Greetings, I've attached the manual (the same one on the website) to this message. The formatting may not be so pretty, but all of the content is there.
Cheers, Patrick --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "mnemosyne-proj-users" group. To post to this group, send email to mnemosyne-proj-users@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to mnemosyne-proj-users+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/mnemosyne-proj-users?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---Title: Documentation
Documentation
Installing for the first time and upgrading from previous versions
Mnemosyne runs on Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X.
Upgrading Mnemosyne
We recommend that Windows users uninstall any old versions of Mnemosyne before installing a new version (this will keep your revision data intact.)
Installation on Windows
A standard binary executable (.exe) is provided for Windows users.
Installation on Mac OS X
A standard disk image (.dmg) is provided for Mac users. Mnemosyne for Mac currently only supports Intel Macs (those sold from 2006- on).
Download Mnemosyne for Intel Macs here.PowerPC Mac users can consult this guide to compiling the dependencies for Mnemosyne on Mac OS X.
Installation on Linux
Install the following dependencies:
- Python 2.4 or later
- Qt 3.x and PyQt 3.x
- PyXML
- pygame and its dependencies
- If you want to be able to enter formulas using latex syntax, make sure that LaTeX and dvipng are installed.
- Type 'python setup.py install' as root.
- Run the application by typing 'mnemosyne'.
Note: in order to install these packages easily on Debian based systems, i.e. Ubuntu, Knopix, Debian, etc., enable the downloading of non-free software via the etc/apt/sources.list configuration file. See http://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/debian-tutorial/ch-dpkg.html for more details.
Hacking on Mnemosyne
If you want to contribute to Mnemosyne or want to make any local changes, you will additionally need the following tools:
- Qt-Designer: Useful to modify the .ui xml-files.
- pyuic: required to convert the .ui files to python code.
If you check out the source from subversion, you have to install it by typing 'make' rather than 'python setup.py install'
Compiling Dependencies for Mnemosyne 1.0.x on Mac OS X 10.4 and 10.5
Since it can get a little difficult, here we will list the steps to compile Mnemosyne on Mac OS X.
We're looking for someone to help us build a standalone installer; if you can be of assistance, please contact us.
Compiling yourself -the steps
- Install Apple's Developer tools. The Developer tools can be found on any OS X system install disk, or downloaded from the Apple Developer Connection (free registration required).
- Install Python 2.4.
- Download qt-mac-free-3.3.8.tar.gz from Trolltech. Leopard users will need to apply this patch.
- Install SIP.
- Install PyQt3 for Mac.
- Install PyXML, PyGame, and PyObjC.
- Install Mnemosyne.
Alternate option- Using Fink (works on 10.4 or earlier, not 10.5/Leopard)
Rich shares the following:
I've had a lot of success using Fink to install various command line tools into OS X 10.4.11, including newer Python and gcc versions than Apple provides; X11 applications have been more of a mixed bag, but the Mnemosyne install went well with just a couple of tricks.
For any who might not know, Fink is a port of the Debian packaging system to OS X.
There's a GUI, Fink Commander, which makes dealing with the thousands of packages available a little easier. The GUI isn't very Mac-like and it still helps to know a little bit about how apt-get works; the various functions in the GUI seem a little thrown together and confusing. You also need to enable use of the "unstable" repositories - lots of perfectly usable and stable programs there.
Fink puts everything it installs in its own tree under /sw so it doesn't clobber anything else you have. The tricks involve getting Mnemosyne installed and running correctly from there also.
I'm just running a G4 so all the compiling took several hours. Also, I'll note that I've read that getting X11 and Fink running correctly on Leopard currently requires some patching. I'm staying with Tiger for a little while yet.
That said, I used Fink to install the latest versions of the various Mnemosyne dependencies listed above.
Specifically, I used Fink to install from source these packages:
- python25 1.2.5.2-1
- qt3mac 3.3.8-12
- sip-py25 4.7.4-1
- pyqt-py25 3.17.4-2
- pyxml-py25 0.8.4-1
- pygame-py25 1.7.1release-1005
- pyobc-py25 1.4-2
These brought a number of their own dependencies along, which I just let Fink handle; Fink tends to handle dependencies quite intelligently, which is one of the reasons it's such a useful tool.
The first thing was to get Mnemosyne to install into /sw/bin. I had to juggle my PATH environmental variable around so /sw/bin was higher in priority than paths to other versions of Python that I have installed. You may not have to do this, depending on what you have installed on your machine. I also, as root, put this symbolic link into /sw/bin: python -> python2.5
Now, running 'python setup.py install' in the folder where I had unarchived Mnemosyne installed the program correctly into /sw/bin using Python 2.5.2.
Then I had to edit, again as root, the resulting mnemosyne file and
change the first line from
#!/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.5/Resources/Python.app/Contents/MacOS/Python
to
#!/sw/bin/python
Now I can run Mnemosyne from an Xterm window and it comes up quickly as an X11 app and functions well. The only irritant is that I have to run xclipboard to get Aqua to X11 pasting to work, but I've found that's not unusual with X11 apps on OS X. Mnemosyne does use my Latex installation, which is great.
I hope somebody else find this procedure useful; it seemed simpler to me to let Fink do most of the work than to download and compile all the dependencies separately as described in the Mnemosyne documentation.
--Rich
Alternate Option- Using Macports (Works on 10.5/Leopard)
Konrad shares the following:
I've managed to install Mnemosyne on Leopard using MacPorts, here's how:
Install the XCode development tools from the CD
Install macports from http://www.macports.org/
Usage information can be found on http://guide.macports.org/#using.port
There's an error in the repository, version 4.7.4 of py-sip cannot downloaded. To fix this, edit the port file:
$ sudo vim /opt/local/var/macports/sources/rsync.macports.org/release/ports/python/py-sip/Portfile
-> Change version to 4.7.5 from 4.7.4
-> Remove the existing checksums:
checksums md5 3bae6d0fb931fe2ddcd6f6c1da245afa \
sha1 be35863fae6a14f092cd3ce47c3ab545b9233168 \
rmd160 8682a1e5cbf0f8b42f3ebe99d4b9e0b363ce8034
-> Add the following new checksum
checksums md5 32b3f3cc1afe5e73349f89a47ea27ed2
Try to install py-pyqt3
$ sudo port install py-pyqt3
This will fail because an extra patch is needed for Leopard:
$ cd /opt/local/var/macports/build/_opt_local_var_macports_sources_rsync.macports.org_release_ports_aqua_qt3-mac/work/
$ curl 'http://fink.cvs.sourceforge.net/*checkout*/fink/dists/10.4/unstable/main/finkinfo/graphics/qt3mac.patch2' | sudo patch -p0
Try again, this time it should succeed:
$ sudo port install py-pyqt3
Install the remaining packages:
$ sudo port install py-xml py-game py-pyobjc2
This will fail, run the command again until no errors occur anymore.
Install mnemosyne using the python binary from the ports:
$ tar -xvzf mnemosyne-1.0.1.1.tgz
$ cd mnemosyne-1.0.1.1/
$ sudo /opt/local/bin/python2.4 setup.py install
The binary is now inconveniently installed as:
/opt/local/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.4/bin/mnemosyne
You can create a symlink to your ~/bin directory for convenience:
$ ln -s /opt/local/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.4/bin/mnemosyne ~/bin/mnemosyne
Enjoy!
More information can be found on this thread: http://sourceforge.net/forum/message.php?msg_id=4974125
Getting started using Mnemosyne
First, if you haven't already, you may want to read about the principles behind Mnemosyne.
The tutorial
When you start the software for the first time, a tutorial will appear explaining how to grade the cards. Please carefully read the explanations-- grading cards properly is necessary for Mnemosyne to know what you are forgetting and what you remember.
If you ever want to see the tutorial again, choose Help -> Getting Started from the menu.
What can I study with Mnemosyne?
You can use Mnemosyne to study anything. In addition to unicode text (meaning all human languages are supported), you can add pictures and sounds to cards.
How do I add cards?
You can make your flash cards however you want. One point to keep in mind, though, is that it will probably be easier on you if you limit each flashcard to one "thing" you are trying to remember.
An exception to this is foreign language study, where you have a word to memorize and you want to learn both the meaning and the pronunciation-- Mnemosyne includes a special feature for this.
For more recommendations on how to make the cards, you can read 20 Rules of Formulating Knowledge from the SuperMemo website. SuperMemo is the commercial software that inspired Mnemosyne.
Grading 101
The software will present you with a question, and your task is trying to remember the answer. Afterwards, you rate yourself on a scale between 0 and 5. These ratings will be used in computing the optimal revision schedule. Let's see what these grades mean.
Grades 0 and 1 are used if you don't know the answer yet, or if you have forgotten it. A card with grade 1 is starting to get more familiar than one with grade 0, and will be repeated less often.
The software will keep on asking you these questions until you give them a grade 2 or higher (the exact grade doesn't matter). Grade 2 basically means that you think you'll be able to remember the card for at least one or two days. It signals the transition between short and long term memory.
So now you've memorised this new card. Mnemosyne will next try to make sure that you do not forget it anymore. It will schedule the next revision of this card to some future date, when it thinks you'll still be able to remember it with some effort, without having forgotten it completely. This is the most efficient for the learning process.
If in the future Mnemosyne asks you the question too soon, and you're able to remember it without any effort, you rate the card a 5. The program will take this into account by waiting a lot longer before asking you this question again. (If you know a card really well, you may need to consistently give it a 5 the first several times. As long as you keep giving the card a 4 or 5, Mnemosyne will keep increasing the interval-- there is no limit, and cards will gradually develop a year or more between repetitions).
If Mnemosyne gets it just right, so that you remember it, albeit with some effort, you use grade 4.
If on the other hand it takes you significant effort to remember the answer, and you think the software has waited too long to ask you this question, then rate the card 3.
If you fail to remember it altogether, rate it either 0 or 1, and Mnemosyne will keep on asking you this question until you think you'll be able to remember it again for a few days.
For best results, it is suggested to do your revisions every day, although Mnemosyne will try to cope as well as possible if you postpone your revisions or if you want to learn ahead of time.
Initial grades for cards
When first entering cards, you will have to assign a grade. If you don't know the card, give it a 0 or 1. If you do know the card, give higher grades, and the higher the grade, the longer the initial interval will be.
Reviewing the cards
When you start Mnemosyne, it will automatically present you with any cards that have been scheduled for review that day (plus any cards from previous days that you missed). To do your review, simply click on Show Answer (or press enter, return or space), add a grade, and you're on to the next card.
In the bottom right corner of the Mnemosyne window are some statistics, including the total number of repetitions scheduled for the current day. To see a 7-day schedule, choose Deck -> Show Statistics from the main menu, or press CTRL+T.
For the best performance of your memory and the Mnemosyne algorithm, you should do your entire scheduled review each day. If this is not possible, it's not a major worry-- Mnemosyne will automatically postpone the cards for you. However, if you frequently miss days, your recall will suffer.
Backing up
Your Mnemosyne data represents a long-term commitment to learning. If you are serious about using Mnemosyne as a learning tool, you should frequently back up your data. Losing your Mnemosyne data after months or years of use could be tragic. Don't let it happen to you!
Backing up: cards that include media
Mnemosyne stores all of the program data in the .mnemosyne directory. If you follow the recommended procedure for media, all of your sounds and pictures will also be stored in your .mnemosyne directory. However, if you have stored them elsewhere, do not forget to back them up as well!
Backing up: Linux
The best way to backup your data is to copy the .mnemosyne directory from your home directory and move it to a different drive, burn it to a CD, or compress it and e-mail it to yourself.
Backing up: Windows
Mnemosyne stores its files in the .mnemosyne directory located at: C:\Documents and Settings\username\.mnemosyne. To back up, copy this directory and move it to a different drive, burn it to a CD, or compress it and e-mail it to yourself.
Mnemosyne's automatic backups
Mnemosyne makes automatic XML-based backups in .mnemosyne/backups. However, these contain only the contents of your cards and not the history of your learning process.
Organizing and grading cards
How to organize your cards
To make your life as easy as possible, we recommend keeping all your cards in a single file and use categories to add some structure to them. E.g., to a question 'house' in a category 'Spanish', you'll need to answer 'casa', whereas the same question in the 'French' category requires 'maison'.
To add a category, just type the name you want to use for the category in the Add cards window. If the category already exists, Mnemosyne will add the card to that category; if it is a new category, Mnemosyne will automatically create the category for you.
We also recommend that you keep all your categories active at the same time, and let Mnemosyne figure out what cards to review. Manually activating and deactivating categories can become very tedious. Keeping each category in a different file requires even more mouse clicks from your part.
Working with large numbers of new cards
By default, Mnemosyne will only show you 5 different cards you've put in grade 0 at once. This is because it does not make sense to try and memorise e.g. 100 new cards all at once.
However, you can change this number 5 by using the number of grade 0 cards to learn at once option in the Configure menu. If you already know all your cards, you can just go through all of them in a single pass and grade them 3, 4 or 5.
However, we recommend only going through a limited number of new cards each day, in order to help Mnemosyne achieve a better spread of your workload when reviewing those cards again.
Also note that the 'number of grade 0 cards to learn at once' setting determines how many new cards you are trying to learn at the same time. It does not tell you how many new cards you need to learn per day. You are the judge of that: you can learn more cards or less cards, depending on how you feel.
The difference between grade 0 and grade 1 cards
Grade 1 cards show up less often and are not subject to the 'number of grade 0 cards to learn at once' setting. This setting is there to prevent you from trying to memorise too many new cards at once. It does not tell you how many new cards you need to learn per day. You are the judge of that: you can learn more cards or less cards, depending on how you feel.
Maximum interval between repetitions
There is no maximum interval between repetitions, and this period can exceed one year.
Dealing with large numbers of cards to review
Don't worry too much! Do as many cards as you feel like to catch up, the rest will be automatically rescheduled to the future.
Sorting the cards in the Edit deck list by category
Click on the Category column title. Clicking Category again reverses the sort order.
Mass-moving cards
To mass-move a group of cards from one category to another, select multiple cards, right-click, and then choose change category.
Hierarchical categories
Support for hierarchical categories is planned for a future release (no timetable available).
For now, you can give your categories names like 'Science::Physics' and 'Science::Mathematics'.
Learning only selected cards
Assuming you have organized your cards into categories, you can use the Activate categories feature.
Select Deck -> Activate categories from the main menu (or press CTRL+G). From the menu that pops up, select the categories you wish to learn. You can select non-contiguous categories by pressing Ctrl during clicking.
Don't forget to re-activate all of your categories when you're done! An Activate All button is provided for this.
Renaming Categories
To rename categories, open the "Edit Deck" window. Along the bottom of the window is a scroll bar. Scroll to the right to find the "Category" column.
Click on "Category" to sort all of the cards by category. Now, highlight all of the cards you want to move to the new category.
Finally, right click on one of the selected cards and select the "change category" option. Enter the name of the new category and you're finished.
Resetting All Learning Data
First, export your cards to XML. Then choose one of the following:
- start a new database (or, if you want to erase your logs too, delete the .mnemosyne dir)
- import the XML, but choose 'reset learning data'
Advanced Grading
Here is some additional information about what happens when you grade cards. This information is not necessary to successfully use the program and is intended only for advanced users.
If you grade a card successfully (2-5), the card is scheduled again for a future date. If you grade a card unsuccessfully (0-1), the card is placed in the "unmemorized" pile and is available again for review after you finish the repetitions scheduled for the current day.
All cards have an "easiness" factor which the algorithm uses to schedule the interval between repetitions. It is basically the factor with which the old interval is multiplied in order to get the new one. It's default value is 2.5, and it cannot go below 1.3, so intervals always increase if you grade a card 2 or higher. The easiness factor is not generally presented to the user because its usefulness is limited to the algorithm's computations.
If you select grade 4, the easiness factor is unchanged and the card is scheduled for future repetition based on the previous record of repetitions.
If you select grade 5, the easiness factor is increased and the card is scheduled for future repetition based on the previous record of repetitions.
If you select grade 2 or 3, the easiness factor is decreased and the card is scheduled for future repetition based on the previous record of repetitions.
If you select grade 0 or 1, the easiness factor is unchanged and the previous record of repetitions is erased.
Adding images, sounds, mathematical formulas, and three-sided cards
A Note About Vice Versa
Mnemosyne will not show the reverse card until you have learned the forward one.
Adding images
Images can be added to questions or answers.
Right-clicking or pressing CTRL+I brings up a file selection dialog that you can use to choose an image file.
This generates tags of the form
<img src="">. (The path is relative to the location of your *.mem file, although you can use absolute paths too. For easy sharing of databases, we recommend that you put all your pictures somewhere inside the .mnemosyne directory.)
Adding sounds
Right-clicking or pressing CTRL+S brings up a file selection dialog that you can use to choose a sound file.
This generates tags of the form <sound src="">. (The path is relative to the location of your *.mem file, although you can use absolute paths too). To play the sound again, press CTRL+R in the main window.
Supported file formats are wav, ogg and mp3. On Linux, this requires properly installing pygame and its dependencies like SDL.
Relative Paths
Whether you're adding sounds or images, it's recommended that you use relative paths. To do this, you have to make sure that the path is relative to the location of your database.
Most typically, you have:
.mnemosyne (the directory/folder that stores all your files)
.mnemosyne/default.mem (your card collection)
.mnemosyne/images/a.png (the images in a directory/folder that you want to add-- storing this in your .mnemosyne directory/folder makes it much easier to back up completely!)
The relative path would then be images/a.png
Adding chemical and mathematical formulas with LaTeX
LaTeX can render your formulas using tags like <$>x^2+y^2=z^2</$>.
For this, you need LaTeX and dvipng installed. Windows users can download MiKTeX to achieve the same functionality.
The error output of LaTeX gets saved to the file .mnemosyne/latex/latex_out.txt.
Achieving more control over LaTeX
The <$>...</$> tags use LaTeX's inline math environment, but there are two more tags:
- The
<$$>...</$$>tags for centered equations on a separate line (LaTeX'sdisplaymathenvironment) - The
<latex>...</latex>tags for code which is not in any environment, but just embedded between a typical latex pre- and postamble.
By the way, you can edit what goes into the pre- and postamble by delving into your .mnemosyne/latex directory and editing the aptly named preable and postamble files to your heart's content. While you're there, feel free to edit the dvipng file as well.
Three-sided cards
Three-sided cards are useful when dealing with vocabulary in foreign scripts easier. When learning foreign words, one often needs to recall the word, the meaning, and its pronunciation-- hence, three sided cards for the three difference aspects.
To add three sided cards, right-click on the text field in Add cards. Then, choose the option to switch to 3-sided card input, which replaces the question and answer fields with three fields: written form, pronunciation, translation.
After selecting an initial grade, 2 cards will be added:
Q: written form
A: pronunciation
translation
and
Q: translation
A: written form
pronunciation
Future versions of Mnemosyne will make sure that a change you make in one pair of the set is automatically reflected in the other one.
Formatting cards
You can use HTML tags to change the color, formatting and style of your text. Even if you're new to HTML, the tags are relatively simple and you can probably learn them quickly.
Bold, Italics, and Underline
Bold example: <b> phrase in bold </b>
Italics example: <i> phrase in italics </i>
Underline example: <u> underlined phrase </u>
Comments
You can also use HTML comment tags if you want to annotate a list of cards that you plan to import into Mnemosyne.
Example: <! enter your comment here >
Complete List of Tags
See the QT3 reference.
Importing cards
Plain text and Microsoft Office (Word and Excel)
Mnemosyne can import plain text files where each line contains a question/answer pair separated by a tab. So e.g. if you have such a list in Word, save it as plain text (*.txt), choose 'other encoding - Unicode (UTF-8)' if your data contains foreign characters, and then you get a file which you can import in Mnemosyne if you choose the 'Text with tab separated Q/A' format.
The same goes for Excel using 'save as', 'tab delimited (txt)'. However, Excel's unicode text format is not the standard UTF-8, so this only works for latin characters.
OpenOffice Calc
Choose File-> Save as and select csv as the format. Then click on the box that says edit filter options and choose utf-8 as the character set, tab as the field delimiter, and clear as the text delimiter. It works perfectly with unicode (a major advantage over Excel!).
SuperMemo 2006
To import text-only cards from SuperMemo 2006 (including Unicode/cards with foreign scripts), choose File-> Export-> Q&A Text from the SuperMemo menu. Make sure Allow HTML is checked and nothing else in the next box, then press OK. Import the file SuperMemo creates into Mnemosyne as a SuperMemo 7 text file, and choose a category if desired.
Unfortunately, Mnemosyne can only import question/answer cards, not incremental reading information or your repetition history.
SuperMemo for Palm
Mnemosyne can import Supermemo for Palm databases that have been converted to XML by the open source smconv.pl.
Additional file formats
Mnemosyne can also import Memaid's XML format (Mnemosyne's predecessor) and also Supermemo7's text format.
Importing three-sided cards
For each card, put 'written form', 'pronunciation', and 'translation' on a single line, separated by tabs.
Exporting, printing, and sharing cards with the Mnemosyne community
Preparing to share your cards with others
First, export the categories you want to share to XML, and choose reset learning data on export.
If your deck contains images or sounds, it's best to keep these in a separate folder inside your .mnemosyne directory and use relative path names to refer to them (the default). That way, the people you are distributing your cards to just need to copy this directory to their .mnemosyne directory.
Distributing the cards online
The Mnemosyne Project is now collecting flashcard sets to share with the wider community. You can register now and add your cards to our website. Get more information and contribute!
Printing a list of cards
In the export function, export to a file with extension '.txt', which you can then open in your favourite word processor.
Advanced features
Increasing the size of foreign (non-Latin) characters only
If you're studying Japanese, Chinese, Arabic, or other non-Latin languages, you may want to increase the size of the foreign text without changing the size of the English text. To do this, there is an option increase font size of non-latin characters in the Mnemosyne preferences.
Synchronising data Between Linux and Windows
It is recommended that you place all your files in the .mnemosyne folder. That way, you can just copy that folder around. There are tools which make this synchronisation process a bit easier, e.g. Unison. If you have your Linux home directory mounted as Z:\ under Windows, you can use a Unison prf-file that looks like this:
root = C:\users\pbienst\.mnemosyne
root = Z:\.mnemosyne
log = false
fastcheck = true
Keyboard shortcuts
Many keyboard shortcuts are available when doing repetitions and entering data. Here's a list:
- Enter, Space, Return: default action (mostly show answer)
- number keys 0-5: grades (use Ctrl+number keys when adding cards)
- Ctrl+N: New file
- Ctrl+O: Open file
- Ctrl+S: Save file (in the main window)
- Ctrl+A: Add cards
- Ctrl+E: Edit current card
- Del: Delete card
- Ctrl+D: Edit deck
- Ctrl+G: Activate categories
- Ctrl+T: Statistics
- Ctrl+S: Insert sound (in the edit fields)
- Ctrl+I: Insert image
- Ctrl+P: Preview card
- Ctrl+F: Find
- F3 : Find
- Ctrl+P: Preview card
- Ctrl+R: Replay sound
In text fields, the standard cut, copy, paste, undo and redo shortcuts are available.
Mnemosyne XML DTD
The following is not an actual DTD, but should be an overview sufficient to give users a general understanding of the Mnemosyne XML.
WARNING: This format is expected to change significantly in Mnemosyne 2.0.
Sample Mnemosyne XML export for one card:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> <mnemosyne core_version="1" time_of_start="1215720000" > <category active="1"> <name><th-en></name> </category> <category active="1"> <name><en-th></name> </category> <item id="74b1b599" gr="2" e="2.500" ac_rp="2" rt_rp="0" lps="0" ac_rp_l="2" rt_rp_l="0" l_rp="32" n_rp="33"> <cat><th-en></cat> <Q>เงา</Q> <A>shadow; reflection; image</A> </item> <item id="74b1b599.inv" gr="2" e="2.500" ac_rp="2" rt_rp="0" lps="0" ac_rp_l="2" rt_rp_l="0" l_rp="32" n_rp="34"> <cat><en-th></cat> <Q>shadow; reflection; image</Q> <A>เงา</A> </item> </mnemosyne>
Attributes of Item
Note: you don't need to set any of the following explictly yourself. They are given suitable defaults for new cards when you import them.
id= created as a hash of the data
gr= the grade, default is 0
e= easiness
ac_rp= acquisition reps
rt_rp= retention reps
lps= lapses
ac_rp_l, rt_rp_l = ... since lapse
l_rp= last rep
n_rp= next rep
Running Mnemosyne from a USB drive
Using Windows
First, copy the Mnemosyne directory from C:\Program Files to your
USB drive, and then copy the .mnemosyne directory from inside
your home directory (usually C:\Documents and Settings\<your user name>) to inside the Mnemosyne directory
on the USB drive. Alternatively, you can start mnemosyne with the -d option
to specify where .mnemosyne directory is located, e.g.
F:\Mnemosyne\mnemosyne.exe -d F:\.mnemosyne.
Using Linux
To run the Linux version from a USB key, untar the source file
mnemosyne-X.X.tgz (with X.X the version number) to the USB key.
Copy your .mnemosyne directory to the USB key as well.
Change to the directory where the USB key is mounted and type
PYTHONPATH=mnemosyne-X.X python mnemosyne-X.X/mnemosyne/pyqt_ui/mnemosyne -d .
(This assumes that the system you are working on has Python installed, as
well as all the libraries Mnemosyne requires.)
Starting Mnemosyne from a different directory
Mnemosyne can be started from any directory (folder on Windows) of your choosing (by default, it is .mnemosyne and stored in the user's home directory).
For Linux and Mac OS X, just use the -d option at the command line:
mnemsosyne -d /WhereIWantToGo/DirectoryOfMyChoice
For Windows, open a command prompt (Start-> All Programs-> Accessories-> System-> Command Prompt) and type:
C:\Program Files\Mnemosyne\Mnemosyne.exe" -d your_custom_data_dir
Advanced preferences (including language settings)
To avoid cluttering the interface, only the most frequently used options are listed on Mnemosyne's preferences screen. For advanced options, you can edit the .mnemosyne/config.py file to exercise a fine-grained control over the program's behaviour.
Here is an example config.py file:
# Mnemosyne configuration file.
# Align question/answers to the left (True/False)
left_align = False
# Keep detailed logs (True/False).
keep_logs = True
# Upload server. Only change when prompted by the developers.
upload_server = "mnemosyne-proj.dyndns.org:80"
# Set to True to prevent you from accidentally revealing the answer
# when clicking the edit button.
# The translation to use, e.g. 'de' for German (including quotes).
# If set to None, the system's locale will be used.
locale = None
# The number of daily backups to keep. Set to -1 for no limit.
backups_to_keep = 5
# The moment the new day starts. Defaults to 3 am. Could be useful to
# change if you are a night bird.
day_starts_at = 3
Left-aligning text
You can get left alignment by adding html tags to each card or by setting left_align = True in config.py.
Changing the language Mnemosyne uses
By default, the language corresponding to your system's locale is chosen. If you want to override this behaviour, edit the .mnemosyne/config.py file and replace the line locale = None to locale = 'en' or locale = 'es' or whatever. You can find the corresponding language codes here.
Using plugins
Plugins allow you to customise Mnemosyne's behaviour.
Installation
To install plugins, copy them to your .mnemosyne/plugins directory.
Any Python files you place inside that directory will be executed on Mnemosyne's startup.
There are currently no really useful plugins available, and documentation on how to write them is a bit scarce, but this will change in the future.
Downloading scripts and plugins
There are many scripts and plugins available for Mnemosyne on the downloads page.
Troubleshooting
I'm getting a "this collection is already in use" message.
First, make sure the program is not already open! A common reason for this message is that you have started the program twice.
If that is not the problem, please reboot your machine and try deleting the file .mnemosyne/MNEMOSYNE_LOCK in your home directory.
Restoring from Mnemosyne's Automatic Backups
If something terrible happened to your collection, you can restore from Mnemosyne's automatic backup. To do this, open the backups directory in your .mnemosyne directory (in your home directory). Next, unzip the file you want to restore from. Then, open Mnemosyne and import this xml file into a new database.
In Linux, it seems Mnemosyne prevents other programs from using sound.
Add this to your environment:
export SDL_AUDIODRIVER="alsa"
When I start the program under Windows, I get a message about a missing '~\\.mnemosyne' directory
In the system control panel, go to 'system settings' and add HOMEPATH=%USERPROFILE% to your environment variables. You might need a reboot. If that fails, you can always try HOMEPATH=C:\ or something.
I was using Mnemosyne and my laptop battery died/the computer crashed. Now when I try to restart the program, I receive the message "Unable to load database, creating tmp file." Then nothing happens. Where's my data?
Just choose File-> Open and then load (your home dir)/.mnemosyne/default.mem. You might have to type the file in the path box at the top of the file selector to get into the hidden dir .mnemosyne.
On Linux, SCIM doesn't work right with Mnemosyne!
Please see this forum thread
https://sourceforge.net/forum/forum.php?thread_id=1885597&forum_id=53713...
Translations
Available languages
Currently, Mnemosyne is localized in the following languages:
- English (en)
- Spanish (sp)
- French (fr)
- German (de)
- Portugese (pt_BR)
- Dutch (nl)
- Czech (cs)
- Polish (pl)
- Chinese (zh_CN, zh_HK, zh_SG, zh_TW)
- Japanese (ja)
- Persian (fa)
- Hebrew (he)
- Norwegian (nb_no)
Changing the language mnemosyne uses
By default, Mnemosyne will use the language to which your system is set. To change this, learn about advanced preferences.
Contribute a translation!
If you want to help translate Mnemosyne, please do the following:
- download the latest revision of mnemosyne_XX.ts from here.
- rename the XX to your language code.
- add the translations either by editing the file in a text editor or by using Qt Linguist 3.x (not 4.x to be on the safe side). If you use a text editor, make sure to add the translation between the translation tags, and not to overwrite the text in the source tags.
- send the finished file to the developpers.
- become famous.
Future plans / requested features
To see features planned for future versions of Mnemosyne, see our feature tracker. You can also request new features there.
There is no time table for the implementation of any given feature, as this is a purely a hobby project, depending very much on the amount of available free time. However, the project has been progressing slowly but steadily since 2003, and we foresee that it will continue to do so for many, many years.
