Bug #16719
Switch from ibus-anthy to Mozc
100%
Description
Hey received a bug report from a japanese user, complaining about our current input method for japanese.
Here are a few reason why it would be better to switch to fcitx-mozc:
- the accuracy of the conversion of Anthy to Kanji is so bad that the amount of
kanji that can be converted is small, so it is useless - most japanese users use mozc
And in order to use this piece of software one has to reboot Tails after installing, so adding it through additional software doesn’t do the trick.
Subtasks
History
#1 Updated by intrigeri 2019-05-14 14:45:03
- Assignee changed from sajolida to intrigeri
I’ll take a look as I’ve done work in this very area recently.
Note that we don’t ship ibus-mozc
so I’ll fix this ticket’s title once I’m there.
#2 Updated by intrigeri 2019-06-01 14:36:58
- Subject changed from Switch from ibus-mozc to fcitx-mozc to Switch from ibus-anthy to fcitx-mozc
- Description updated
- Category deleted (
Accessibility)
#3 Updated by intrigeri 2019-06-01 14:47:20
- Subject changed from Switch from ibus-anthy to fcitx-mozc to Switch from ibus-anthy to Mozc
- Assignee deleted (
intrigeri)
We could try shipping ibus-mozc (either on top of ibus-anthy or instead of it), even though I’m not entirely convinced by the current state of its maintenance in Debian. My concern is that last time I tried to get feedback about such matters, I got very little, so I’m a bit afraid of making things worse for some users while satisfying some users’ preferences. @mercedes508, can you please share (privately) the email address of this user, so I can at least ask them whether whatever we prepare is better for them than the status quo?
fcitx is a totally different beast and it has no IBus compatibility in Stretch (while there’s fcitx5-module-ibus in Buster but that seems pretty much experimental at this point, no idea how well this would integrate with a GNOME desktop).
#4 Updated by mercedes508 2019-06-04 11:19:16
intrigeri wrote:
> @mercedes508, can you please share (privately) the email address of this user, so I can at least ask them whether whatever we prepare is better for them than the status quo?
Done.
#5 Updated by passis12345678 2019-06-30 18:14:51
Hi, I am the Japanese user.
I don’t use the email address anymore, so I’ll answer it here.
There are several types of Japanese input, and of course there are preferences.
But I don’t think any Japanese users would agree that Anthy is better than Mozc.
The accuracy of Mozy’s Kanji conversion is clearly superior to that of Anthy.
I’ve never seen or heard of anyone who likes Anthy.
Any Japanese user would be happy to replace Anthy with Mozc.
Replacing ibus-anthy with ibus-mozc is just one thing that can get worse. That’s an extra step to start using Japanese input.
ibus-anthy allows you to enter Japanese immediately after booting, but ibus-mozc defaults to alphabetic and you have to change the setting to Japanese each time after booting.
That is why I think fcitx-mozc is better than ibus-mozc. fcitx-mozc doesn’t do that. You can input Japanese immediately after starting.
So fcitx-mozc is best, but I think ibus-mozc also has advantages over disadvantages.
This is because the inconvenience of changing settings each time is only once after you start up Tails, but the inconvenience of poor Kanji conversion accuracy lasts all the time you start up Tails.
#6 Updated by intrigeri 2019-12-31 09:04:15
- has duplicate
Bug #17389: Update japanese input method to uim-mozc added
#7 Updated by goupille 2020-01-21 16:40:51
@intrigeri, I just sent you an email (ticket number in the subject) with the contact of a user very willing to help for this
#9 Updated by intrigeri 2020-03-26 13:04:06
- Status changed from Confirmed to In Progress
- Assignee set to intrigeri
- Target version set to Tails_4.6
- Feature Branch set to feature/16719-ibus-mozc
#10 Updated by intrigeri 2020-03-26 19:36:16
Hi @passis12345678,
it took me a while to find a little bit of spare volunteer time to get to this, but I have finally prepared a Tails experimental image with Mozc:
Could you please try it?
Thanks in advance!
Note that it’s using ibus-mozc, instead of fcitx-mozc, because IBus is better integrated with GNOME. I suspect there’s a way to pre-configure ibus-mozc to use one of the Japanese input methods (instead of latin) it supports, but I did not research this; and I would not know which one to pick as a default anyway.
Note to myself: I’ve also asked the user mentioned on Bug #16719#note-8 to try it.
#11 Updated by passis12345678 2020-04-01 07:31:15
Hi intrigeri,
I tried
tails-amd64-feature_16719-ibus-mozc-4.6-20200331T1901Z-c56cd06b69+stable@a6a3be338d.img
and
tails-amd64-feature_16719-ibus-mozc-4.6-20200331T1901Z-c56cd06b69+stable@a6a3be338d.iso
.
I couldn’t start that ISO file. But I could start that IMG file and I was able to use Mozc without trouble.
The only problem with ibus-mozc is that the default characters are Latin instead of Japanese, but I found a solution and I hope you can check it out.This is a very short page in English.
Here’s the page.
https://github.com/google/mozc/issues/381
Thank you so much for taking the time to improve the Japanese language. Japanese users will be delighted.
#12 Updated by intrigeri 2020-04-01 08:00:51
Hi @passis12345678,
> I tried
> tails-amd64-feature_16719-ibus-mozc-4.6-20200331T1901Z-c56cd06b69+stable@a6a3be338d.img
> […]
> I was able to use Mozc without trouble.
Thanks a lot for the quick feedback!
> The only problem with ibus-mozc is that the default characters are Latin instead of Japanese,
From Bug #16719#note-5 I understood that this one-per-Tails-session annoyance (Mozc) was preferable to the permanent annoyance while typing in Japanese caused by Anthy.
From this I inferred that the state of the branch you’ve tested is an improvement compared to current Tails releases.
Did I understood correctly?
If we’re on the same page, then I’ll propose the current branch for Tails 4.6, without blocking on this problem.
> but I found a solution and I hope you can check it out.
> […]
> https://github.com/google/mozc/issues/381
Unfortunately, this suggests that there’s no way to configure this: the proposed solution requires patching and recompiling ibus, which I think requires a bit too much maintenance work.
> Thank you so much for taking the time to improve the Japanese language. Japanese users will be delighted.
My pleasure :)
#13 Updated by passis12345678 2020-04-01 14:47:51
Yes. You completely understand.
I think the new problem created by replacing ibus-anthy with ibus-mozc will create new frustration among Japanese users. But if you asked those people if they should quit ibus-mozc and go back to ibus-anthy, I’m sure they wouldn’t agree, and I think the benefits of mozc are as great as the heavy users of tails.
I’m going to use this test image for a while as I can’t wait for 4.6 to be released.
#14 Updated by intrigeri 2020-04-01 16:34:11
- Category set to Internationalization
- Status changed from In Progress to Needs Validation
- Assignee deleted (
intrigeri)
#15 Updated by anonym 2020-04-15 11:14:48
- Assignee set to anonym
#16 Updated by anonym 2020-04-15 13:45:33
- Status changed from Needs Validation to Resolved
- Assignee deleted (
anonym) - % Done changed from 0 to 100
Changes LGTM!
Testing also went fine, but I get that the default input method being wrong will be annoying. I did some digging if we actually can change the default input method, but my understanding is indeed that it is reset to “Direct mode” on each time ibus-mozc
initializes. :/ Oh well.
Any way, merged!