ウィズダム英和・和英辞典 app good for
The recent 2.0 update is a huge improvement. Faster startup, highlighting kanji within definitions and searching for results, better interface, and searching for words within phrases, the specific word or within other definitions. The best eng-jpn/jpn-eng dictionary available on the app store.
I must say that fundamentally this dictionary is quite good and complete. I use it all the time and quite successfully.
My main gripe is that theres no English support. Its all in Japanese, and nothing from within the app itself.
I was looking for the expression to shoot oneself in the foot. It doesnt exist in this dictionary. So I was going to recommend it as an addition.
I wonder if theyre at all interested in any critique. To say the dictionary is for Japanese users is lame.
Otherwise a good dictionary even if a little pricey.
Nick
I translate Japanese to English for a living, so I use dictionaries on a daily basis. And while I probably dont absolutely need one on my iPhone, I figured it might come in handy and I was curious what it was like. There are better dictionaries out there, but this is certainly not a bad one. The entries are on the short side, but its very attractively presented and controls very smoothly. As another reviewer mention, there is no romaji (Romanized Japanese), and that is because this is intended for a Japanese audience. I dont think you can fault it for that. My main complaint is that there doesnt appear to be any way to look up words within a dictionary entry, or to look up words in another application, such as email. This is probably hard to implement on the iPhone, though, because it lacks any means to select text, or to copy and paste text. Overall, a pretty impressive little dictionary.
The Wisdom dictionaries are fairly well known in Japan. That said, they are written for native Japanese speakers, not people in the earlier stages of learning Japanese. If your Japanese is good, then these are very helpful. If youre still at a beginning/intermediate level, then this simply is not what you need.
This electronic edition of the WISDOM dictionary, like the print edition, is designed for Japanese, not Westerners. The use of kanji only (i.e., the lack of romaji), make it very difficult to use effectively for any Westerner who has not mastered well over a thousand kanji. That said, for advanced learners who are trying to break the dependence on romaji it works very well. The definitions are concise and search terms can be entered in kana.
As a Japanese who lives in the US and needs this kind of dictionary handy, this app was a perfect fit to me. Definitely worth the price!
Some bad moments
24 dollars and it doesnt even have romanji! It really wont help you with your English - Japanese translations, it should just be a Japanese - English dictionary. No japanese pronunciations that I have found, just English, and not good ones at that. Dont buy if you are looking for a English - Japanese dictionary.
The previous review is completely accurate, the dictionary has no romanji (which Im fine with...), but worse yet, it doesnt even offer kana to help with pronunciation. So even if youre learning Japanese and are quite familiar with hiragana and katakana, this dictionary is basically useless. Its pretty much only intended for people that are completely fluent in Japanese (and can read all of the common kanji...). It also doesnt have anything cool like the drawing input that nicer electronic dictionaries have for looking up kanji. The lookup of words seems very sluggish to me too... The Sanseido dictionary this uses is free to use online too, so I cant really see the justification for charging $24.
This dictionary appears to be a very nice Japanese to English dictionary. I imagine it would be useful to a native Japanese speaker. For a native English speaker, you cannot search for Japanese words using Roman-ji in any useful way and get a English translation. Essentially it assumes you know several thousand Kanji not to mention Hiragana and Katakana. It also uses a lot of Kanji in describing English meanings. Since it is not what it is is advertised as, I rate it as only a 1.
While it looks quite interesting, this app is a total disaster to install. Its resulted in me having to do a restore of my iPhone and me losing a week on info due to a corrupt backup. If you do manage to get in installed, it then messes up your ability to download & install any other apps. Honestly it should be pulled from the store until these issues are resolved.
I bought this the first week it came out. I cant read kanji so going from E-J as an english speaker the app is useless. I emailed them about it and their response tone was "thanks but dont look for it soon." meaning itll probably never have it, and I wasted $20ish bucks. Not to mention this was before apple allowed for refunds so I cant get one.
