Arabic-L:GEN:Needs to make own key layout in Windows

[Dilworth Parkinson]

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Arabic-L: Fri 13 Apr 2007
Moderator: Dilworth Parkinson <dilworth_parkinson at byu.edu>
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1) Subject:Needs to make own key layout in Windows

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1)
Date: 13 Apr 2007
From:Dan Parvaz <dparvaz at mac.com>
Subject:Needs to make own key layout in Windows

With the demise of the the Ittisalat list (RIP), I feel this is the  
community I should be turning to for this. In Mac OS X, the  
international keyboards include an "Arabic" and an "Arabic QWERTY"  
keyboard layout; the latter maps Arabic letters to their Latin  
"equivalents" (a -> Alef, b -> baa, etc.). Again, I'm in the position  
to be entering substantial amounts of Arabic text, only I'm doing it  
on a Windows XP (ugh) system. There doesn't seem to be an easy way to  
import or create alternative keyboard layouts (in OS X, this boils  
down to an XML file).

SIL refers to me to a program called Keyman which requires a separate  
layout creation program and licensing fees which border on the  
comically arrogant. Are there no decent alternatives? Something which  
captures keyboard events and sends on user-defined unicode character.  
If needed, I'll write it, but I can't believe nothing cheap/free has  
been done in this area...

Thanks in advance,

-Dan.

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End of Arabic-L:  13 Apr 2007