Can I get Japanese characters to display properly using IE6?

[leoblob]

If so, how???

[Kenn]

Right-click in the IE window, choose "Encoding" and select Japanese. It may prompt you to install one of the language packs that comes with the Windows CD, but I imagine you can point it to your \i386 directory if it asks. Good luck!

[MadeInJapan]

Make sure you choose "Auto Select" in your encoding option. There are a few other Japanese fonts, such as "Shift JIS" and EUC. More recently, there is also Unicode (UTF-8 ) for Asian languages in general. Also, if you want Word to dispay Japanese characters you'll have to install this from the Office Installation disc or Windows setup, depending on which Windows you're using. If running Win98, you can download these language packs in Windows Update that will automatically enable this in your Office documents. This is very handy if you want to "cut and paste" from the web to a document for future reference.

Once you get everything working, you can test my school's web page to see if it displays correctly:
www.tmghs.net

[leoblob]

Right-click in the IE window, choose "Encoding" and select Japanese. It may prompt you to install one of the language packs that comes with the Windows CD, but I imagine you can point it to your \i386 directory if it asks. Good luck!

Thanks for the suggestions! I tried this (above), but I don't have Japanese as an option. Also, I don't have an \i386 directory. I suspect my lack of these items is due to the fact that I am running WIN98SE...??

I also tried selecting Unicode UTF-8 as the text encoding... no luck (the screen changes around some, but the Japanese characters are still not readable). When I use Autoselect, it picks "Western European (Windows)" every time, even when I'm on a Japanese-language site.

Maybe my downloading of the WIN98 language pack will give me a better chance ???

EDIT: I just went on Microsoft's site, and there is a download for Japanese Menus and Dialog Boxes... but it requires "Japanese Language Support." I don't see any download for Japanese Language Support (but I do see downloadable support for other languages..?? )

[leoblob]

I GOT IT!!!

What a battle! After a number of various failed attempts, I ended up copying my IE6 CD into a temp directory on my hard drive, removed the "read only" attribute from the files, ran IE6 setup from that temp directory, selected the two components it showed for Japanese, downloaded the files (half hour on dial-up), and it worked!

The suggestions you guys gave me was just enough to help me figure out things to try.

MadeInJapan, I went on your site and it appears to display perfectly.

[MadeInJapan]

Very good! If there's a will there's a way! You should be able to read the Japanese in Word and other Office applications now too!

Just curious, why do you need Japanese? An interest or needed for work or school? If you are a young guy, under 20, we have a special educational programs for non-Japanese nationals...check out the English link on the page I mentioned in my earlier post.

...And yes, you would not have the I386 folder as you are not running Win2K or WinXP. I noticed Win98 as I was posting, so I mentioned the language packs in the Windows Update. It is really a nice feature the IME.

[leoblob]

I was doing some research for a paper I'm writing (for work), and I ended up at M a t s u s h i t a's home site (Japan), and I thought, there's gotta be a way I can get this to display properly.

Also, I've always been very interested in Japanese culture, people, etc., went to Japan in 94, stayed with some non-English speaking Japanese friends, quite an experience! My Japanese is VERY rusty now, but maybe I can refresh my reading skills a bit.

This IME absolutely blows me away! I suppose this technology has been around for a while, but to me, it's still incredible. Since I am 32 years beyond 20 years old, I remember clearly the days when computers were unbelievably primitive.

... and I can read your signature now!

[MadeInJapan]

For Knowing Eyes Only....LOL