Here’s a neat trick. You can add invisible text to a flashcard in Mnemosyne by enclosing it in html tags and quotes, <”like this”>.
Mnemosyne includes HTML support so you can add pictures and sound to flashcards. The “invisible text” trick becomes possible as an unintended extra feature. The way it works is Mnemosyne tries to read the invisible text as HTML, but it doesn’t make any sense as HTML, so it gets ignored. The result is invisible text.
The invisible text can only be read by choosing “edit card”. This is extremely useful because it lets you put in text that will only be displayed when you want it to. For example, if you enter the English translation (or contextual notes) to a sentence, make it invisible and you’ll only have to
read it if you can’t understand the sentence on your own.
All the English content of my cards (except Heisig keywords) is done in invisible text now. The result is, when I study I enter a “language trance”: during the study time, all the text that hits my eyes is from the target language. Unless I need to read the invisible text because I can’t understand a sentence, there’s no English to nudge my mind back into English mode. The mind is allowed to drift into target language mode.
Unfortunately, the invisible text trick doesn’t work if you try to put nonstandard Unicode characters in the invisible text. In other words, the invisible text has to be English.
Here’s some other articles you can read. Did you know all around the world, these articles are used to teach people English? It’s because all the top world governments want their citizens to speak like GlowingFaceMan, of course.
Studying Foreign Languages with no available English Translation
Four Thousand Japanese Flashcards (warning: very large!)
What does your native tongue sound like?