The synonym system in reviews is unsatisfying

Bunpro
#1

I use Bunpro solely for grammar practice, so that might influence how you perceive this post. I believe Bunpro is a high-quality tool, but I think the synonym/partially correct/yellow system could use some improvement. While it’s great that the Bunpro team is focusing on enhancing vocabulary and reading practice, these features don’t benefit me since I practice them elsewhere.

Most Bunpro users review grammar, and many likely encounter several synonym answers in each session. I think some standardization or additional work on the system could improve the user experience. Here’s how I see the current issues:

  1. Sometimes, Bunpro just informs you there’s a synonym or a stronger/weaker nuance. This is fine, but it leaves you guessing between six or more synonyms for some grammar points. A bit more guidance would be helpful, though I understand this might be a lot of work for the Bunpro team and is likely impractical.

  2. Occasionally, there’s a grammar point that I think fits, but it’s not recognized as a synonym. In these cases, I’d appreciate an explanation of why it’s wrong, but instead, I’m just marked as incorrect with no guidance. It would be nice to have a way to report these instances so the Bunpro team can confirm whether it’s a valid synonym or not. I realize this could overwhelm the team with incorrect reports, but some kind of middle ground would be helpful.

  3. Sometimes, there’s a hint that is actively misleading, which is the most frustrating experience as a user.

  4. The best-case scenario is when Bunpro provides specific advice on how to correct your answer to get it right.

Implementing these changes wouldn’t be easy, but as a grammar teaching and SRS tool, having to guess why “なくてはいけません” is wrong and “なければいけません” is right makes for a poor user experience. I think somehow improving this system is currently the single greatest improvement the team could make to Bunpro overall.

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#2

I agree with all you’ve said. I also find the hints misleading and I sit there guessing between all the possible solutions and then “get it right” which I think doesn’t really help me practice well enough because I’ve actually gotten in wrong like 3-4 times before I got it right - yet it still goes up an SRS level.

2 Likes
#3

For me, that which you’ve highlighted and not being able to enter Kanji are the platforms biggest weaknesses, especially when compared to rival products I’m also subscribed to and using.

There’s also a lot of inconsistency with the review questions.

Some give vague hints when you provide a logically and grammatically correct answer, but not the one wanted—why not just open the review highlighting the things it isn’t to save the wasted effort? Others applications do this.

Other review questions just slap you across the face even with a logically and grammatically correct answer, because it’s looking for some obscure old fashioned way that nobody even uses.

I understand this is being slowly addressed, but as of right now things like that are what’s going to put me off using it.

To be an actually good Vocabulary tool for me personally, every word in an example sentence should be able to be tapped/clicked for a dictionary lookup—especially as the example sentences used often use words and even grammar not yet taught—and it would be even better if you from that drill down into the Kanji used, including stroke order etc.

At the moment I’m having to jump between multiple apps to feel like I’m getting a comprehensive feel of what is going on.

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#4

The hints have dramatically improved over the years. I can tell they are being worked on and improved. からして and にすれば for instance, now have hint’s about who’s perspective. If you think logistically each review could have a lot of different hints, and there are thousands of reviews.

So my advice, is when you have a review and there’s no hint or an unhelpful hint, submit feedback saying what you’d like to see. I did this recently when I felt I was pretty close, just used the wrong では or は, and the team added it.

At the end of the day there are people working on this but I’m sure it’s a huge task. It will get there, like I said, it’s already much better.

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