The Japanese Language Proficiency Test is over with, which means I am now free to make some updates at long last!

The first, really big update is in the Japan Blog's media page. I've uploaded a bunch of pictures and videos taken over the past 11 months. All the videos have thumbnail pictures now, too. Within the next few days I think I'll write about some of the stuff that has happened with me here in Japan over that time.

Second is the update to J-Ben. Version 1.1.1 fixes a number of bugs with the previous version, and features improved English-Japanese searching. Check it out!

- Paul

A major update to J-Ben has been released. Check the J-Ben page for details.

There may or may not be another update this month. I know of some significant bugs, but nothing which should outright crash the program. Since I only have about 30 more days to study for the Japanese Language Proficiency Test, that takes priority for now.

- Paul

J-Ben 1.0.1 is up! The new version features a brand new vocab list which you can use while studying kanji. Search for a kanji, and if a word in your list uses that kanji, it'll show up alongside the other dictionary info. Check the J-Ben page for details and for updated screenshots.

- Paul

The newest version of J-Ben is just about ready. However, just a few minutes ago I discovered a small bug which is annoying enough for me to put off a release. I've already fixed the bug in source, but I don't have immediate access to my Windows machine to make an appropriate build.

However, the source for the program is available from the J-Ben page, so if you can compile code, you can check that out. The source archive includes Code::Blocks project files for Windows and a simple Makefile for Linux.

A final comment: the new version is dependent upon the Boost libraries. I'm using a header-only library though, so you don't need to build anything for your platform; just grab the boost distribution, unzip it somewhere, and change the include paths accordingly to match.

For questions or comments, please leave a comment on my blog. And if most of what I just said was Greek to you, just wait one or two more days and there'll be a fresh Windows version zipped up and ready to fly.

- Paul

I don't want to spend a lot of time writing, but basically this is what's going on.

First, I've written a new program called J-Ben (Ｊ勉), which is available in the software section of this site. That is really the reason for the other updates which are going on.

I posted about the project on Freshmeat, and as a result have seen a small increase in traffic on the page. I also recognize that my site does not look so good visually; it probably looks better as a black/white plain text page than it did with the ugly "websafe yellow" CSS layout I used before. As a result, I'm currently updating the CSS layout a bit, along with some other parts of the web site. More changes may follow later. Since I'm not a graphics designer, I may ultimately just drop the stylesheet or make it an optional thing, because the site looks plenty good without a style applied.

That's all for now.

- Paul

I have added a new section to the site: Software. This section will include any programs I've written which I think are interesting enough to share with others.

For now, the new page will include information about my new program, JKanji. If you're interested in studying Japanese, please check it out! It is under active development.

- Vultaire

The Japan Blog now has a media section. I had some fun writing some new scripts which make it much easier for me to upload new pictures or videos to my site. I've written a PHP script to manage that portion of the site, so now I pretty much just need to upload my photos or videos without worrying about anything else. Very convenient. Anyway, check it out: Japan Blog

Expect slightly more frequent updates now that I have some of these scripts in place to make my life easier. =)

- Vultaire