Learn Swedish online?

For some reason, a bunch of people in Japan want to learn Swedish. ^^ It's a bit charming actually, but are there any language resources out there? I set out on a small quest to find some.

Since I work and study at the Computer Science department at KTH, the first thing I thought of was Lexin, Stava and Granska.

Lexin is a Swedish to many-languages dictionary, it's a good tool both for us Swedes who sometimes need to check our spelling twice, or when translating Swedish. Give it a try, it's the best Swedish dictionary that is available for free.

Lexin also offers a set of images, marked with the Swedish names for the things in the picture. Like the ones you get in elementary school books. The text is in Swedish, but try out the 33 image sets.

Stava is a spelling tool and also some grammar checking is done. I think one of the creators hinted me that it did beat Microsoft Word's Swedish grammar checking in a scientific test. So although it looks simple, it's far superior to anything I have found on the web. The only drawback is that it is in Swedish, but it's fairly easy to make out which buttons to press and how it suggests change of spelling.

Granska is a grammar checking tool, it's fairly new compared to the previous two tools. And to be honest, I only know that it has proven to be very good at detecting a grammatic mistake called "särskrivning" in Swedish. For example, unlike English, Swedish is very liberal when it comes to forming new words by using two words and turning them into a single word. "Get" goat, "Ryggsäck" rucksack and "Tillverkare" maker can be turned into "Getryggsäckstillverkare" Goat rucksack maker. This is a perfectly legal word, although rather strange. The language group at the CS department is responsible for this and it aims to aid non-native speakers of Swedish.

I think this is all the CS department has to offer at the moment. So I set out onto the world wild web for more resources.

Stockholm School of Economics has a good 40 page introduction to Swedish. It's free and basic.

Leif Stensson has made a quick guide to Swedish grammar, although not finished it gives some insight into Swedish grammar.

FSI has a rather large collection of audio files for practising pronunciation, I checked out the first one and it was quite al right. This is in fact the only good audio resources I did find.

Transparent Language has a Swedish Proficiency Test on line, it's not very extensive but might give you a hint. It's not easy though, so study for a while before looking at it.

I hope you get some help using these links, and good luck on your Swedish studies. Att lära sig Svenska är en utmaning, men en utmaning som i slutänden troligen ger dig en hel del glädje.

Unix Party pin?

Yesterday I watched the movie Contact, based on a novel by Carl Sagan. I found it rather interesting, but that's not why I am making this post. On one of the computer monitors at the antenna array in New Mexico, there is a pin. Saying "Unix Party". I am not American, but I think it resembles to a political party pin, used during US elections. I have done some research about it, but I haven't found anything. Does anyone know anything about this? I would be happy to know more about this little novelty.

I took a photo of the screen. It's a bit blurry, but you can clearly make out "Unix Party".