LCD to display Kanji (Ryan Clarke & Kramer?)

KenM

Hello Ryan, Kramer, anybody else with "asian" experience.

Do you have any experience with a small LCD that will display Kanji charachters?

Preferably display Kanji and ASCII text.

The display does not need to be large .....I want to use it on my desk at work to randomly display Kanji characters as a study aide.

I have my eye on a few, but no experience on ease of use, quality of display etc.

Therefore, if you have any useful information you can pass along, please do.

Thank you

Ken



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Ken

Post Edited (KenM) : 5/6/2006 3:36:06 PM GMT

PJAllen

Don't most of the LCDs come with Kanji characters already?· All my 44780-type LCDs do ($A0 - $EF).

KenM

Hi PJ,

Thanks for the reply. If I am thinking about the same commonly available 44780 then that module has only two Kanji characters, maybe three.

If you are referring to characters like

タ　チ　ツ　テ　ト　ナ　ニ　ヌ　　shown if the·colum that is the 4th row from the left, then those are Katakana (for some reason the upload image function will not work for me now).

Or am I missing something.

Thanks and still looking.

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Ken

PJAllen

I believe they ($A0 - $EF) are·all Kanji.· No?· Please see attached, because I can manage these with my 4x20LCD (44780-based.)· Maybe I'm totally out of it.

Post Edited (PJ Allen) : 5/6/2006 4:12:46 PM GMT

KenM

Hi PJ,

The text in the example you posted is called Katakana and is used·so Japanese people can pronounce (sort of) foreign words.

Thanks !!

PJAllen

Well, sink me -- guess I had it back-weird.· Now I Know.

Paul Baker

This is the only one I found readily, http://www.eea.epson.com/go/Prod_Admin/Categories/EEA/LCD/LcdModMono/displayItem?itemId=L54110540020000&categoryId=EEA.LCD.LcdModMono

its a 6x2 kanji display. Though I dont know how you would get single quantities. Hitachi makes a controller that is kanji compatible, but thats probably lower level than you desire.

As Im sure you are aware, displaying kanji poses a problem because you need many more pixels per glyph than romanji or katakana needs. This requires either a specialized LCD or using a graphics LCD.

One possible work around is using an LCD which supports hiragana, while it is still a bastardization to express kanji using hiragana, it is not as much as using katakana to express kanji.


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Post Edited (Paul Baker) : 5/6/2006 5:47:49 PM GMT

KenM

Thank you Paul for the information on the LCD.

Going slightly off course, if anybody is interested I will try to partially explain the Japanese language when it comes to writing text.

Japanese reading and writing·can be in 4 forms.

Hiragana - Katakana - Kanji - Romaji

HIRAGANA·= all the sounds of the Japanese alphabet and has a specific set of characters. It is used for native Japanese words. In Hiragana....a,i,u,e,o = あ、い、う、え、お

KATAKANA·= all the sounds of the Japanese alphabet and has a specific set of characters. This set is used for foreign words so Japanese know how to pronounce foreign words used in Japan, but are not native of Japanese language.

For example a,i,u,e,o in Katakana = ア、イ、ウ、エ、オ。In Japan they use the word banana, but that word is not native to Japan, so....ba-na-na = バナナwritten using Katakana

KANJI = symbols borrowed from Chinese characters which can be entire words. The same Kanji word can be written in Hiragana, (as is done prior to the Kanji character being learned.) Also, some native Japanese words do not have a Kanji equivalent and are written only using Hiragana.

For example, the word meaning "before"·written in·Kanji is 前、and the same word written using Hiragana·is まえ。

ROMAJI = all the sounds of the Japanese language written·using english vowels and constanants.

For example, the·word "banana" written using·Katakana is バナナ,　and using Romaji is written banana. When spoken by a native Japanese person·it sounds similar to the way it is pronounced as·a native speaking American.

Cheers !

Ken


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Ken

Post Edited (KenM) : 5/7/2006 2:04:51 AM GMT