Monday, October 19, 2020

You too can easily write in Hindi in Linux using IBus

 

 Yes you read that right, you can easily write in Hindi using IBus in Linux. Select itrans transliteration method for the Devanagari writing system.  Open your favorite editor and you can now type in Hindi. I am giving the keymap for the letters all you had to do is combine them.

Vowels

 

Consonants

 

 

 

 

 

 
 

 Numerals

 

Ligatures 


 






References:

1. https://www.aczoom.com/itrans/html/dvng/dvng.html


Friday, October 16, 2020

Best Fonts for writing in Tamil in Debian Linux

 
Today there are many fonts for Tamil language, some fonts supports the sri [ஶ்ரீligature and some don't, also most fonts renders the word ர், ரி, ரீ as ர், ரி, ரீ. There is no balance between these renderings. The Tamil Nadu govt in order to avoid the confusion specified that  ர், ரி, ரீ should be rendered as  ர், ரி, ரீ and most of the people become accustomed to this usage and moved on. As for the Word ஶ்ரீ it is a ligature of ஶ் + ரீ so some fonts renders ஶ்ரீ  as  ஶ்ரீ. In my opinion these are some of the best Tamil fonts. 

1. Lohit Tamil Classical


This font by Red Hat renders the words properly and also looks more professional and antique. As the word classical implies the word னை will be rendered as னை. This was how the word was written before the 70's. Here is a look of how this font looks.

ஶ்ரீ கிருஷ்னர் வந்தார். அனைவரும் வணக்கம் செலுத்தினர்.



2. Noto Serif Tamil


This Font by  Google is the next best font. it renders  the  word  ர், ரி, ரீ  as  ர், ரி, ரீ


 ஶ்ரீ கிருஷ்னர் வந்தார். அனைவரும் வணக்கம் செலுத்தினர்.



3. TAU Series Fonts


The TAU series of fonts are released by Tamil Virtual Academy[TVA]. There  

is  also  TAU- Elango series also released by TVA don't get confused with

that series  of  Fonts.  Of all the fonts TAU-Barathi  has good font 

shape and renderings. Its also  like  Noto  serif Tamil.

ஶ்ரீ கிருஷ்னர் வந்தார். அனைவரும் வணக்கம் செலுத்தினர்.

There you have it. I believe these three fonts  are enough for professional looking documents written in Tamil language.


References:


1. http://www.tamilvu.org/tkbd/Tamil_Unicode_G.O.zip

2. https://logic10.tumblr.com/post/25302495177

Thursday, October 15, 2020

Easy way to write in Tamil in Linux Using Ibus

 In the last post I had written on how to use IBus. Now we will see how to write in Tamil. When you select Tamil in the preferences it will give you a wide range of options such as Phonetic,Tamil99, Vutam, Inscript , Typewriter, Itrans and lk-renganathan. Of these use the phonetic and Tamil99  which are easier to write. One limitation is that it does not support the Tamil99 extended characters, viz the Tamil numeral for 10,100,1000 and fractions
Keymap for Tamil Phonetic

vowels


Image showing tamil vowels and its keymap




Consonants

Image Showing tamil Consonants and its keymap


Grantha Words 

The word க்ஷ  is a ligature of க+ஷ, and similarly ஶ்ரீ is a ligature of  ஶ் +ரீ . To write  க்ஷ  properly in Tamil phonetic layout do the following.
 
First type ஷ் then move your cursor before ஷ்   and type க் then go over to your next word it will render it as க்ஷ். Similary  for க்ஷி  first type ஷி move your cursor before ஷி and   type க் then go over to your next word now it will render it as ஷி 

Image Showing Grantha words and its keymap

* in Tamil99 layout. 

Tamil99 Keymap for Grantha Words

For the Grantha words one can use Tamil99 layout and for others phonetic layout as it is easy to write in tamil using phoentic layout.

image showing grantha word in tamil99 keymap




image showing grantha word and its  tamil99 keymap


image showing grantha word and its  tamil99 keymap


image showing grantha word and its  tamil99 keymap


image showing grantha word and its  tamil99 keymap

image showing grantha word and its  tamil99 keymap

Tamil Numerals And Special Characters 


In the Tamil language numerals are represented by letters and also there are special ligatures, we have to use the Tamil99 input method for writing this special characters

image showing tamil numerals and its tamil99 keymap



Image showing special characters and its tamil99 keymap


References:




Wednesday, October 14, 2020

Writing in Indian Launguages in Linux using IBus


To compose a document other than in English you need transliteration software. In Linux there is one such software that is IBus.Through IBus you can write in any language with ease. 

Installation

 In Debian start the synaptic package manager click the search button  and type IBus in the search field and press enter.

Image showing synaptic package manager with the search dialog box
Synaptic Package Manager

 Now scroll down and select IBus it will show the dependencies of the packages click ok and again the same with IBus-m17n and click apply in the taskbar. Make sure you have m17n-db package is installed before installing IBus.  

Location & Usage

After installation configure your system to make IBus starts when you login.IBus is typically located in your systray. It will show as EN.

image showing the xfce systray with IBus input system

This is your default locale setting. Now right click that icon in your panel and click preferences, a dialog box will open up and then goto Input Method 

Image showing the IBus Preferences Dialog box
IBus Preferences Dialog Box

 

Click the Add button and click the … in the bottom it will show you more choice and scroll down and you can now select your desired Indian language to write. 




Image showing the input method selection screen after clicking the add button


 

Image showing the indian language Tamil option







Image showing the type of input method to be selected after selecting the Tamil Language


Image showing the input method options when we right click the IBus interface in the systray

The Indian languages supported in IBus are Assamese, Bengali, Devanagari, Gujrati, Malayalam, Marathi, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Kashmiri, Maithili, Oriya, Punjabi, Sanskrit and Urdu. You can now open your favourite text editor and left click the Ibus icon in your systray to select your language or pressing ctrl+spacebar to change the language.

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