set and entire study list options for reading to translation and translation to reading.

The settings window, brought up by clicking the Whole study list train settings... buttons, Which allows you to set what to include and exclude in study exercises. The date of last training section specifies what to include based on the last time it was studied. It defaults to before yesterday, so it wont include anything that you have already studied in the last twenty four hours. The score section specifies what to include based on score. If you only want to study things you are less familiar with you can change it to between 0 and 50 and it would only show you red to yellow entries. The sort bias specifies if entries with a low score should be more likely to appear before entries with higher scores.

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4.4.1. Vocabulary Flashcards

There are four options in total in the vocabulary flashcards submenu: From Japanese, whole study set; From Japanese, current set; From translation, whole study set and from translation, current set. Each option will display different contents in the same window. It will either show the translation or reading first, from an entry that has been pulled either from the study list or the current set.

The training window has four buttons up the top; Answer and skip, as well as two initially greyed out options, correct and wrong. Underneath this is a detailed display window. It will only display part of an entry initially. Either the Japanese if you have selected from Japanese, or the definition.

If you have selected a from Japanese option, then there is an extra option along the detailed view toolbar, Show furigana, a checkbox which toggles whether or not the furigana for the entry is displayed.

When you have decided whether or not you know the answer, pressing the answer button will display the rest of the entry, just as it would in the detailed display. You can then tell Tagaini if you got it correct or incorrect, which modifies the entries score, or skip the entry, which doesn’t change it at all.

Whilst the whole entry is displayed, you can use the detailed view as normal, however the toolbar is greyed out before hitting the answer button. When you tell Tagaini how well you remembered the entry, it goes to a new entry at random, and you can repeat the process until you have run out of entries in the set. Down the bottom of the view some statistics are displayed.

Correct: 5, Wrong: 1, Total: 6

The numbers correspond to how well you are doing in that particular set. Every time you a new training system, even with the same set, the numbers are all set back to 0.

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4.4.2. Kanji Flashcards

The kanji flashcards menu, like the vocabulary flash cards menu, has four options: From kanji, whole study list; From kanji, current set; From meaning, whole study list and `from meaning, current set. Choosing a from kanji option displays the kanji by itself, allowing you to guess its meaning and reading. Choosing a “by meaning” option, displays the kanji’s meaning and allows you to guess the kanji.

Studying kanji is similar to studying vocabulary. The window is the same, the buttons are the same. After you have asked for the answer you can use the display view, now showing the whole entry, as normal. You can mark an entry as correct or incorrect. You can chose to just skip it. The totals are down the bottom of the view. You cannot, however, ask for furigana as that would defeat the point of trying to memorise the kanji.

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4.4.3. Reading Practise

The last option in the practice menu is reading practice, whole study set. It brings up the reading practice window, which is a bit different to the flash card window.

The window shows you a vocab entries written form, and asks you to type the correct reading for the entry. Underneath the text field, it has a detailed display which shows only the entries definitions. You must type the entry in kana (かな) to get entries correct, it will not accept romaji answers, though it does not mind if the answer is in hiragana ひらがな or katakana かたがな.

When you get the answer correct it displays the word correct in green writing between the detailed display and the text field and moves immediately on to the next entry. When you get the entry incorrect, however, it displays Error! in read writing between the text field and the detailed view and changes the text field into a long next button. The detailed view shows the entire entry so you can see where you went wrong. When you press the next button it will show the next entry.

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4.5. Importing and exporting data

User settings can be exported and imported from Tagaini. This allows you to move study lists, tags, notes and other things Tagaini remembers between versions. The export user data item in the program menu saves out a small data base with these settings, so that another instance of Tagaini may load it, whether it is another user on the same computer or on a different computer altogether.

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5. Troubleshooting

Unable to read Japanese

If you are unable to read Japanese text, you probably don’t have any Japanese font’s installed. You will likely have to install the Japanese langauge pack in windows and Mac OS X. To get Japanese support in linux please see your disributions documentation, if the information and links provided in Tagaini’s Install Guide were insufficiant.

Unable to type Japanese text

Inputing Japanese text is not handled by Tagaini, instead by what is called an Input Manager. You will need to install and use one of these to input Japanese text. For instructions on installing an IM, please see Tagaini’s install guide.

Tagaini won’t compile from GIT

Tagaini depends sqlite, but will not link with your systems sqlite libaries because Tagaini requires slightly customised versions of sqlite and pysqlite that are not kept in Tagaini’s git repo. Instead, you first have to get them, as well as build the ui’s language packs. These are the first two instructions in the install guides compiling from source section.

 tagaini-jisho $ ./builddb.py -d
 tagaini-jisho $ lrelease src/gui/gui.pro

continuing from the qmake section after running these two commands should help.

Database Issues when Compiling from Source

Currently, when compiling from source Tagaini does not install the databases anywhere. This means that Tagaini can only be run from the folder that contains the databases. To be able to run Tagaini from wherever, the databases have to be copied into the tagaini database path manually.

If updating an existing version of Tagaini by compiling the source code, installing it may cause the existing databases to fail. For example, a table in the kanji database changed between 0.2.397 and 0.2.4 which causes kanji entries not to have meanings if run without updating the databases. To fix this, rebuild the databases and copy it to the path.

The databases can be copied into the following places:

/usr/local/share/tagainijisho
/usr/share/tagainijisho
%wintagainipath%
%mactagainipath%

Other Bugs

If you have an issue that is not listed above, you may wish to check Tagaini’s bug tracker on launchpad, or the mailing lists. Chances are that someone else has already reported the problem and an work around has been posted. If no one else has reported the bug, then please feel free to do so.

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6. Contact

For development-related contact and user questions we ask that you use Launchpad’s bug tracker or answers interface.

For informal discussion about Tagaini’s development, you can join the dedicated Google group.

This manual was written by Neil Caldwell, and Tagaini Jisho is copyright Alexandre Courbot.

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Footnotes