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on http://www.smspower.org/db/champion_kendou-sg-jp.shtml and on the front page you transcribe the name as "kendou" (since that's the way it'd be written in hiragana), but using diacritcs ("kendô" or more preferably "kendō") or just vowel doubling ("kendoo") it'd be phonetically more accurate

(I still guess your japanese is better than mine though, heh)

see also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hepburn_romanization#Variations

bye,
clem

You are right.
I shall consider switching to ô or ō (don't know how to type the macro, it's pasted) for my romanization. I'll address that later.

Quote

Variations

Variations of the Hepburn system indicate the long vowels ō and ū as follows:

* Tōkyō: indicated with macrons. This follows the rules of the traditional and revised Hepburn systems, and is considered to be standard.
* Tokyo: not indicated at all. This is common for Japanese words that have been adopted into English. This is also the convention used in the de facto Hepburn used in signs and other English-language information around Japan, mentioned in the paragraph on legal status.
* Tôkyô: indicated with circumflexes. Circumflexes are how long vowels are indicated by the alternative Nihon-shiki and Kunrei-shiki romanizations. Circumflexes are often used when a word processor does not allow macrons. With the spread of Unicode, this is becoming rare.
* Tohkyoh: indicated with an "h". This is sometimes known as "passport Hepburn", as the Japanese Foreign Ministry has authorized (but not required) this usage in passports. [1]
* Toukyou: written using kana spelling: ō as ou or oo (depending on the kana) and ū as uu. This is sometimes called wāpuro style, as this is how text is entered into a Japanese word processor (wādo purosessā) using a keyboard with Roman characters. This is not recognized as standard and is almost exclusively found in amateur romanization. Nevertheless, this method most accurately represents the way that vowels are written in kana, differentiating between おう (as in とうきょう (東京), written Toukyou in this system) and おお (as in とおい (遠い), written tooi in this system).
* Tookyoo: written by doubling the long vowels. This follows the rules of the modified Hepburn system, but is also common when writing words of foreign origin without reference to any particular system, i.e. paatii for パーティー ("party") instead of pātī. This is also used in the JSL form of romanization.

Some linguists object to Hepburn, as the pronunciation-based spellings can obscure the systematic origins of Japanese phonetic structures, inflections, and conjugations. Supporters argue that Hepburn is not intended as a linguistic tool.

I've spent a lot of time typing in Hànyǔ Pīnyīn and it's a nightmare; in Word you can set up keyboard shortcuts like Ctrl+-, O for ō (look in the Symbol dialog), but you have to set them up separately for all characters. For it to work in all programs, it would require some funky keyboard macro software that I'm not bothered to mess with; AutoHotkey is a scriptable hotkey program that I'd probably look at first.

for longer texts the safest way is probably to write "ô" throughout, then at the end do a global search and replace for "ô" to "ō" - just make sure you do it case-sensitive

Author	Message
clem Guest	A note on transcription of japanese titles Posted: Tue Mar 28, 2006 9:40 am
clem Guest	on http://www.smspower.org/db/champion_kendou-sg-jp.shtml and on the front page you transcribe the name as "kendou" (since that's the way it'd be written in hiragana), but using diacritcs ("kendô" or more preferably "kendō") or just vowel doubling ("kendoo") it'd be phonetically more accurate (I still guess your japanese is better than mine though, heh) see also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hepburn_romanization#Variations bye, clem

Bock Site Admin Joined: 08 Jul 2001 Posts: 8649 Location: Paris, France	Posted: Tue Mar 28, 2006 10:43 am
	You are right. I shall consider switching to ô or ō (don't know how to type the macro, it's pasted) for my romanization. I'll address that later. Quote Variations Variations of the Hepburn system indicate the long vowels ō and ū as follows: * Tōkyō: indicated with macrons. This follows the rules of the traditional and revised Hepburn systems, and is considered to be standard. * Tokyo: not indicated at all. This is common for Japanese words that have been adopted into English. This is also the convention used in the de facto Hepburn used in signs and other English-language information around Japan, mentioned in the paragraph on legal status. * Tôkyô: indicated with circumflexes. Circumflexes are how long vowels are indicated by the alternative Nihon-shiki and Kunrei-shiki romanizations. Circumflexes are often used when a word processor does not allow macrons. With the spread of Unicode, this is becoming rare. * Tohkyoh: indicated with an "h". This is sometimes known as "passport Hepburn", as the Japanese Foreign Ministry has authorized (but not required) this usage in passports. [1] * Toukyou: written using kana spelling: ō as ou or oo (depending on the kana) and ū as uu. This is sometimes called wāpuro style, as this is how text is entered into a Japanese word processor (wādo purosessā) using a keyboard with Roman characters. This is not recognized as standard and is almost exclusively found in amateur romanization. Nevertheless, this method most accurately represents the way that vowels are written in kana, differentiating between おう (as in とうきょう (東京), written Toukyou in this system) and おお (as in とおい (遠い), written tooi in this system). * Tookyoo: written by doubling the long vowels. This follows the rules of the modified Hepburn system, but is also common when writing words of foreign origin without reference to any particular system, i.e. paatii for パーティー ("party") instead of pātī. This is also used in the JSL form of romanization. Some linguists object to Hepburn, as the pronunciation-based spellings can obscure the systematic origins of Japanese phonetic structures, inflections, and conjugations. Supporters argue that Hepburn is not intended as a linguistic tool.

Maxim Site Admin Joined: 19 Oct 1999 Posts: 14740 Location: London	Posted: Tue Mar 28, 2006 11:19 am
	I've spent a lot of time typing in Hànyǔ Pīnyīn and it's a nightmare; in Word you can set up keyboard shortcuts like Ctrl+-, O for ō (look in the Symbol dialog), but you have to set them up separately for all characters. For it to work in all programs, it would require some funky keyboard macro software that I'm not bothered to mess with; AutoHotkey is a scriptable hotkey program that I'd probably look at first.

clem Guest	Posted: Tue Mar 28, 2006 8:28 pm
clem Guest	for longer texts the safest way is probably to write "ô" throughout, then at the end do a global search and replace for "ô" to "ō" - just make sure you do it case-sensitive

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