Typing in different scripts / input methods / etc

MusicBrainz
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For editors who often edit data in languages/scripts that you don’t know, I’m curious how you all type them?

Decades ago, I tried out compose keys for accents in the latin alphabet, then eventually settled on m17n-db’s rfc1345 input method which supports latin, greek, cyrillic, hebrew, arabic, and more. Lately though I’ve been feeling more of its limitations and wondering if there’s something better and more up-to-date.

Does anybody here know of other options? Is this a thing that other people wish could be improved, or is it just me? (I’ve also been thinking about writing a new input method inspired by RFC 1345 but with more features like search and more characters, but it’s probably only worth it if it would help other people too.)

P.S. I wasn’t sure whether to post this is MusicBrainz or General chatter, since this is related to editing MBz, but only loosely. Let me know if I should move it?

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I use an input editor function built into macOS that converts certain Latin character sequences into characters in whatever language I’m typing in. I have keyboard imputs for Chinese, Japanese, Korean and Russian set up, as well as an extended Latin keyboard called ABC Extended that lets me type accent marks not covered by the standard US keyboard.

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I use Copy and Paste. Find the tracklist on a different release or some other site. Meainly from fear of making a typo that says something rude. :grinning_face_with_smiling_eyes:

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I have a French OS and keyboard for my mother language.
English can be typed with them (less characters).

I use the same IME thing as @HibiscusKazeneko in Windows and Linux, for other foreign languages I know (Vietnamese and Japanese).
I also use an old NJStar Japanese word processor for its dictionary features.

I use BabelPad to check languages I don’t know, character by character (the status bar displays the Unicode name for the current character).

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Thanks all. I guess I’m a bit unusual in that I don’t like switching input methods (mostly because I forget which one I’m using), so I really want one that handles as many languages as possible? Maybe I’ll keep using what I’ve been using, or maybe I’ll write something else myself.

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Don’t worry, it’s visible what IME is active, on desktop.

90% of the time you’re using your native language and sometimes you change with Alt+Shift for a few words.

And on Android, I’ve added English, Vietnamese and Japanese to the default French keyboard.

What language is active is also visible on smartphone (in the space bar).

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Even on a smartphone when it’s in the space bar I often don’t notice and it takes a minute for me to figure out why swiping words isn’t working. On the desktop where it’s off in the corner of the screen, I’m even less likely to notice.

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I ended up making a new thing: GitHub - dseomn/unimnim: input method that uses mnemonics to input as much of Unicode as possible

So far it only supports Cyrillic, Greek, Hebrew, Latin, and a whole bunch of non-script things like punctuation, but I’d be happy to add more if anybody else is interested.

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