Contents
Deck
The deck stores all your cards and scheduling information. It is saved in a file with a name ending in .anki
The two core objects in an Anki deck are facts (on the left) and cards (on the right).
Facts
A fact is a single piece of information, made up of a number of fields. For example:
- Expression
- a giraffe
- Meaning
- an animal with a long neck
- Example
- giraffes live in the zoo
- Tags
- animals, my text book chapter 3
Cards
A card is a presentation of a fact, and has two sides: a question and an answer. Any number of fields can appear on each side.
When you add a fact to Anki, cards which show that fact are generated. Some models generate one card, others generate more than one. For example, in the Japanese model, two cards can be generated:
Card 1 (recognition)
Question:
- a giraffe
Answer:
- an animal with a long neck
- giraffes live in the zoo
Card 2 (recall)
Question:
- an animal with a long neck
Answer:
- a giraffe
- giraffes live in the zoo
Recognition cards train your ability to recognize and understand an expression. Recall cards train your ability to remember that expression when prompted. Recognition cards are generally easier to review, as you don't have to worry about synonyms or remembering items exactly. Recall cards are more difficult, but they lead to stronger memories. Which ones you use is up to you.
Tags
Tags are little pieces of information attached to facts to help you organize your deck. You can make facts with some tags appear at a higher or lower priority, and display only cards matching certain fact-tags.
Models
A model describes the type of information you want to input, and the type of cards which should be generated. The two main parts are:
- Fields
- In a simple deck, there are two fields: "Front" and "Back". You can add more fields as necessary.
- Card Templates
- A card template tells Anki what a card's question and answer should look like. For example, it might say "put the 'Reading' and 'Meaning' field in the question, and the 'Expression' field in the answer".
Most users will only need one or two models in their deck. Models are named things like "English", "Russian verbs" or "Capitals of the world"
Other terms
Spaced Repetition
See Wikipedia
Delayed Cards
If you have a model with two cards:
front -> back
back -> front
then showing one directly after the other would not be useful. So Anki delays showing the second card. This starts at 1 minute and gets bigger as the review interval of the cards increases.
You can customize the delay with ModelProperties#General
New cards
Cards that have never been studied.
Young cards
Cards that have been seen before, but have an interval of less than or equal to 21 days.
Mature cards
Cards that have an interval over 21 days. By the time cards become mature, they are usually quite easy to remember.