Arabic Keyboard Layouts

Only the first one of these is included "pre-built" (that is, as a regular keyboard file). All the others must be "built" (by selecting Build from the Tools, Keyboard, Setup/Select Defaults, and after the Arabic alphabet has been selected).

All six Arabic keyboards include enhanced number keys, allowing the keyboard to insert one of three distinct sets of numbers:

•	"European" Arabic numbers (1, 2, 3, etc.)

•	The Farsi and Urdu alternative glyphs for these Arabic numbers

These options are displayed in the bottom third of the Select Keyboard Layout dialog (Tools, Keyboards, Setup/Select Defaults), and can be changed at any time.

Although in most cases, keyboards for Arabic proper would use option 2, while Farsi and Urdu keyboards would use option 3, in some contexts the "European" Arabic numbers are increasingly being used. By enabling these three user-selected options for each keyboard, the number of possible shipping layouts thus triples, to 18, without actually increasing the number of distinct keyboard files.

These configurable numbers merely determine which characters (regular "European" Arabic numbers, the codings for Arabic proper, or those for the Farsi/Urdu variations) get inserted into the file when those keys are used. They do not insert a "smart" character into the file--once a character has been inserted into a document, it remains that character, and cannot be changed just because the configuration of the active keyboard is changed.

As anybody familiar with typing in one of the languages that uses the Arabic alphabet will already know, there are many different "regular" and so-called mnemonic layouts available. (A quick search of the web will make this very clear.) Although there are competing layouts, many of which may be better than the ones adopted here, the Nota Bene "regular" layouts largely follow the Windows standards, while the mnemonic versions draw from other sources (the Urdu mnemonic, for example, is based on that proposed by the Center for Research in Urdu Language Processing [CRULP]), modified as necessary.

•	The Ctrl+Alt and Ctrl+Alt+Shift states are identical, and include (a) the European Arabic numbers, along with the characters from the top row of the U.S. keyboard and (b) special "forced form" characters, as described below

•	The number keys on the top row of the unshifted keyboard are configurable, as described above.

•	Ctrl+spacebar is defined to enter a narrow ("thin") space

If for any reason the supplied keyboard layouts do not meet your needs, you can always create a customized keyboard, as described under Help, Customization and Other Programming, Customized Keyboards. When doing so for Arabic, there are two special kinds of key assignments:

•	Those that let you change the configuration of the numbers on the fly (i.e., without building duplicate keyboards), as described above

•	Those that modify the forms (stand alone, initial, medial, final) of the characters, as described under Character Forms below

As with any other alphabet, you can display the active keyboard layout by clicking Ctrl+Shift+K. You can resize this dialog using the arrow keys on the bottom right, and drag it off to the side so you can refer to it as you type, without it covering your text. As in other cases, the display of the keyboard diagram will shift to the Ctrl+Alt/Ctrl+Alt+Shift state if you simply hold down the specified shift keys, without typing any character (it will return to the regular state when you press any other key).

Arabic: Keyboard Layouts