Shabda-Brahma and South Asian (Indian etc.) Languages: A Specific Discussion

Independent Sites Offering the SB-Supported TT-Fonts:
 Kiran (Hindi/Marathi)   Aadarsha Ratne Int. (Assamese) Site1 & Site 2

(Should have Aadarsha Ratne Internet, and preferably also Kiran, Installed in PC)
 

Even though Shabda-Brahma is a powerful tool for fast word-processing in English and other languages of European origin, it is an even more powerful tool when used in Indian/ South-Asian Languages such as Assamese, Bengali, Hindi etc. This happens because of two major reasons. The first one is that the South-Asian language fonts almost always requires a lot of cumbersome key-combinations, particularly ones involving the Shift key. (The numbers of characters in most South-Asian Languages is quite high, while they have to be accommodated within the same keyboard.) This causes more difficulty in typing in a South-Asian language, and so the auto-suggestions and shorthand-abbreviations in SB become particularly handy there. The second is that the words in South-Asian languages almost always have frequently encountered conjunct consonants (juktakshar-s), which unnaturally increase the number of characters to be typed, even for the words that look apparently small  (not to speak of the famously longer words in South-Asian languages). So the reduction caused by SB in even the number of keystrokes (in addition to their oddity) becomes significant in South-Asian languages. In Assamese and in Hindi, optional on-screen keyboards (for the two pre-assigned fonts) have also been developed that'll facilitate typing and keyboard-learning to inexperienced users in those fonts.

To get the numerous and complicated conjunct consonants into the text, SB nowadays uses the peculiar symbolizer technology devised by this developer, originally available only in the tiny freeware application 'Text-Symbolizer' downloadable from the developer's webpage. The term 'symbolizer' indicates that in most Indian-language fonts the conjunct consonants (juktakshar-s) are represented by symbols i.e., special characters, while the symbols themselves need not be directly typed (inserted), but may be generated from characteristic key-combinations, generally having a link character such as "`". (This particular character is the vyanjan sign in the Aadarsha Ratne family of South-Asian fonts, and two examples of such characteristic key-combinations therein is n`d`w and j`j`w.) Thus in symbolizer technology, there's always an input text-file which doesn't contain the symbols (but contains only symbol-generator key-combinations), and an output text-file that contains the symbols i.e., the conjunct consonants etc.. Also, in symbolizer technology the symbol-generation instruction-list should be user-modifiable, as is the case with both SB and Text-Symbolizer. In SB, the symbolizer facility is activated when one chooses the (so-called) Assamese or Hindi script in SB and then finally attempts an HTML-Export for the typed text file: in that case the written text file is the input text-file for the inbuilt symbolizer, and the SB-Exported HTML file is its output text-file.

In SB, the 'Assamese script' is associated with a fully pre-defined symbolizer instruction-list compatible with the Aadarsha Ratne Internet TTF font, while the 'Hindi script' is associated with a similarly pre-defined symbolizer instruction-list compatible with the Kiran TTF font. If you need to use the symbolizer facility in another South-Asian language such as Telugu or Oriya etc., you'll obviously need to have this list self-defined or defined by a third-party. However, if you want to write Bengali using the Aadarsha Ratne Internet TTF font (ARI-font is known more as an Assamese font), no such thing needs to be done, as most conjunct consonants are shared by the Assamese and Bengali scripts, and two special characters 'ru' and 'roo' will be specially taken care of when you'll be answering a question (after you activate the symbolizer) regarding whether you're writing Assamese or Bengali. To increase the convenience of bilingual writers in Assamese and Bengali (such as this developer), even the same set of auto-suggestions consisting of the shared vocabulary of the two languages may be used with the Assamese spelling (with Assamese 'v' & 'r' characters), which will be auto-converted to Bengali spelling if you specify at the end that you want the language to be considered as Bengali!

The symbolizer conversion instruction- lists for the Hindi/ Marathi/ Nepali script using the Kiran TTF (true-type font, was developed by Kiran Bhave, refer to kiranfont.com), and for the Assamese/ Bengali script using the Aadarsha Ratne Internet TTF (developed by Rabin Deka, refer to assam.faithweb.com -- an older version of this font all along being used in SB is being hosted by someone called 'Proud Assamese') are displayed in the following table (if the Hindi/ Assamese characters are not being properly displayed, make sure these two TT fonts are installed in your PC, and view this file in Microsoft FrontPage/ Microsoft Word etc.):

I. Hindi Script using the Kiran TTF:
r\D      DÜ
r\Z      ZÜ
r\ja     jaÜ
r\f      fÜ
ma\A     É
ma\ga     È
h\ma     Ó
d\ma     Ô
T\T      Õ
T\z      Ö
D\D     ×
D\Z     Ø
na\na     Ùa
k\va     Û
kx\va    Û
h\r     Ò
~a\{    Ú
Because of possible problem in display of the characters, the list is repeated below in another form:

II. Assamese Script using the Aadarsha Ratne Internet TTF (also works for Aadarsha Ratne New TTF):

j`j`w        Òµ
m`B`r         ð
n`d`w         ®d³
n`t`r         ¯«
n`t`u           ¯ª
t`t`w        ݵ
m`B\           ð
n`t\           ¯«
s`t\           û
B`r           í
D`b           D¸
D`w           D¸
D\u             D\Â
E`N          ¦
M`g          Ð
M`k         Ï
N`Q          Û
N`Z         Ü
N`j         ×
N`q         ®q
P`l        P¿
S`c         À¤
S`l        S¾
S`m        Àm
S`n        S°
S`w        S³
S\u          S\Â
X`m      X»
Z`Z      Ú
b`D       ì
b`d       ë
b`j      ê
b`l       b¾
c`C       ¤C
c`c       ¤c
d`B      ã
d`D       á
d`b       â
d`d       à
d`m       d»
d`w       â
g`D       Î
g`b       g³
g`g       Í
g`l       g¾
g`w       g³
h`N       þ
h`l       h¾
h`m       ÿ
h`n       h°
j`b       j³
j`j      Ò
j`n       Ô
j`w       j³
j`z      Ó
k`b      k´
k`k     É
k`l      k¿
k`q       Ê
k`r      ß¡
k`s      Ë
k`t      Ý¡
k`w      k´
l`Z       ô
l`b       l³
l`g       ½g
l`k      ó
l`l       õ
l`p      ½p
l`q      ½q
l`w      l³
m`B      ï
m`P      ¹P
m`b       î
m`l       m¾
m`m       ¹m
m`n       m°
m`p       ¹p
n`C       Ö
n`D       æ
n`Q       ä
n`T      ¯Å
n`Z      Ü
n`b      ¯³
n`c      Õ
n`d      ®d
n`j      ×
n`m      ®m
n`n      ç
n`q      ®q
n`s      ®s
n`t      ¯©
n`w      ¯³
p`l      p¾
p`n      p°
p`p      é
p`q      ²q
p`t      è
q`q       Ù
s`K       ÃK
s`P      ÃP
s`T       ÄÅ
s`k      ú
s`l       ľ
s`m       Äm
s`n       Ä°
s`p      Ãp
s`r       Ä\
s`t      Ä©
s`w      ü
t`T      Þ
t`b      t´
t`m      t»
t`n      ¨°
t`r      ß
t`t      Ý
t`w      t´
x`N      §
x`P     ÁP
x`Q       ù
x`k     Ák
x`m      Ám
x`p      Áp
x`q      ø
B\        í
HT      Þ
Hm      t»
Hn      ¨°
Ht      Ý
Su         ö
gu         Ì
hu         ý
k\       ß¡
rU        ò
ru        ñ
t\        ß

This developer hopes that native speakers in the various major South-Asian languages will come forward to create symbolizer instruction-lists (that'll be common to both SB and the Text-Symbolizer freeware) for the popular TTF fonts in each of the major South-Asian scripts, thereby create great convenience for everyone typing in those language-fonts, and in that process enrich the Text-Symbolizer freeware venture by this developer!

Figure: Shabda-Brahma with on-screen Assamese keyboard working on some Assamese text