Microsoft PowerPoint doesn’t natively support furigana (ruby) notation for Japanese text. Teachers in particular suffer from this, having to create separate little textboxes and manually position them above the kanji. But what if someone were to create a workaround?
The problem
Word supports furigana, but PowerPoint does not. And PowerPoint is exactly where the teachers want to use furigana, because it features heavily in lesson content.
The way users normally address this is incredibly tedious: create separate textboxes for every bit of furigana, and carefully position them above the kanji.
The solution
I propose making a Microsoft Office add-in that would streamline this process: auto-generate suggested readings, create and position textboxes automatically, and let the user manage them as a single group.
Advice and feedback from users would be very helpful for developing this software!
*Update:
Beta released: https://sourceforge.net/projects/furigana-for-powerpoint/
Submitted by: OTAKI Yu (write-up & prototyping: Ilia Leikin)
Hashtags: #Furigana #JapaneseTeaching #PowerPoint
Looking for: advice from real-world users
I can: create the software
Status: prototyping in progress
