Japanese Input is a soft input panel for Windows Mobile based devices that provides basic handwriting recognition for Japanese kanji and kana characters.

Japanese Input is the perfect companion for Pocket Dictionary, a Japanese Dictionary for Windows Mobile.

Features

• Write Japanese text into any application with Japanese font support, including Pocket Dictionary and Word Mobile.
• Recognizes over 2000 characters, including kanji, hiragana, katakana, roman letters, numbers, and punctuation.
• Hiragana and katakana results are colour coded (blue for hiragana, green for katakana) in the input panel so you can easily distinguish them.
• Includes kana input panel that allows for quick typing of hiragana and katakana characters as well as a number of commonly used symbols.
• Configurable recognition options; recognize after every stroke or after a time-out to save processing power.
• Undo stroke option to quickly correct mistakes.
• Full support for VGA devices.

Screenshots

Click for VGA versions.

Installation instructions

If necessary, install a Japanese font on your device. It's recommended to install the font first, so Japanese Input can automatically configure for the correct font when it's first started.

Download the appropriate CAB file for your Windows Mobile version, and copy it to your device. On your device, use File Explorer to open the CAB file, and follow the instructions on screen.

If you are updating or reinstalling the application, it is recommended that you soft-reset your device prior to running the installation. This ensures none of the files are in use.

Limitations

The handwriting recognition algorithm used by Japanese Input is not very powerful compared to state-of-the-art recognition systems. This algorithm, which was first created by Todd David Rudick in Java in 1997, requires that you write the correct number of strokes (and if possible, also in the correct order). If you don't, the results are not likely to be very good. But it's free, and it works well enough in most cases.

Version history

Version 1.0 (refresh 2007-06-08)

• Updated stroke data file (see here for details).

Version 1.0

• First version.