Re: Keyboards

Paul Bennett wrote:

> Interesting. If Carsten's willing, maybe I could discuss
> with him on list  (or off list if you prefer) exactly what
> he did and how he did it. Maybe  it can throw some ideas
> into the open that other people could be inspired  by, or
> build on.
You can download what I've done up to now under
http://www.beckerscarsten.de/downloads/sprache/. In that
directory, there is a file called x-sampa-ipa-keyboard.zip
or similar. The keyboard is basically in X-Sampa, not in
CXS. I'd rather adopt Z-Sampa (the ZBB's extension of XS)
BTW, since this one also includes the newer signs from the
ExtIPA and the two new symbols for the labiodental flap or
whatever it was. Google for "Z-Sampa" on kutjara.com, since
I know neither the exact address of the wiki nor the one of
the respective page in the wiki. However, the task the
keyboard layout does is converting from XS into IPA as you
write. It's quite helpful in my opinion. I guess I should
promote it a bit more ;-) My server does not offer a
downloads-statistic, so I don't know how many times that
file has been downloaded so far and I'm too lazy to check
the logfiles.

So, if you want to take over my work ... The description
included in the ZIP file (in German and English) is not
completely correct, since for example, you cannot enter [J\]
due to an error I made: When defining dead-keys, you don't
define them like <key>+<key> but as <glyph>+<glyph>. So my
definition of <J>+<\> doesn't work, since the glyph <ɲ> is
assigned to the key <J> and not the glyph <J>. You have to
give the program <ɲ>+<\> to work. It's a bit tricky, but
once you know how it works, it's just an shitload of work to
include all the deadkey combinations, but it works at least.
So for example if you have assigned, say, <ß> to the key on
which "\" is printed, you'll have to define <...>+<ß> for
the deadkey. That way, I mixed up the hyphen, which can now
be found on shift-comma instead of the key for the hyphen,
which is the tiebar. It's a mess sometimes, be warned!
Actually, it'd best to start all over I guess.

Note that I used the standard de-DE keyboard layout (QWERTZ,
you'll see it), but with some changes to the places of the
sentence marks. You certainly want to rearrange the keyboard
to the English layout. Or even better, if you get your hands
on this, tweak my file for the English keyboard and also
make amends to my German layout. Making a layout for the
French wouldn't be bad either I guess ... The PDF help file
explains the basics, but is errorneous, so you're better
trying it out yourself. I also wouldn't mind to somehow make
it possible to enter numbers which have been excluded so far
and also non-IPA-specific (combining) diacritics like the
diaresis or the cedilla and those. I'd also appreciate to
include a way to write ß. I've been way lazy with updating
this layout because it would mean to delete the layout from
the Preferences dialogue on languages, uninstall my current
installation of the DLL file, then modify the source file
and installing it again ... It's bad that you cannot edit
already installed keyboards.

FWIW, I also edited the standard German keyboard to be able
to write things like ś and ţ. It's also not perfect since I
recently noticed that Unicode also includes e.g. e-dotabove
which I didn't include. I think something like that and more
ordered than my version already exists. It's annoying that
there's a US-International keyboard layout, but none for
German or French and all. Why didn't they include deadkeys
for writing ç etc. in the standard keyboard layouts anyway?
The Swiss keyboard has a deadkey for the diaresis for
example with which you can enter ë and ï, but the German
keyboard layout lacks this ability for some reason. We've
only got a key for each ä, ö, ü and that was it. No ability
to enter ë or even œ. But then, there is a deadkey with
which you can enter á, à, é, è etc. This also goes for the
circumflex accent.

So ... feel free to improve my work. It's under GPL and far
from perfection. It's unlikely that I will work on it
further.

OBConlang: I'll try to make a keyboard for the Tahano
Nuhicamu once I finished the TTF font with its *potentially*
4,000,000 combinations (of which I'll only need 30,000 I
estimated) ... I've only got about 3,000 combinations at the
moment and it needs the Tavultesoft keyboard program thing
because it enables you to extend the deadkey function as it
seems in that you can define a string of more than one
keystroke plus some other string to be replaced by one glyph
from the font. That way, I should be able to enter <[name]-
meung> and what comes out is the pre-assembled glyph

     ___       /
   /        '    /
   |      \__/
 _|     .---,    ,
   |     ,---'    | ___
   |     |____/_      \
           ,  ,      ___/
            ,      /    .---,
                   \____/

(to be best viewed in Arial Unicode MS). I need the glyphs
preassembled because the outlines of the single glyphs are
just scans with the letters having an irregular width each.
It's been too much work to draw everything in Inkscape. And
the result wasn't that pretty either. Handwritten it looks
much nicer IMO.

Cheers,
Carsten

--
Keywords: keyboards, ipa, cxs

"Miranayam cepauarà naranoaris."
(Calvin nay Hobbes)

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