[smc-discuss] Dot-Reph character in the keyboard layout

[Santhosh Thottingal]

On 03/03/2014 11:13 AM, Baiju M wrote:
> I think SMC should take a stand on Dot-Reph character for the
> non-phonetic input method.

Agree on the fact that we need a layout representing requirements of 
Malayalam users.

The example key ">" is already used for Chillu ല്‍  in Inscript 2.
See http://i.imgur.com/7C31DcJ.png for the layout in Inscript 2.

Dot reph is not the only character missing in Inscript 2. Inscript 2 
added some characters, some keys were swapped, but some keys are 
avoided. Chillu ക്‍ is one example.

Then there is a bunch of archaic characters in Unicode and some more 
characters are coming in upcoming versions.

So finding a key to place dotreph does not solve the problem. We need to 
think What characters are present in such a non-transliteration 
keyboard. Do we need to include all characters in unicode block for 
Malayalam? Or do we need to find a criteria for including a subset of 
that? Should we base this new keyboard layout on top of Inscript 1 or 
Inscript 2? What I heard is Inscript 2 is approved by TDIL and no more 
discussions are planned. In fact the keyboard layout for Inscript 2 was 
proposed in 2009 and we were invited for a consultation at CDAC. We had 
sent our feedback to CDAC and IT Mission, but we did not hear anything 
back. Anybody know latest status on this?

Now that we saw Inscript 2 broke backward compatibility by changing 
existing keys, the BC policy has importance in a potential new layout we 
can come up with.

It is also interesting to note that Inscript 2 placed ക്ഷ and ്ര in the 
layout with the reason "Backward compatibility"

All in all, it is a responsible task. Not to forget https://xkcd.com/927/

Thanks
Santhosh