# How do Chinese/Japanese typewriters work? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 20, 2011, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-chinese-japanese-typewriters-work/568351 "2011-01-20T17:39:13Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![TokyoBayer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tokyobayer/32/13989_2.png) [@TokyoBayer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TokyoBayer)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2011, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-chinese-japanese-typewriters-work/568351/21 "2011-01-23T01:55:57Z")
> [@Monty](#): > > **TokyoPlayer** very well may be referring to the relatively low number of Chinese characters, known in Japanese as _Kanji_, used in Japan. As discussed on [this Wiki page](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kanji#Orthographic_reform_and_lists_of_kanji), the lists of Kanji used in Japan are not that large (comparing approximately 3,000 characters to the purported 100,000+ total of all Kanji). > > There is also the issue that Japanese does have a native syllabary of 48 symbols, each symbol representing one syllable. Typing the symbol for MA only requires one keystroke in Japanese but still requires two keystrokes using the Pinyin system for Chinese. Both of these reasons, and more, although the second reason isn’t exactly correct. Japanese has the syllabary hiragana, [Hiragana - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiragana) which is an important element in the discussion. The keys are labeled in hiragana, [http://img.kakaku.com/images/productimage/fullscale/01507010463.jpg](http://img.kakaku.com/images/productimage/fullscale/01507010463.jpg) in addition to the standard QWERTY labeling. The method is changed by a software setting. The same hiragana syllable can be input either directly with one stroke using the hiragana keyboard setting or with two or three strokes using the QWERTY setting. While it is theoretically faster to use the hiragana setting in reality, as words are input in English as well, people have to memorize the QWERTY layout, and no one I know has mastered the hiragana setting. They can get more fluent with QWERTY, though, although not up to the same speed as Western languages because of the nature of the beast. I’ll outline how Japanese is done and contrast that with one of the methods of inputting Chinese, as outlined by The Master, quoted from the link above: > [@](#): > > (1) Figure out which of the 50,000-plus Chinese characters you want to use. (. . .) I should point out that you can get by with about 3-4,000. Japanese tend to use fewer of the obscure kanji than the Chinese, since they have the option of writing in _hiragana_ if they don’t remember the kanji. > [@](#): > > (2) Try to remember how to pronounce said character. This is fairly simple. Each Chinese character has one syllable, and in Pinyin, the official pronunciation system used in mainland China, there are 403 possible spoken syllables. Syllables can be pronounced with one of four tones (level, rising, falling, and falling-and-rising), each tone giving the syllable a different meaning. The tones account for what many westerners regard as the singsong quality of east Asian speech. We must either be in awe of the Master if he really believes that recalling the pronunciation of 50,000 characters is straightforward, or accept that he has overlooked the difficulty which even the natives have. The clear advantage here for Japanese, though, is because there is only 107 syllables (rough count) which can be written with hiragana. Japanese and Korean also don’t have same tonal structure used in Chinese, Taiwanese, and Vietnamese among others. The two factors show why Japanese is obviously must less complicated. > [@](#): > > (3) Enter the syllable into the computer phonetically using Roman (i.e., our) letters. This takes up to six keystrokes plus, in some programs, one more keystroke for the tone. Typically this pops up a menu of possible characters, six characters or so at a time. Japanese syllables take a maximum of four keystrokes in contrast to the six in Chinese. Not having to add in the tone reduces a key stroke for each syllable. Words are typically two and some times three kanji or move, although those are less frequent. > [@](#): > > (4) Page through the characters looking for the one you want. With 50,000 possible written syllables but only a few hundred possible spoken ones, each spoken syllable can have as many as 131 different meanings (average: 17), (. . .) Japanese word processing programs have become increasingly more sophisticated, and you can type in complete sentences. Because of the nature of Japanese, where particles are written in _hiragana_ and foreign words are written in _katagana_ (another system of writing the same identical syllables) it’s easier for the word processing program to interpret which kanji are to be used. You still have to choose between the many homophones, so you can never touch type Japanese. > [@](#): > > (5) Hope like hell you speak Mandarin, the most important of the seven or eight major Chinese dialects. Although written Chinese is pretty much the same throughout China, spoken Chinese can vary dramatically and some dialects are mutually unintelligible. The Pinyin pronunciation system and Pinyin-based word processors are geared toward Mandarin. If all you speak is Cantonese, you’ll have to use an alternative input method, which can involve stroke analysis, numerical codes, or other matters even more frightening. Japanese doesn’t have that problem. Even though there are local dialects, it doesn’t affect the inputting process of the kanji. > [@](#): > > (6) Having found the character you want, tap one more key to enter it into your document. All decent word processing programs allow you register preferences for homophones, and even to register complete sentences from just a few keystrokes. I can whip out a standard email in Japanese from blocks of about 20 or 30 registered sentences in just seconds, and then customize in a couple of minutes. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/73ab20/32.png) [@The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tao_s_Revenge)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2011, 2:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-chinese-japanese-typewriters-work/568351/22 "2011-01-23T02:55:30Z")
I hope I’m not coming off disparaging Chinese and Japanese languages, but are there any movements toward modifying their character sets to be more digicompatable? ---
**Author:** ![TokyoBayer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tokyobayer/32/13989_2.png) [@TokyoBayer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TokyoBayer)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2011, 5:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-chinese-japanese-typewriters-work/568351/23 "2011-01-23T05:26:22Z")
It actually is going the other way in Japan. With the relative ease of inputting kanji (in contrast to remembering how to write the damn things), the use of kanji is increasing. ---
**Author:** ![China\_Guy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/779978/32.png) [@China\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/China_Guy)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2011, 5:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-chinese-japanese-typewriters-work/568351/24 "2011-01-23T05:31:46Z")
well sorta. RE Chinese - instead of modifying their character sets, computers have gotten more powerful. Even I, a non-native speaker, can type reasonably fast using pinyin. The key is being able to recognize the correct characters. Two things at play: 1. Because Chinese is a tonal language, it has evolved over time to become largely di-syllabicized (eg, uses 2 syllables). An example would be that in Chinese one would say “walk out” as opposed to “walk.” Given tones, “walk” might mean any number of characters but “walk out” would be only 1 or 1 of a few combinations. 2. Context. Based on the sentence and common character combinations (that di-syllabicized thing again), computers often kick out the right characters or narrow down the choice. As long as the typer can \*recognize \*Chinese characters, then it works pretty well. My off the cuff observation is that native Chinese can type about as fast as an English typewriter. They are fast enough texting on a cell phone keyboard as to be workable (and it’s a lot more challenging than pinyin on a qwerty keyboard). Net net, technology is catching up to deal with Chinese instead of the Chinese language morphing to be computer friendly. Regarding Japanese, the whole romanization/hiragana/katakana is essentially a simplification of Chinese characters. J dopers chime in here, but there are what about 1,000 basic characters. A college grad probably knows something like 3,000 characters. [Chinese is probably more like 10,000 characters as Chinese does not have a system like katakana substitute for characters (and no bopomofo doesn’t count)]. ---
**Author:** ![George11](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/4bbf92/32.png) [@George11](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/George11)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2011, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-chinese-japanese-typewriters-work/568351/25 "2011-01-23T20:43:57Z")
> [@Kiyoshi](#): > > [Here’s](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Na8Hcn3UNfU) a video of a Chinese typewriter in action. The audio’s in Swedish, unfortunately, but there is a brief explanation in the text underneath. > > I don’t understand how the typist can line up the moving thingamajig with the exact character he wants, without making a mistake. Everything looks so tiny and fiddly. It would have me screaming! I speak Swedish so perfectly fine by me 😃 ---
**Author:** ![George11](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/4bbf92/32.png) [@George11](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/George11)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2011, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-chinese-japanese-typewriters-work/568351/26 "2011-01-23T20:52:30Z")
> [@](#): > > It actually is going the other way in Japan. With the relative ease of inputting kanji (in contrast to remembering how to write the damn things), the use of kanji is increasing. So true, I’m learning Japanese and I can recognise 700+ kanji. Writing them…I doubt I’m even up to 200. Maybe even 100. I remembe reading a few months ago that the education ministry in either China or Japan were growing concerned with the population’s increasing inability to write Chinese characters due to using computers all the time. > [@](#): > > Japanese has the syllabary hiragana, [Hiragana - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiragana) which > is an important element in the discussion. The keys are labeled in hiragana, [http://img.kakaku.com/images/product...1507010463.jpg](http://img.kakaku.com/images/product...1507010463.jpg) in addition to the standard QWERTY labeling. The method is changed by a software setting. The same hiragana syllable can be input either directly with one stroke using the hiragana keyboard setting or with two or three strokes using the QWERTY setting. > > While it is theoretically faster to use the hiragana setting in reality, as words are input in English as well, people have to memorize the QWERTY layout, and no one I know has mastered the hiragana setting. They can get more fluent with QWERTY, though, although not up to the same speed as Western languages because of the nature of the beast. Its away from the topic, getting into computers but whilst you’re on it…Why is that? Surely using the hiragana setting makes more sense? Why don’t people learn that? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-chinese-japanese-typewriters-work/568351.md?page=1)