ankimini (languague learning) pre packages - beta testers wanted
 

Hello,

if you are learning a language, you may have come across Anki (http://ichi2.net/anki/), a powerful spaced repetition learning system which I really can recommend from my own experience. It has a nice software (Win/Linux/Mac), and an online learning site with sync capabilities.

There is also a mini version called ankimini, which provides a small web server which lets you learn offline from within the browser.

I tried packaging it for maemo, and the result is here:
http://user.cs.tu-berlin.de/~sayer/anki/

Pre-made decks can be found here:
http://ichi2.net/anki/wiki/ExtraDecks

This was built in diablo (latest OS); if python2.5 is available for
chinook it may work there as well.

To use them you need to install all .deb files from the above link:
python-simplejson, python-sqlalchemy (if you don't have these already; I have not found them nowhere packaged on the web), anki (which is libanki), and ankimini. Then you copy your deck to mydeck.anki in the home folder (MyDocs), and run ankimini, which can be found in the Extras menu. It starts an xterm window with the server, and a little later the browser for the display.

For setting the sync account or deck name, edit ~/.ankimini-config.py
(e.g. start Utilities|X Terminal, then type vi .ankimini-config.py, I
for insert, edit the name, Esc, :x)

I would be happy if any IT users could try the packages and give
feedback whether they work.

The packages were built with pypackager, .pypackager files can be found in the src dir. Somehow I don't understand setuptools; there is a bdist_maemo command, but it needs to be told the scripts and files to package explicitely (?). So I used the bdist_dumb, then extracted the resulting archive, and used that as input for pypackager.

Next step is obviously to do proper config menu, a hildon/GTK frontend etc for libanki - but for me lazy guy ankimini is already pretty cool!

Regards
Stefan

Re: ankimini (languague learning) pre packages - beta testers wanted
 

Maemo port of anki(mini) now got a home on garage:
https://garage.maemo.org/projects/anki

Re: ankimini (languague learning) pre packages - beta testers wanted
 

Thank you!!!

I've tried it and it works pretty well.

Re: ankimini (languague learning) pre packages - beta testers wanted
 

This looks interesting, just when I'm trying to learn Japanese too. I'm going give this a shot. Thanks!

Re: ankimini (languague learning) pre packages - beta testers wanted
 

How exactly is this used. I clicked on ankimini in the Applications Menu, it opens X Terminal, does some stuff and closes, then opens the Web browser. I currently don't have an available wireless network so I don't know what page is trying to load. Is an internet connection required to run the program?

Re: ankimini (languague learning) pre packages - beta testers wanted
 

Update:

I have a wireless signal now. No page loads in the browswer. It says...
---------------------------
Unable to connect to server

localhost:8000
- Site may currently be busy or unavailable
- Device may not be connected to the internet (* I know this isn't the case for me)
-----------------------------

There is no valid URL in the address bar, it just says http://localhost:8000/


The message I get in Xterm is...
-----------------
Open loadopt file: Permission denied.
-----------------
I tried to take a screenshot of the rest of the Xterm message, but it closes way to fast to be able to capture or read it.

I have an N810
OS Version: 5.2008.43-7

Re: ankimini (languague learning) pre packages - beta testers wanted
 

No, it works without an internet connection. But you need to have a deck stored in your home directory before X-Terminal can load it up. Like Stefan says, you can download a pre-made deck at

http://ichi2.net/anki/wiki/ExtraDecks

just save one of the files, and ankimini will load it up in the browser offline. You may want to create your own decks in time.
You just need to register at http://ichi2.net/anki/
download the full-featured program which allows you to create your own cards then save them in your N810.

You can also do this online, without downloading the software.

Re: ankimini (languague learning) pre packages - beta testers wanted
 

Silly me, I must have skimmed over that part. I had downloaded some decks but thought they'd be loaded manually when the app is run. It seems be running now. At first it looked like it got as far as the browser, then stopped.

Re: ankimini (languague learning) pre packages - beta testers wanted
 

You have to rename your own or downloaded deck to mydeck.anki, then you have to copy this file in the /home/user/MyDocs/ directory of your n800/810.

Re: ankimini (languague learning) pre packages - beta testers wanted
 

Hi,

you can also edit ~/.ankimini-config.py and set the deck's name there.

Stefan

Re: ankimini (languague learning) pre packages - beta testers wanted
 

I hacked up a maemo gtk frontend for libanki with (until now) the same functionality as ankimini. It's partly hildonized, and it is called ankimaemi. All is working, except images (which I am not sure whether they work in ankimini either) :) and it is a lot snappier than ankimini. For now it is using gtkhtml2 for rendering the cards' contents.

Packages for OS2008 are available here:
https://garage.maemo.org/projects/anki

python-gtkhtml2 can be found in extras-devel repo.

The source (in pypackager layout) can be found here:
git://github.com/sanchi/ankimaemi.git

I think there is a lot of potential in it for Internet Tablet or other
mobile internet devices - for example there could be a checkbox 'available for chat with language tandem' which could open chat/VoIP call/VoIP conference/video call if someone else who fits. Or, adding example sentence spoken by native speaker to a
public deck on the 'net could be really simple.

Stefan