virtual-keyboard

I have realized I need some sort of virtual keyboard so that I can type different alphabets faster with UK keyboard layout.

I have been inspired by this website in my trilingual language journey.

Dependencies

• Python (>=3.12) download here
• GTK (>=4) download here
• Sarabun font download here

Note: please don't do global system installation of python dependencies through pip, poetry can install it safely for you

Run with python

poetry shell && poetry install
python ./keyboard.py

Or roll your own binary

poetry shell && poetry install --with dev
poetry run pyinstaller keyboard.spec
./dist/keyboard

Linux Binaries

Grab the binary from releases for your OS then rename it to virtual-keyboard and move to /usr/local/bin

Create the virtual-keyboard.desktop in /usr/share/applications and copy the contents of this desktop file

FAQs

• Do you plan to add more languages?

We can consider as long as we don't break existing languages, I will not support chinese or japanese due to the complexity it brings.

• Why Python?

Safest way to touch GTK and not become a sociopath even if python binding is not feasible and has no docs.

• Why GTK?

I use GNOME so I wanted to feel the native experience even though I hate every library GLib ecosystem produce in raw complex macro-maniac C

• Will you support GTK3 or Python 2.7?

No, please use up-to-date software

TODOs

• Design the layout for buttons with label size and color
• Finish the text area input implementation with Gtk.Entry
• Add sub-menu to pick target languages
• Key Event presses follows target language mapping
• Port it to GTK 4