Posted by:
Ken Penner I
suppose this wishlist for a keyboard driver should have been made earlier, but
perhaps it is not too late to improve it before it becomes
standard!
My
request is simple: don't move anything from the Israeli standard keyboard layout
(with one exception). I have been typing with the Israeli layout for some time
now, and I imagine I am by no means the only one who has become familiar with
its layout.
In my
view, a keyboard layout should be backward-compatible with existing standards
(as long as these are practical).
I.e.
the Israeli standard keyboard key layouts should be retained as much as
practicable.
I see
you have done this for the Hebrew consonants in the Tiro layout. Excellent!
These are of course the most used keys. Some standard manuals (I thought SBL was
one of them, but I can't find the reference now) recommend typing unpointed
Hebrew unless the vocalization is relevant to argument.
The
next most common characters typed are the sin/shin dot, dagesh, and vowels.
These are included in the standard Israeli keyboard, and therefore I suggest
these be placed on the same keys as the Israeli keyboard, but in a more
accessible way. Ideally, commonly used keys should be unshifted. However,
on the standard Israeli keyboard layout, one must press Caps Lock and
Shift to get the nikud (on the Number row). This is excessively annoying.
Instead, these can be placed on the same keys, but without having to press Caps
Lock and Shift. In other words, they would be in place of the numbers, for
which one can use the number pad. (If one really has need for the numbers on the
number row, e.g., on a laptop, perhaps they could be accessed from the number
row with Caps Lock on).
If
this means that a third "Israeli" layout should be created, that's fine. I do
think it would become the standard among Hebrew scholars, at least among those
who ever work in Israel.
So
here is my proposal. It really is almost the same as your beta Tiro layout, with
the exception of Nikud, modern punctuation, and numbers.
Consonants: as on the Israeli layout and your Tiro
layout.
Nikud:
on the same keys as the Israeli layout (the number row), but
unshifted
Other
Israeli keys (Shekel, Euro, yiddish letters, LRM, RLM): as on Israeli keyboard
(with AltGr). (Like the Tiro beta, but with the LRM and RLM on Control-[ and
-].)
Modern
punctuation: as on the Israeli layout (shifted number row).
Teamim
and other Biblical-only marks: as on the Tiro beta, unless this conflicts with
the above.
Numbers: on the same keys as the US/Tiro beta/Israeli layout (the number
row), but with Caps Lock.
Cooperatively,
Ken
Penner
McMaster/Hebrew
From: John Hudson [mailto:tiro@tiro.com]
Sent: July 27, 2005 3:17 PM
To: SBL
Fonts
Subject: New keyboard driver (beta)
New
keyboard driver (beta)
Reply
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|
From: John Hudson |
I have put a beta version of the new
Tiro Biblical Hebrew keyboard driver at
(To see the link, please log in.)
The
zip file contains the revised manual and a self extracting
archive containing the installer file and dll. This release also
includes an uninstaller, because you will need to remove the old
version of this keyboard from your system before you can install
the new one. Please refer to the manual for
instructions.
Note that this new keyboard is designed to
work with the new version of the font (beta 1.09 or greater).
Please refer to the font manual for information about new
Unicode characters and changes to earlier encoding
recommendations. |
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