Yeah, we definitely shouldn’t be naming WaniKani, or shaming them by suggesting that there is no reason they shouldn’t expand the app to the 2500 most frequent kanji list, which would include Joyo and JLPT. And don’t mention the enormous amount of subscribers that would easily enable that simple spreadsheet addition.
4 Likes
Same!
Same!
Same!
Blimey, we share more than just a name!
4 Likes
they were never Wanikani features, but they removed legacy lessons from the code, and I’m not well versed in this area, but basically it broke tons of user-made plug ins (at least the best ones) that made the service good (in my opinion, I canceled my subscription shortly after). So they are willing to take away a lot of the add ons that made WaniKani so good, and then don’t just make it part of the service.
2 Likes
I had to break it to you, but you stopped using it for no reason then. Most scripts are easily remedied by using the tampermonkey beta. There are a few other scripts I had to swap out for newer versions and that’s about it. It took me all of 10 minutes to be able to use every one the scripts I was using again.
8 Likes
It’s probably more constructive to take WK feedback over to their forums and add to, or indeed start, a feedback/features request thread.
8 Likes
I mean this thread wasn’t intended to be that, it’s kind of my fault for asking which resource he was referring to…
Was mostly curious incase it was one I was looking into.
3 Likes
She*
But there are too many to list and for different reasons, haha. But yeah that wasn’t the point of the post and I’m not going to call those people out 
Which one are you looking into?
1 Like
Can’t believe I’m this late to the thread. 
I genuinely believe one of the coolest things about working here is that I get to help people learn Japanese. After all, learning Japanese helped change my life, it might just change yours too. 
Thank you everyone who has ever reached out to any capacity, even if we don’t reply immediately or it takes us a few tries to get there, we do read everything.
We’ll keep working hard to keep winning that trust every day. 
6 Likes
I mostly make a mental note/keep a list on my phone. It’s good to see different people’s opinions on things.
So if I feel like something isn’t working for me I’ll go check on the list and see if something will help.
Right now I feel like I got plenty of resources and shouldn’t be buying anything more. Other then that Japanese easy news app in a few months.
That seems like a good resource to have eventually.
These are fair concerns, and generally speaking, I agree with you. Regarding BunPro in particular, though, I no longer have these concerns anymore:
When they introduced vocab, I was concerned about this potential mission creep as well, and I believe I even mentioned my concern in a comment somewhere.
However, a few things have occurred since then that have reassured me that the BP team is (at least currently; mission creep is always a potential problem) is on the right track and has their priorities in pretty good shape for the foreseeable future.
In order of me remembering them off the top of my head:
- I ended up just straight-up trying out the vocab feature.
- It has its flaws and issues, but it is still technically in Beta, and they have responded that they will address the (so far minor) issues more in the future, after they tackle some bigger issues/features for the grammar features and the general website. So, I can’t really fault them for it being in a Beta state.
- More importantly – and speaking of doing one thing simply, getting bang for buck – the vocab feature does actually work quite well. Certainly well enough for my purposes. And it basically just does that one thing – being an SRS for learning JLPT-level vocab items – and it doesn’t really interfere with the grammar feature, in my experience. You can do as little or as much vocab as you want; or as little or as much grammar as you want. Don’t want to use vocab, don’t have to. It’s not an over-blown feature, just a simple, straightforward vocab SRS.
- They clearly used the implementation of the vocab feature as a ‘use case’ for developing their Decks feature.
- Not only is this a sign (in my eyes at least, as a former software developer myself) of a fairly mature software development process, which bodes well for the continued future improvements of the site/tool, but also…
- The Decks feature is also a clear improvement on the previous (and still the current default, if you’re not opted-in to using the Beta) Paths feature. The Paths feature, while it does its job, and does it fairly well, is a bit clunky to use sometimes, and also is a bit inflexible in terms of being ‘future proof’ for implementing new features and improvements to the grammar features.
- So, in other words, although on the surface it may appear that adding a vocab feature ‘shifts focus away’ from the core feature of the website – which obviously is grammar – in my estimation it has actually aided them in making the grammar feature more flexible and a bit easier to use, via the development of the Decks feature, which the vocab feature uses directly.
- In other other words: To make the grammar app more flexible and easier to use, they needed to upgrade the Paths feature to the new Decks feature. And they used the ‘use case’ of Vocab Decks as a prototype/working-project in order to develop Decks. Now that they’ve done this, improving the grammar app became easier. And indeed the new Reviews 2.0 features (which admittedly I haven’t tried yet) seem to have been made possible by doing this under-the-hood development (of Decks and whatnot).
-
Sigh. I keep writing things much longer than they need to be.
TL;DR: They actually used the development of Vocab to improve the development of Grammar. So it’s not really an either-or situation. The whole app/site is better off now, not just the vocab feature.
- They actually listened to feedback and concerns over mission creep and the lack of information around what they were working on. Now they regularly post on the forums about not just what they’ve completed and released, but also what they are currently working on and, crucially, a general time-frame of when they intend to release new updates/features.
- They actually followed-through with their announced planned updates/features and have been steadily releasing various improvements to the site/app.
- In particular, they’ve definitely made improvements to the grammar features. Not just adding on more and more features (classic mission creep), but improving and refining their core feature: grammar.
I could probably go on, but that’s plenty long already. Long story short: I was also worried about mission creep, but the BunPro team proved my worries wrong, and I’m genuinely impressed with how far they’ve come, and how responsive they are to feedback.
I no longer worry that vocab is an out-of-place feature. In fact, I can foresee many ways that it could be more-or-less seamlessly integrated with the grammar feature(s), supplementing the learning of grammar by supporting it with the learning of relevant vocab along the way.
Example review sentence has a word you haven’t learned yet? Want to learn it? I can foresee that it will be (relatively) easy for them to have an “Add this word to your vocab reviews” button or whatever.
Or: Studying some vocab? Not sure how this vocab word ‘fits in to’ the Japanese language? I can foresee that they could possibly implement a “Find grammar/sentences which use this vocab” button, or something along those lines.
Either way, I’m confident that they will seek out our feedback on such feature ideas before they implement them, and will incorporate our feedback into their plans/priorities, and will also keep us up to date on those future plans and priorities, and furthermore listen to our feedback about those plans and priorities, too.
BunPro: They’re not perfect, but they’re certainly heading in that direction, IMHO!
11 Likes
Bunpro instills in my consistency.
Just 2 lessons a day is enough for me.
Bunpro gives them to me in organized way, step by step, level by level. With good explanations and examples to top.
I’m glad I’ve returned to bunpro last year.
Now I can steadily progress my grammar knowledge and one day I’ll conquer the N1.
Thank you guys!
5 Likes
Thanks for this thoughtful response.
— Dave
4 Likes
Had a bad time with textfugu and etoeto eh. I’m in the same boat tho. I bought textfugu lifetime sub instead of wanikani which I still regret.
Your Mileage May Vary (It means like … “it depends on the person”. Like one person can use a product and do really well with it, and others can have a … different … experience.)
Don’t forget about their forever refund. You’ll get back your $120. Just send them an email.
I’m in the same slow and steady camp. I schedule my reviews so I don’t have more than 50 grammar reviews in a day, which sometimes requires guessing how many reviews I might fail today and tomorrow, and no more than 10 grammar points in the beginner stage.
2 Likes
I agree.
I went premium for a while, but I eventually stopped using the platform because the SRS experience was not enjoyable for me. Every now and then I entered to check the site, and I was surprised that there was always something new.
It wasn’t until now that I created a new account just to see if there was something worth of my money and I found that the reviewing section was finally usable. I will gladly go premium again after all these new changes!
I’m taking the N1 test on July and I’m excited to have this brand new Bunpro as one of my main prep tools.
Kudos to the whole staff!
5 Likes