Introduction

This page is is the top level community documentation (English) page for Japanese language in Ubuntu. Here you will find information regarding using Japanese with Ubuntu. Chiefly information regarding setting up Ubuntu in Japanese, setting up a Japanese language input environment in Ubuntu that is set up in a language other than Japanese and programs that you might find useful.

Ubuntu In Japanese

Perhaps a good place to start if you are a native Japanese speaker is the official Japanese Ubuntu website.

http://www.ubuntulinux.jp/

If however you are wanting to run Ubuntu in Japanese and you already have an installation, you can easily add Japanese translation by adding Japanese in the 'Language Support' dialogue (System / Administration in Gnome), selecting Japanese as default language, loggin out and then selecting Japanese under 'Select Language' at the log on screen. This will log into a Japanese session with a Japanese locale and hopefully menus and programs will be in Japanese too.

Please note that if you want to type in Japanese using English (or any other language) Ubuntu or if you want to get all the special Japanese repositories set up and Japanese fonts configured correctly, I suggest following the instruction below instead!

Japanese Input Environment

It is quite possible and in many cases advisable to run a Japanese language input environment on an English (or other language) installation of Ubuntu. For people who's first language is not Japanese or who do not want all their menus and programs to suddenly change to Japanese too, it is the suggested option.

The following page lists different input methods and provides a walk through explaining how to set up the input system so you can type in Japanese, along with setting up fonts to display correctly and setting up additional Japanese repositories to get the latest and complete packages.

Japanese Input Guide

The current discussion thread in the Ubuntu Forums might also be useful and is a place where you can ask questions and get help:

Ubuntu Forums Japanese Thread

Other Japanese Related Documentation

Japanese in Adobe Reader

Japanese in Java

Japanese Language Related Software in Ubuntu

There are a number of useful packages that relate to Japanese. Here are but a few:

edict - A popular dictionary program

enamdict - A dictionary of Japanese names

gjiten - Another dictionary

gs-cjk-resource - Ghostscript files for Japanese

kanatest - Kana testing program

kanjidic - Kanji dictionary

kanjisaver - Kanji screensaver

kiten - Reference tool for KDE

xjdict - Another dictionary

Japanese (last edited 2008-12-03 21:49:47 by 79-74-65-57)