In a Windows-based computer that is configured for Japanese input, typing Japanese Hiragana or Katakana characters is pretty easy. You usually just type the letters as you pronounce them in English. For example, when you want the character "か" which is pronounced as "ka", you will just type "k" and then "a".

However, for small Hiragana or Katakana characters that are included in some words or names, it is not as straightforward. For instance, if you want to type the small u in the syllable "トゥ", pronounced as "tu" , you cannot just type t and u consecutively because you will get ツ(pronounced as “tsu”) instead. To type it, you need to type the sequence twu.

So to type syllables containing small Kana characters, you have to know and memorize the corresponding sequences of letters. If you don't know or do not want to memorize the sequences, you can still type small Katakana characters by prefixing them with x as in the following list.

• ぁ    xa, la
• ぃ    xi, li
• ぅ    xu, lu
• ぇ    xe, le
• ぉ    xo, lo
• ゃ    xya, lya
• ゅ    xyu, lyu
• ょ    xyo, lyo
• っ    xtu, ltu
• ヵ    xka, lka