Package: libkmflcomp-dev (0.9.4-1)

Development files for libkmflcomp

KMFL stands for 'Keyboard Mapping For Linux'. It is effectively a 'soft' input method for X11 systems. KMFL is based on an intuitive keyboard description language that works well for the great majority of non-ideographic scripts. KMFL allows complex keyboard 'mappings' or 'layouts' to be defined in a natural, declarative way using a high-level language. It does not require a programming background in order to implement new layouts. It enforces well-formedness, and provides helpful visual feedback to the user as they type.

Although complex script rendering takes care of many of the complexities of a non-roman script, it is important to be able to generate and edit well-formed Unicode sequences of base and diacritic characters using the keyboard. It is also important to enforce well-formedness at the keyboard level. KMFL is able to do this by examining the surrounding characters (known as the context) when text is inserted or changed. Through this context-sensitivity, KMFL is also able to provide progressive visual feedback to the user when multi-key sequences are being entered, which is much more reassuring than when 'invisible' dead-key sequences are used. KMFL is also able to do in place editing to handle character reordering based on the surrounding context.

KMFL is based on a commercial product for Windows called Keyman from Tavultesoft. Keyman is a mature and successful product, and the definition language has been refined and strengthened over a long period of time in response to field needs. Tavultesoft was instrumental in the development of KMFL. Tavultesoft developed the platform-independent library, and SIL implemented the SCIM module. The result was KMFL, which is 100% compatible with Keyman at the keyboard definition source level.

A good explanation of the benefits and use of Keyman is available at http://www.tavultesoft.com/keyman/intro.php.

KMFL is implemented as a platform-independent library together with an IM-framework specific module. KMFL currently includes a SCIM (Smart Common Input Method) module that passes the mapping work on to KMFL.

There are currently a large number of keyboards available for Keyman for languages such as Tamil, Burmese, Lao, and Tlingit. KMFL allows these keyboards to be used under Linux.

This package contains the development libraries and headers to use libkmflcomp in an application.