Japanese Translators

[An naoscaire]

Hi all.

I'm planning on learning a bit of Japanese and I was wondering if any of you out there know of any good language learning programmes. I was floating around on the apple site and came accross these two:

Talk Now Japanese
http://store.apple.com/Apple/WebObj...013bmhVOP1ocJrsF7/2.0.11.1.0.6.12.1.15.1.17.0


and World Talk Japanese
http://store.apple.com/Apple/WebObj...013bmhVOP1ocJrsF7/2.0.11.1.0.6.12.1.24.1.17.0


I haven't been able to find any demos, screen shots or reviews of these items so I'd like to know if anyone has tried these. If so, what did you think of them and do they teach you through the Latin alphabet or Japanese alphabets? I've heard from some people that if you are learning Japanese, it's best to do it through their character sets rather than your native alphabet because as you progress it becomes more advantageous to have learned through their characters (if you decide to visit, reading signs etc.). Dunno if this is always so, if not, correct me.

Can anyone recommend any others?

Thanks for taking the time to read this, go gentle on me, I'm new around here!

 

[Mechcozmo]

Open Sherlock
Type the word
Press Translate

(There is more to it, but that's the basic rundown)

 

[bousozoku]

Welcome to MacRumors!

I don't think you'll find a friendlier place for Mac users on the web.

I don't know either of the applications. Most of their kind aren't great but there aren't any great alternatives either. Classes cost too much, if you can find them. Audio CD courses work too, but they're not as good because you can't really go backwards easily and the lessons aren't interactive.

As far as characters go, you should concentrate on learning it with Roman characters and work toward learning Japanese kana characters later.

If you have more questions, just ask.

 

[mduser63]

I think it's definitely best to learn Hiragana and Katakana right away instead of using Romaji (Roman characters). I think it gives you a better sense of the way the language fits together, and will make the transition to reading/writing and learning kanji easier. Sorry, I can't recommend any specific programs for learning the language. I learned it mostly by living there, which I highly recommend if you ever get the chance.