RFC: scim and gnome 2.18

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.

This would require only small changes to gnome.

The keyboard preferences dialog would need to support
enabling this:

Add a checkbox to the 'Keyboard' tab - something like
'Enable complex
input methods'. If scim is not installed then this will be
disabled,
and something somewhere will tell you how to install scim to
get this
functionality.

If this is checked then scim will be started at startup
Behind the scenes scim will be configured to start with X.
In Debian
there is a script called im-switch that sets up the
environment for
IMEs. Hopefully that could be made into a freedesktop
project for
other distros to use as well. Or if there is another way to
do it that
would be good as well.

There will be an extra button on keyboard preferences to
call scim
config e.g. Complex &Input.

This requires X to be restarted so it would be useful to
have a way to
log out and restart X rather than having to do a full reboot
.

Regards,
Daniel

[1] http://www.scim-im.org/

P.S. I haven't found discussion about this before in list
archives but
the thought was vaguely mentioned at GUADEC so now would be
a good
time to discuss it.

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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.nms
u.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
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On Fri, 2006-09-08 at 17:05 +0200, 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.
> 
> This would require only small changes to gnome.
> 
> The keyboard preferences dialog would need to support
enabling this:
> 
> Add a checkbox to the 'Keyboard' tab - something like
'Enable complex
> input methods'. If scim is not installed then this
will be disabled,
> and something somewhere will tell you how to install
scim to get this
> functionality.
> 
> If this is checked then scim will be started at startup
> Behind the scenes scim will be configured to start with
X. In Debian
> there is a script called im-switch that sets up the
environment for
> IMEs. Hopefully that could be made into a freedesktop
project for
> other distros to use as well. Or if there is another
way to do it that
> would be good as well.
> 
> There will be an extra button on keyboard preferences
to call scim
> config e.g. Complex &Input.
> 
> This requires X to be restarted so it would be useful
to have a way to
> log out and restart X rather than having to do a full
reboot .
> 
> Regards,
> Daniel
> 
> [1] http://www.scim-im.org/
> 
> P.S. I haven't found discussion about this before in
list archives but
> the thought was vaguely mentioned at GUADEC so now
would be a good
> time to discuss it.

I ommited to reply here as well.

Just to remind, the discussion logs of the Keyboard
discussion that took
place in July are available at
http://wiki.freedesktop.org/wiki/KeyboardInputDiscussion


Thanks Daniel for bringing this up,
Simos


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Hi Daniel,
So glad to hear that you are considering integrating SCIM
into GNOME.
That's excellent.

On 9/8/06, Daniel Glassey <dglasseygmail.com> 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.
>
> This would require only small changes to gnome.
>
> The keyboard preferences dialog would need to support
enabling this:
>
> Add a checkbox to the 'Keyboard' tab - something like
'Enable complex
> input methods'. If scim is not installed then this will
be disabled,
> and something somewhere will tell you how to install
scim to get this
> functionality.
In windows, if input method support is not installed (for
most western
locales/versions of windows), the first time you check that
checkbox,
a message can be poped up to tell users how to install SCIM.
(maybe
providing a hook for distros here so they can start their
installation
process automatically)

> If this is checked then scim will be started at
startup
> Behind the scenes scim will be configured to start with
X. In Debian
> there is a script called im-switch that sets up the
environment for
> IMEs. Hopefully that could be made into a freedesktop
project for
> other distros to use as well. Or if there is another
way to do it that
> would be good as well.
I agree freedesktop shall have a standard wrt input method

> There will be an extra button on keyboard preferences
to call scim
> config e.g. Complex &Input.
>
> This requires X to be restarted so it would be useful
to have a way to
> log out and restart X rather than having to do a full
reboot .
>
> Regards,
> Daniel
>
> [1] http://www.scim-im.org/
>
> P.S. I haven't found discussion about this before in
list archives but
> the thought was vaguely mentioned at GUADEC so now
would be a good
> time to discuss it.
>
> --
> I'm subscribed with delivery to gtk-i18n-list so only
cc me if that
> list is included in reply
>
>
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Daniel Glassey wrote:
> 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.
>
>   
Great idea!  I have wanted to work on closer integration of
Input 
Methods (IM) and GNOME for some time.
> Add a checkbox to the 'Keyboard' tab - something like
'Enable complex
> input methods'. If scim is not installed then this will
be disabled,
> and something somewhere will tell you how to install
scim to get this
> functionality.
>   
> If this is checked then scim will be started at
startup
> Behind the scenes scim will be configured to start with
X.
Ok.
> In Debian there is a script called im-switch that sets
up the environment for
> IMEs. Hopefully that could be made into a freedesktop
project for
> other distros to use as well. Or if there is another
way to do it that
> would be good as well.
>
>   
BTW in Fedora Core 6 we have added a simple user IM setup
tool called 
im-chooser written by Akira Tagoh to make it easier for
users to turn IM 
on or off.
> There will be an extra button on keyboard preferences
to call scim
> config e.g. Complex &Input.
>
>   
Ok
> This requires X to be restarted so it would be useful
to have a way to
> log out and restart X rather than having to do a full
reboot .
>   
In the longer term I would like to see even tighter IM
integration so 
that the desktop does not need to be restarted to activate
(or 
deactivate) IM.

Jens
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