Transfer Existing Notes

Overview¶

This section is dedicated to explaining how you can change other Anki cards into this note format.

Note

If you are simply importing old JPMN notes, updating JPMN will properly update all the notes in place. See this section instead.

Introduction¶

Unfortunately, there are so many card formats out there that it would be impossible to cover how to import from every format with detailed rigor. Instead, this section will give you some general tips on operations that will likely be common across most or all formats, as well as present a small example for Anime Cards.

Additionally, although you maybe able to import most of the card, it is unlikely that you will have complete 100% full functionality after importing the notes.

Prerequisites¶

Before doing anything that affects your Anki collection in a major way (for example, basically everything on this page), please make a complete backup of your collection.

Note

Transferring your previous notes shouldn't change your media files at all. However I recommend exporting with media just in case, so long as you have the disk space for it.

Anki¶

Anki provides a feature to switch between note types, without affecting scheduling information. To do this, follow the proceeding steps:

Head to the Card Browser window:

Main Window → Browse
Select all the cards that you want to switch.

Tip

Ctrl+A selects all cards in the browser.
Right click the selection → Notes → Change Note Type...

Mapping Fields¶

Here is where I can't give specific advice, as every note is different. However, here are a few tips:

Map Word to Key and Word.

Your card likely doesn't have a separate Key and Word field, and instead only contains one Word field. To import this correctly into JPMN, make sure JPMN's Key and Word field are exactly your old card's Word field.
The WordReading field should ideally be a simplified furigana format. For example, if the word is 成り立つ, this field should be 「成[な]り立[た]つ」. If you do not have any field that resembles this, use the kana reading (なりたつ) or true furigana (成なり立たつ), and continue with the steps below.
Leave AJTWordPitch and SentenceReading empty.

These fields can be empty as AJT Japanese can batch generate both word pitches and sentence furigana.
You may have some word pitch fields already in your card. Pitch accent graphs should be mapped to PAGraphs, and pitch accent positions should be mapped to PAPositions.
FrequencySort maps to the frequency value used to sort by frequency, which works exactly the same as Marv's Frequency field as documented in Marv's Resources page.
If you have a field that stores the source of the media, I recommend mapping that to AdditionalNotes or Comment.
I recommend not setting FrequenciesStylized to anything, even if you have a field for frequency lists¹.
When in doubt, look at the format in the example notes.

An example with Anime cards is shown below.

Example for Anime Cards (click here)

jp-mining-note fields	Anime Cards Fields
Key	front
Word	front
WordReading	Reading
PAOverride
PAOverrideText
AJTWordPitch
PrimaryDefinition	Glossary
PrimaryDefinitionPicture
Sentence	Sentence
SentenceReading
AltDisplayWord
AltDisplaySentence
AltDisplayPASentenceCard
AltDisplayAudioCard
AdditionalNotes
Hint
HintNotHidden	Hint
IsSentenceCard
IsTargetedSentenceCard
IsClickCard
IsHoverCard
IsHintCard
IsSentenceFirstCard
IsAudioCard
PAShowInfo
PATestOnlyWord
PADoNotTest
PASeparateWordCard
PASeparateSentenceCard
SeparateAudioCard
SeparateSentenceAudioCard
Picture	Picture
WordAudio	Audio
SentenceAudio	SentenceAudio
PAGraphs	Graph
PAPositions
FrequenciesStylized
FrequencySort
PASilence
WordReadingHiragana
YomichanWordTags
SecondaryDefinition
ExtraDefinitions
UtilityDictionaries
CardCache
Comment

Note

Anything not specified should be set to (Nothing)

Batch Editing¶

After switching your notes, you will have to do the following few steps:

1. Correctly Formatting `Sentence` Field¶

If your sentence fields have been highlighted in a way that isn't using , then it will be incompatable with JPMN by default.

To see what the formatting of the sentence is, view the raw HTML of the Sentence field.

Sentences are usually formatted in one of three ways, as shown below:

(1) Highlighted with (2) Nothing is highlighted(3) Highlighted, but not with 

If the tested content is highlighted with , then it is already formatted correctly. You can skip this step.

Example:

今日も、なんか、昼<b>爆睡</b>してしまったんので…

The note comes with a feature to automatically highlight the word within the sentence. However, this is an imperfect solution, and there is currently no easy way to add accurate highlighting to existing sentences.

As there is nothing to do, you can skip this step.

Example:

今日も、なんか、昼爆睡してしまったんので…

If the tested content is highlighted with something that isn't , then continue with the following instructions to change it.

Example:

今日も、なんか、昼<span style="color: #ffc2c7">爆睡</span>してしまったんので…

Instructions to port formatted sentences (click here)

Note

You may want to make another backup before doing the following, just in case.

Determine how the sentence is formatted.

We will be using the above for this example. This example highlights the word using a  with a custom color.
```
今日も、なんか、昼爆睡してしまったんので…
```
The above is created from the following Yomitan fields:
```
{cloze-prefix}{cloze-body}{cloze-suffix}
```
Testing the Conversion.

In the Anki card viewer, select only one of your old notes.

Afterwards, right click the selection, and head over to:

Notes → Find and Replace...

Setting the fields.

Set the Find field to something that can find your highlighted content. We will use the above as an example.

It is extremely likely that you will have to change the Find field according to your note's sentence format.

Field name	Value
Find:	`<span style="color: #ffc2c7">(?P<t>.*?)</span>`
Replace With:	`<b>$t</b>`
In:	`Sentence`
Selected notes only	Checked ()
Ignore case	Unchecked ()
Treat input as a regular expression	Checked ()

Example image (click here)

Verify.

Press Ok, and then preview the card.

If the highlight is yellow (or blue on light mode), then it it was successful! Repeat steps 2 and 3, except select all of the affected notes instead of just one.

If it was not successful, you likely have to adjust the Find field. See here to see Anki's official documentation on regex.

2. Cleanup Other Fields¶

^{New in version 0.12.0.0 (latest version: 0.12.0.0-prerelease-19)}

Run the following batch command:

cleanup

Expected this batch command to take quite a bit of time, especially on collections containing many thousands of cards. This is because the batch command does quite a bit behind the scenes:

Corrects WordReading if it is ruby text or regular text.
Backfills WordReadingHiragana.
Backfills PASilence.
Moves extra pictures in the Picture field into the PrimaryDefinitionPicture field.
- Note that this requires beautifulsoup4 installed (pip install beautifulsoup4). This is installed by default on Anki, so this will be properly ran if the batch command was ran with JPMN Manager.
Moves extra audio in the WordAudio field into the SentenceAudio field.

3. Batch Generate Pitch Accents and Sentence Furigana (optional)¶

This step requires the AJT Japanese addon to be correctly setup. Although this step is technically optional, pitch accents likely won't show for imported cards if you had nothing to import into PAPositions. In that case, this step is highly recommended.

See here on how to backfill pitch accents and sentence furigana.

4. Backfill the `FrequencySort` Field (optional)¶

See here if you want to backfill the FrequencySort field.

Conclusion¶

If everything went smoothly, then you have successfully transferred your notes to the JPMN template. Enjoy reviewing your old cards with a new template!

Legacy Instructions¶

Most steps have now been combined all into the one cleanup batch command. The legacy instructions for dealing with those steps individually are recorded below just in case.

Legacy instructions: Batch Set PASilence Field

This will ensure all PASilence are filled correctly. See here to understand what this field does. This can be done with a batch command, or manually within Anki itself.

Batch CommandWithin Anki

set_pasilence_field

Head to the Card Browser window.
Right click a card, and then head to:

Notes → Find and Replace...
Set the fields to the following:

Field name	Value
Find:	`.*`
Replace With:	`[sound:_silence.wav]`
In:	`PASilence` ^{(IMPORTANT! Do not forget this field!)}
Selected notes only	Unchecked ()
Ignore case	Unchecked ()
Treat input as a regular expression	Checked ()

??? example "Example image <small>(click here)</small>"
    <figure markdown>
    [![The above table in Anki](assets/importing/bulk_add_silencewav.png)](assets/importing/bulk_add_silencewav.png)
    </figure>

Legacy instructions: Correctly Formatting WordReading Field

Your WordReading field is likely formatted in one of three ways:

Furigana (plain)FuriganaKana only

This is generated with the {furigana-plain} helper.

Example: 成[な]り立[た]つ

If your WordReading field is formatted this way, then the WordReading field is already formatted correctly. You can skip this step.

This is generated with the {furigana} helper.

Example: 成なり立たつ (HTML: <ruby>成<rt>な</rt></ruby>り<ruby>立<rt>た</rt></ruby>つ)

If your WordReading field is formatted this way, it would be ideal to convert this into plain furigana so the note can properly parse the field.

Instructions for converting furigana into plain furigana (click here)

Head to the Card Browser window.
Right click a card, and then head to:

Notes → Find and Replace...
Set the fields to the following:

Field name	Value
Find:	`<ruby>(<rb>)?(?P<kanji>.?)(</rb>)?<rt>(?P<furigana>.?)</rt></ruby>`
Replace With:	`$kanji[$furigana]` ^{(Keep the whitespace at the beginning!)}
In:	`WordReading`
Selected notes only	Unchecked ()
Ignore case	Unchecked ()
Treat input as a regular expression	Checked ()

This is generated with the {reading} helper.

Example: なりたつ

This means that your old cards only have a kana reading. It would be ideal to have the WordReading as the kanji word with furigana. You likely want the kanji word with the furigana, so the kanjis actually show in the proper places. Some examples include the kanji hover tooltip as well as to the left of the picture field.

Instructions for converting kana readings into (plain) furigana (click here)

The solution provided below is imperfect, but passable. This will format all of the WordReading fields to be Word[WordReading], which means kana will repeated. For example, a card with Word as 成り立つ, and WordReading as なりたつ, will turn into: 成り立つなりたつ

To do this, run the following batch command:

quick_fix_convert_kana_only_reading_all_notes

The above will affect ALL notes. If you instead want to affect certain notes, add the kanaonlyreading tag to all affected notes, and then run the following batch command:

quick_fix_convert_kana_only_reading_with_tag

Legacy instructions: Batch set WordReadingHiragana Field

The following automatically fills out the WordReadingHiragana field.

Filling out the WordReadingHiragana field is optional but highly recommended. This will enable the usage of Word Indicators on existing cards.

To do this, run the following batch command:

fill_word_reading_hiragana_field

FrequenciesStylized uses a custom set of handlebars to store the frequency info in a way that css styles can be easily applied without javascript. This differs heavily from the {frequencies} helper provided by Yomitan. Mapping an existing field that stores frequencies using {frequencies} to FrequenciesStylized will result in incorrect display of data.

There is currently no convenience function to convert it to the proper format.

Additionally, auto-generating frequency info (with the correct css, html, etc.) from arbitrary frequency lists does not seem trivial, and I currently provide no way of doing that (primarily because I'm not sure how to do it in the first place). If you know of a way or would like to help me out with doing this, please let me know! ↩

Last update: May 17, 2024

Transfer Existing Notes

Overview¶

Introduction¶

Prerequisites¶

Anki¶

Mapping Fields¶

Batch Editing¶

1. Correctly Formatting Sentence Field¶

2. Cleanup Other Fields¶

3. Batch Generate Pitch Accents and Sentence Furigana (optional)¶

4. Backfill the FrequencySort Field (optional)¶

Conclusion¶

Legacy Instructions¶

1. Correctly Formatting `Sentence` Field¶

4. Backfill the `FrequencySort` Field (optional)¶