Setting up Japanese input IME (日本語入力方法) on Fedora 20 Linux under the Gnome 3 environment is quick and easy, and can even be done during the initial setup process. It is the same method as the previous Fedora 19 release.

This quick tutorial will show you how to set up Japanese input.

Japanese IME Setup Procedure

To start, open Activities from the Top Panel.

In the Search Box, type Region & Language and select Region & Language.

On the Input Sources section of the Settings screen, press the + in the lower left corner to add a new keyboard input source.

On the Add an Input Source screen, select Japanese.

On the next Add an Input Source screen, select Japanese (Kana Kanji).

Press Add.

Close the Region & Language menu.

You should now have the input language menu in the top bar. The en displayed means English keyboard.

Press it and select Japanese (Kana Kanji) to change to Japanese Input.

The en should have changed to a katakana あ to indicate Japanese input.

That’s it. You can now type in Japanese.

Press the katakana あ in the top bar while in Japanese input mode to toggle between various input modes and typing methods.

For previous versions of Fedora, refer to:

• Fedora 19 (Gnome 3)
• Fedora 18 (Gnome 3)

This tutorial will show you how to install Japanese input IME (日本語入力方法) in Linux Mint 16 under the Cinnamon desktop environment. Japanese IME is required to be able to type in Japanese. It is pretty easy to get working, so let’s start.

Click on the Mint Menu and select Software Manager from the left menu.

In the Enter your password to perform administrative tasks dialog box, enter your system password and press OK.

In the Software Manager, search for ibus.

Select ibus by double clicking it.

Click Install.

Software Manager will now download and install IBus in the background.

While IBus is installing, search for anthy.

Select ibus-anthy by double clicking it and click Install.

Software Manager will now download and install ibus-anthy in the background.

When the activity bar on the bottom shows 0 ongoing actions, installation is complete.

Close Software Manager.

From the Mint Menu, select to System Settings – Control Center.

Open Languages.

If you get the dialog box that says The language support is not installed completely, select Install to install them now.

In the Authenticate dialog box, enter your system password and press Authenticate.

On the Language tab of the Language Support screen, select Install / Remove Languages….

Scroll down and check Japanese, and then press Apply Changes.

The Applying changes popup screen will display. Wait for it to finish applying changes. It may take a few minutes.

On the the same screen, press the Keyboard input method system: drop down and select IBus.

Then press Close.

Log out of the desktop and log back in for the changes to take effect.

After logging back in, you should now see the IBus keyboard icon in the bottom tray.

Right click the IBus keyboard icon and select Preferences.

On the IBus Preferences screen, go to the Input Method tab.

Select the Customize active input methods check box.

Press the Select an input method dropdown and select Japanese → Anthy.

Press Add on the IBus Preferences screen to add the Anthy Japanese input method.

Press Close to exit the IBus Preferences screen.

Now when you click the IBus keyboard input method icon you can select Anthy.

Anthy is now activated. The IBus icon will now change to the Anthy Aち icon, indicating that you can type in Japanese.

That’s all there is to it. Now you can type in 日本語.

Note: Sometimes the input method reverts back to English if you are changing back and forth between windows and applications. Just toggle back to Anthy if this happens by using the IBus keyboard input method icon again.