I made a couple of years ago a little MS word model to type hiragana, katakana and the 100 about kanji I knew at this time.
If some people cannot have japanese typing software in their computer, this may help:
first, that works on MS word 2000/2003 (not tried in open office)
second, you must have the MS Mincho font in your system
third, don't replace normal.dot, just put a copy of this file on your desktop and open it instead of word when you want to type (don't forget to save your work with another file name!)
I put aside a file with the combinations for kanji: significations are in french, I had no time to put them in english. But if you would use it, you certainly know the signification of these kanji in your native tongue, aren't you?
Rules to type:
hiragana:
Alt + a: kana "a"
Alt + k,a: kana "ka"
exception: if you type Alt + n to type kana "n", that doesnt work due to na, ni, nu, ne, no combination: so use for "n" Alt + q
Alt + s,h: kana "shi"
Alt + c,h: kana "chi"
Alt + t,s: kana "tsu"
Alt + Ctrl + y,a: little kana "ya" for combinations like kya, pya,...
Works with ya, yu, yo, shi, tsu
kanataka:
The same, only type:
Alt + Shift + k,a: kana "ka"
(add Shift to hiragana combination to have katakana)
I didn't check, but normallly you would have the: Alt + Ctrl + Shift + a, i, u, o, or e to make little kana corresponding
Kanji:
Ctrl + any combination you'll have on the joined chart. I put the special character code on the right column when I took time to note it (not all the cases).
File 1: japanese model
File 2: liste des kanji (is a the kanji chart)
I expect it would help some people to type,
Please ask if questions or trouble,
Yours,
Kitsune