Monday, April 19, 2004

Pitonneur Hindi typing software - a Nagari IME for Mac OS X by Ted Clancy

"EasyHindi makes typing Hindi simple. It allows you to type words in Hindi script by simply typing their usual roman transliteration on your QWERTY keyboard. It automatically takes care of things like viramas, bindus, nuktas, and whether to use independant or dependent vowel signs."

The transcription scheme resembles the already popular iTrans for the most part. However one feels that it could have been closer and the changes should rather have been towards the shortcomings of iTrans (e.g.: ee for ई, oo for ऊ could have been used). To quote another example, for 'ख़', the usual iTrans 'K' or a better 'Kh' could have been used instead of 'x', which sounds too distant from the sound of 'ख़'. A wonderful effort nonetheless.