Japanese Collection
Japanese Computing
Basics:
Setting up your Browser
Windows | Mac | Unicode
The Windows 2000 operating system contains built-in multilingual support.
Therefore, there is no need to purchase or download additional software
for inputting Asian languages. To activate support for each script, you
must take the following steps:
- From the start button on the lower left tool bar select Settings
- Control Panel - Regional Options.
- Select the Input Locales tab.
- Add the desired languages to the list displayed.
Support for Japanese text input and display in Internet Explorer (4.0 or
greater), Word 2000, Outlook 98, and Outlook Express (4.0 or greater) can
be downloaded at no cost from the Microsoft web site. This software is available
for many non-Roman scripts and is known as the Global IME (Input Method
Editor).
For web browsing, it is a good idea to install the latest version of Internet
Explorer first. (This will also allow you to view web pages with Unicode
encoding, as explained below.) The components for the Global IME must then
be installed separately.
When properly installed, the Global IME appears as a dark blue box with
the letters En on the tool bar at the far right. Clicking this box displays
a pop-up screen that will allow you to select Japanese or any other language
installed. When you are browsing a site encoded in Japanese and place your
cursor on screen to begin input, a small box with a capital A will appear.
Clicking on this will allow you to select kanji, hiragana, katakana, or
English for input.
Netscape versions 4.72 and above will also work with Microsoft's Global
IME on Windows machines.
Here are the links in the Microsoft web site that will assist you with the
above tasks:
For an introduction to the Global IME,
click
here.
For downloading the latest version (5.5) of Internet Explorer,
click
here.
For downloading the Global IME,
click
here.
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Mac operating system (OS) versions 9.0 and above include a language pack
for Japanese. Earlier versions can be made Japanese capable by buying a
separate language pack. (It may be more cost effective to upgrade to the
latest OS, however.) No other software is necessary for displaying and inputting
Japanese for web browsing.
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The Global IME (Windows) and Mac OS mentioned above provide the means
to view internet pages that have been encoded using a standard encoding
method for Japanese such as JIS, Shift-JIS or EUC. A new "universal"
encoding method is beginning to replace the separate encoding methods
used for each non-Roman language. (For an explanation, see the Unicode
Consortium's home page.) Unicode support is now necessary to display
Japanese and other non-Roman scripts in databases such as Eureka (RLIN).
Internet Explorer versions 5.0 and above include the font necessary for
viewing Japanese encoded in Unicode (UTF-8). At present Netscape fonts
cannot display Japanese in Unicode and must be downloaded from another
source.
The first step is to test your machine to see if you are already configured
to display Japanese in Unicode. To do this, go to the Eureka home page,
scroll down, and click on the box that says "Test your Browser's
Fonts." If you cannot read the kanji and kana displayed there, contact
Ellen Hammond, Japanese Studies Librarian, for instructions on how to
set up your machine to view Eureka and other sites with Unicode encoding.
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