The Kiten Handbook

# The Kiten Handbook

Jason Katz-Brown `<jason@katzbrown.com>`

Daniel E. Moctezuma `<democtezuma@gmail.com>`

Revision Applications 20.12 (2020-12-28)

Legal Notice

Kiten is a Japanese reference/study tool by KDE.

Chapter 1. Introduction
Introduction

# Chapter 1. Introduction

Kiten is a set of 3 tools with multiple functions. Firstly, it is a convenient English to Japanese and Japanese to English dictionary; secondly, it is a Kanji dictionary, with multiple ways to look up specific characters; thirdly, it is a tool to help you learn Kanji.

Each of these modes is discussed in its own chapter.

Chapter 2. Using the Dictionary
Using the Dictionary

# Chapter 2. Using the Dictionary

Kiten's most basic mode is as a dictionary for looking up both English and Japanese words. You can also add other dictionaries to Kiten's list.

Kiten uses Jim Breen's Edict and Kanjidic as the default dictionaries. You can find more information at the Edict web site and the Kanjidic web site.

## Looking Up Words

To look up words in either language, type them in to the text-edit (much like Konqueror's location bar) and press either Enter or the Search button on the toolbar (again, much like Konqueror). Kiten will then look up the word.

You can enter Kanji, Kana and English and get back results from Kiten. These results of your search will appear in the large results view which takes up the majority of the Kiten window.

### Filtering

Often times you will want to filter rare words from your search. Kiten will do this for you if toggle Search → Filter Out Rare.

### Note

Not all dictionary files support filtering rare entries - most dictionaries, excluding the two provided by default in Kiten do not.

### Common/Uncommon words

Another way to separate information is to filter common and uncommon words, this is useful when you want to focus on the common words and/or have interest on uncommon ones. The only difference between Filter Out Rare and Common/Uncommon options is that here you also get the Rare/Uncommon results.

Advanced Searches
Advanced Searches

## Advanced Searches

Kiten supports more advanced searches than plain normal word searches.

### Beginning/Ending/Anywhere Searches

Beside a search with Exact Match Kiten has three additional search modes.

To search for the beginning of a word, instead of pressing the Search button on the toolbar or pressing Enter on the text-entry in the toolbar, choose using the Search → Match Type → Match Beginning. Similarly, for ending or anywhere searches, choose Search → Match Type Match Anywhere or Match Ending to search for your text anywhere in or at the end of a word. These search modes work for searches of both languages.

### Word type searches

Kiten supports word type searches such as: verb, noun, adjective, adverb, prefix, suffix, expression or any type. This way you can filter your results more conveniently.

### Searching in Results

Kiten can also help you refine your searches by allowing you to search for new text in the results generated by a previous search. To do this, just choose Search → Search in Results to perform your search. Similarly to beginning/ending/anywhere searches, this works for both languages too.

Chapter 3. Looking Up Kanji
Looking Up Kanji

# Chapter 3. Looking Up Kanji

Kiten has features that makes finding the one kanji you want easy from over 14,000 in the default dictionary.

### Note

Clicking on any Kanji in the main result view will show details on that particular Kanji. This can sometimes be the fastest way to look up a Kanji.

### Tip

Kanji searches are also filtered according to whether Search → Filter Out Rare is checked.

## Regular Searching

You can search with English and Japanese search strings the exact same way you can with the normal dictionary.

Radical Searching
Radical Searching

## Radical Searching

You can use Kiten's radical search dialog to search for Kanji with a combination of radicals and a certain stroke count. Choose Search → Radical Selector to open the radical search dialog.

To choose the radicals you want to be in your Kanji, select one them from the buttons at the bottom of the window. To display possible radicals to select from this buttons with a certain number of strokes, choose this number of strokes from the spinboxes just above the buttons. The radicals you choose will appear in the listbox at the top.

To choose how many strokes your Kanji should have, just enter the values into the spin boxes below the results area.

To perform the lookup, press the button that matches the kanji you wanted to look up.

Grade Search
Grade Search

## Grade Search

To get a list of all Kanji in a certain grade, enter that into the search box as "G:1" (G: is the Kanjidic tag for grade).

Stroke Search
Stroke Search

## Stroke Search

To get a list of all Kanji with a certain number of strokes, enter that number the search box as "S:2".

Kanji List
Kanji List

## Kanji List

This part of the Kanji Browser lets you visualize a list of kanji filtered by grade and number of strokes. By Clicking on a kanji you can get detailed information about it. Kanji Browser separates the list in Jouyou, Jinmeiyou and non-Jouyou kanji. All this kanji is available thanks to the KANJIDIC dictionary.

Kanji Information
Kanji Information

## Kanji Information

This part shows you detailed information about a kanji such as: kanji stroke order, number of strokes, readings and meanings.

Chapter 4. Miscellaneous
Miscellaneous

# Chapter 4. Miscellaneous

This chapter describes miscellaneous features that can be used in both modes in Kiten's main window.

## History

Kiten keeps track of all of your queries in the input field. You can see your last results by clicking on the check mark at the right of the input field. To go forward one in the history, choose Go → Forward. To go backward one in the history, choose Go → Back.

Fonts
Fonts

## Fonts

You can choose the font that Kiten uses in its result view. Go to the Kiten configuration dialog, which can be opened by choosing Settings → Configure Kiten.... Select the Font page of the dialog and select the font in the font-chooser.

### Note

Qt™ 's font-substitution system makes it so a Japanese font will always be substituted for Japanese characters, even if the font you specify doesn't include them. Thus, you can choose any font in the chooser and everything should still display fine.

Chapter 5. Credits and License
Credits and License

# Chapter 5. Credits and License

Kiten copyright 2001, 2002 Jason Katz-Brown

Developers

- Jason Katz-Brown `(jason AT katzbrown.com)` - Original author.

- Neil Stevens `(neil AT qualityassistant.com)` - Code simplification, UI suggestions.

- Jim Breen `(jwb AT csse.monash.edu.au)` - Wrote xjdic, of which Kiten borrows code, and the xjdic index file generator. Also is main author of edict and kanjidic, which Kiten essentially require.

- Paul Temple `(paul.temple AT gmx.net)` - Port to KConfig XT and bug fixing.

- David Vignoni `(david80v AT tin.it)` - SVG icon.

- Joe Kerian `(jkerian AT gmail.com)` - KDE 4 rewrite.

- Eric Kjeldergaard `(kjelderg AT gmail.com)` - KDE 4 rewrite.

- Daniel E. Moctezuma `(democtezuma AT gmail.com)` - Deinflection system improvements, dictionary updates for EDICT and KANJIDIC, GUI improvements, Kanji Browser, bug fixes, code polishing and simplification.

Documentation copyright 2002, Jason Katz-Brown

Documentation copyright 2012, Daniel E. Moctezuma

This documentation is licensed under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License.

This program is licensed under the terms of the GNU General Public License.