How to: Dvorak Japanese Keyboard Layouts on Mac OS X Mountain Lion

I just figured out how to set up the Mac OS X Japanese keyboard layouts to use Dvorak, and I don’t want to forget how I did it.

Install Japanese Keyboard Layouts

Just in case you haven’t done this already, here’s how you install the Japanese keyboard layouts. If you already have the layouts installed, then you can skip to the next section.

1. Open System Preferences
2. Click on Languages and Text
3. In the search box type “kotoeri”
4. Select “Hiragana”. (You can add more, too, but you have to select at least one.)
5. Check “Show Input menu in menu bar”

Setup Dvorak typing

1. Switch to Hiragana using the Input menu in the menu bar
2. Click on the Input menu in the menu bar again
3. Click on “Koteri Preferences”
4. Make sure that “Input style” is set to “Romaji Typing”
5. Change “Romaji keyboard layout” to “Dvorak”
6. Close the “Kotoeri Preferences” window

That’s it

Enjoy!

Note: This procedure was originally outlined in someone else’s blog post, but all the image links are broken which made me dismiss it at first. My goal here is to just preserve how to do this in case I forget.