Hello, I am currently doing some research and thought I would post a few of my questions here. I am looking at how Indian users of an application I am developing would enter info into it in Marathi. 1.) I see there are quite a few virtual keyboards for it, do Marathi speakers use these exclusively or can you buy a "Marathi Keyboard" 2.) What other options are there for entering Marathi text and what would be the easiest (Obviously just an opinion) I would love any info around this and would probably have follow up questions. Cheers
my mother tongue is Marathi and i am from Maharashtra region of India where Marathi is principle language. i do very few Marathi typing an mostly use windows inbuilt Devanagari (script name that Marathi uses) font. but it has some limitations. 1. bulk data entry operators use either hardware from "modular systems" or mechanical typewriter. 2. easy way is to use inbuilt Devanagari font or "shivaji" font. there is virtual layout provided with this shivaji font. if you google it you can easily find it. there are also fonts such as sulekha and suchitra are available and easy to use. hope this will help you in
And then how do you get used to what key on the keyboard equals what if there isn't a Marathi keyboard to go along with it?
They would use a combination of keyboard keys to get the marathi letter if there is not Marathi Keyboard(This is only a guess as I have seen my sister typing in my mother tongue tamil in MSword using combination of keys, For that you need to install fonts in MS word)
keyboard layouts for respective fonts are also available download. but easy way for typing is shivaji font and inbuilt Devanagari font. its simple one has to type in english according to pronunciation of that word in english. e.g. word Marathi will be typed in shivaji as "marazI" (case sensetive)
Jason, one important point that you may not yet know is that Marathi, Hindi, and Sanskrit use the exact same script (letters, vowels, consonants, everything).
Thanks for all the conmments so far. I may install a font pack and do some additional testing. Ajeet - I assume that means then that if I solve all the issues with Marathi and create a better system, I can apply those to Hindi (which I am also targeting)
Absolutely. The best way to type in Hindi (or Marathi), especially for dislpay online, is to use Unicode. There are many options available online.
I think you can also use google translator to translate your word in marathi. But using 'Shivaji' font is the best option and many people in maharashtra use this font for marathi typing .
You are right about the font. But if it is not on the client machine, it will (as will any other missing font), show up as garbage. Hence, I recommended Unicode as it is widely accepted.