Re: RFC: scim and gnome 2.18

[Mark Leisher <mleisher crl nmsu edu>]

Daniel Glassey wrote:
> Hi,
> I'd like to start discussion about proposing SCIM[1] to be included in
> gnome 2.18 as the default IME so that languages/scripts that need more
> than xkb layouts are supported by default.
>
> Also, scim doesn't have the xkb restriction where you can only have a
> maximum 4 keyboard layouts to swtich between.

After years of being irritated at how unnecessarily complicated input 
methods seem to be, I finally started doing something about them for 
GTK+. I started a tiny version of a system we have been using internally 
for the last 10 years. At the moment it works fine with all applications 
using text widgets that allow input methods to be selected. I have 
tested it with some 2.6, 2.7, and 2.9 versions of GTK+.

The idea is that Linux should have something as simple and useful as 
Tavultesoft's Keyman available. This is a start.

1. At the moment, the code has to be compiled with the other input 
modules in GTK+.

2. Currently, ALT_R+SHIFT_R switches between input methods. This will be 
configurable later.

3. Input method files are encoded in UTF-8 and can easily be made to 
work with any keyboard.

4. There is no limit to the number of input methods available in each 
window.

5. Input methods for Arabic, Armenian, Georgian, German, Greek, Hebrew, 
Hindi, Lao, Russian, Serbo-Croatian (Latin & Cyrillic), Japanese T-Code, 
Thai, and Vietnamese are already available and working, and I have a lot 
more I will be converting from our old system. An example Vietnamese 
VIQRI input method can be seen at:

  http://crl.nmsu.edu/~mleisher/viet.mim

6. There is no support for sophisticated Hanzi, Kanji, Hanja, and Chu 
Han input, but simple table-based input for these will be easy to 
implement. I have some Pinyin, ZhuYin, WuBi, etc. table methods that 
will be added soon.

7. I'm currently working on a popup list of input methods to choose from 
to avoid having to cycle through all the possibilities with ALT_R+SHIFT_R.

8. A visual keyboard and visual keyboard layout creator are planned.

9. A future improvement will be to make this approach smaller for 
embedded systems. It doesn't use much memory now, but it can easily be 
slimmed down even farther. The code is currently less than 100K and I 
hope to keep the final release with all the tools under 250K.

MIM (My Input Methods) is *almost* ready for end users. I am adding 
support for a user-specific config file and code for the Han table-based 
input methods (which present multiple candidates at one time).

Anyone interested can email for a copy of the source as it is now.
--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mark Leisher
Computing Research Lab              We find comfort among those who
New Mexico State University         agree with us, growth among those
Box 30001, MSC 3CRL                 who don't.
Las Cruces, NM  88003                 -- Frank A. Clark