বাক্ষর : Bengali Transliteration by Ensel Software

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বাঙলা লেখা হোক সহজ - সুনিয়ম সবসময় বাঙরেজি বর্ণমালা

An easy way to write Bengali using English letters following uniform rules

বাক্ষর = বাংলায় সাক্ষর = literate in Bengali or বাক খোর = যে বেশি বক বক করে

Principle and philosophy

Target users for this app

Modes

Bengali Alphabet and corresponding English letters

Compound letters

Sample texts

Principle and philosophy

• This open source app is a collection of self contained files which works in all browsers in all devices.
• It does not require internet to work (if you download all relevant files to your device)
• There is no dictionary - you get exactly what you type (though some basic word suggestions provided)
• Each letter (in your device keyboard) represents single sound.
• Letters are case sensitive. Please remember that some letters are used differently compared to English.
• There is no auto correction - it works here on the basis of exactly what you typed.

Differnece with Google Transliteration (Google Indic Keyboard)

• Google Transliteration requires internet to work (when typing in computer)
• It is difficult to quickly switch between English and Bengali words. Here you can just prefix words with # which you do not want to transliterate.
• This app uses deterministic mode transliteration where as Google uses predictive mode. In deterministic mode you exactly type what you want to write while in predictive mode, the app tries to figure out what you intend to type because same spelling can be interpreted in different ways.
• For example, when you type "ghora" in Google Transliteration, it offers you following options: ঘরা ঘোরা ঘোড়া ঘড়া
• You have to choose the correct one. But here all such spellings are different: ghora ghOra ghORa ghoRa
• Predictive mode is ambiguous where as deterministic mode is unambiguous!
• Predictive mode is more intuitive when you start but deterministic mode is faster when you learn the syntax!

ইংরিজি হরফে বাংলা লেখার মূল সমস্য়া হল কিছু মুষ্টিমেয় অক্ষর নিয়ে| এগুলো হল a অ বা আ হতে পারে, তাই এখানে o = অ আর a = আ | ও লিখব আমারা q দিয়ে| তেমনি শুধু t আর d আছে ত ট দ ড বোঝানোর জন্য় - তাই w আর x যাদের বাংলায় ভূমিকা নেই, সেগুলো কে এখানে কাজে লাগানো হয়েছে যেমন t = ত, d = দ, w = ড, x = ট | য বা য-ফলা কে লেখা যাবে z দিয়ে| এর ফলে আমার ইংরিজি বর্ণ মালার সব কটি অক্ষর কেই কাজে লাগালাম এবং কোন confusion ও রইল না|

কিছু বর্ণ একাধিক ভাবে লেখা যেতে পারে যেমন q বা বড় হাতের O দুটো ই ও হিসেবে চলবে| তেমনি বড় হাতের T আর D যথাক্রমে ট আর ড বোঝাবে| বড় হাতের R হবে ড় | বিস্তারিত বর্ণনার জন্য় নিচে সম্পুর্ণ অক্ষর তালিকা দেখুন|

আরেকটি সুবিধে হল যে আপনি অন্য় কোথাও ইংরিজি হরফে কিছু লিখে এখানে paste করে দিলে সেটি তৎক্ষণাৎ বাংলায় অনুলিখিত হয়ে যাবে.

This app also uses two boxes model for writing Bengali. In one box model like Google's Indic writing method, you write English letters and as soon as you finish a word, it will show you possible words. The original English script you wrote is not preserved. But in this app, due to two-box approach, the original English text, what you have written, is also preserved.

There are advantages of this approach.

You can see what English letter combination led to the Bengali word formation. So over time you will familiarize yourself with the Bakkhor way of writing.

If you want to write Bengali somewhere but only English letters are avaialble to you, then you can write in Bakkhor spellings and then when you paste the content in this app, entire text will be converted to Bengali at an instant. So, you have the option of saving both Bengali and English Bakkhor text.

You also have the option to type using Bengali keyboard. To get this mode, please click on Bangla Keyboard link at the bottom of Bakkhor page. This mode is intended for touch screen devices without physical keyboards.

Target users for this app

• এই অ্যাপ মুলতঃ যারা কম্পিউটারে keyboard দিয়ে দ্রুত টাইপ করতে চান তাঁদের জন্য়|
• এই অ্যাপ শিশুদের (বা বাঙ্লা শিক্ষার্থীর) যুক্তাক্ষর ছাড়া বাঙ্লা শেখা ও type করার জন্য় ও উপযোগী|
• এই অ্যাপ বাঙলার orthography বুঝতে সাহায্য় করে

আপনি যদি মুলতঃ mobile phone এ অল্প বাঙ্লা লেখেন এবঙ্ Google Indic keyboard নিয়ে খুশি আছেন, তাহলে এই অ্যাপ আপনার জন্য় নয়|

অনুগ্রহ করে এই অ্যাপ কে গুগুলের সঙ্গে তুলনা করবেন না| গুগুল Indic keyboard টি predictive মোডে কাজ করে, এই অ্যাপ টি deterministic মোডে কাজ করে|

Deterministic mode = computer maps your keystroke to individual characters. Like when you type in English using normal computer keyboard.

Predictive mode = here each keystroke may correspond to multiple letters (i.e. indeterministic) so computer tries to guess what word you are typing based on its internal dictionary.

Modes

When you type, there will not be any যুক্তাক্ষর by default.

If you end a word with / then whole word will be written as যুক্তাক্ষর automatically.

If you want precise control of which words you want to make যুক্তাক্ষর, then do not end word with / but use either ' or ; in between letters which you want to convert to যুক্তাক্ষর.

Typing in single case vs combining upper and lower case letters

You can type fastest when you are using single case. If you combine lower case and upper case letters while tryping, every time you type Shift key and another letter, it slows down typing speed because it forces you to pause momentarily. However, since English keyboard does not have enough letters to cover entire Bengali alphabet, in order to use lower case letters only for faster typing, it requires to be creative with some letters. For example, typing Shift + R to type ড় is actually slower than typing rr to type ড় - even though you are pressing same number of keys in each case.

To offer flexibility, this app offers multiple ways to type few letters. For example, to type ট you can either use T or x. In one hand it is intuitive to use t for ত and T for ট but on other hand it make sense to use x for ট because x is unused in Bengali so it it can be remapped for faster typing. Similarly, q, w, z have been remapped for Bengali typing.

These letters were mapped after analyzing large volume of Bengali text to understand letter frequency in Bengali.

If you don't like this mapping, since this app is open source, you can change mapping if you know how to code in JavaScript.

There are 2 rows of suggested and predicted words

The first row (in blue) shows suggested words in case you have unintentionally mis-spelt your words.

The second row (in purple) shows most frequently used words in your written text. It orders words by frequency so that more frequently used words in your text will be shown towards left.

Clicking on the word will add the word to your Bengali text.

This feature may not be available in all mobile devices!

You can re-size the text boxes in computer browser by dragging the lower right corner of the textbox.

There is a 1-box mode layout available. You can select it from main menu on the left. When you are reviewing a large amount of Bangla text and want to insert words in the middle, this mode will be beneficial.

You can also find 1-box mode useful once you have memorized the keyboard layout as it gives to more area to look at your overall writing.

Alphabet/বর্ণমালা

Vowels/স্বরবর্ণ

Consonants/ব্যাঞ্জনবর্ণ

kar/কার examples

Compound letters / যুক্তাক্ষর

Use ' to merge letters to create compound letters.

Sample texts

Paste these examples and convert to Bengali. You can get an idea how to type here by studying these examples.

Instead of ' or ; inside words, you can also precede words by / to write that word as juktakkhor.

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