Since all Indic Languages are Unicode-only Languages, presently, Indic languages are supported only on WindowsXP and Windows 2000 operating systems.
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| Enabling Indic support on Windows XP |
1st Step: Enable Indic Functionality in the OS
- Go to Start -> Control Panel -> Date, Time, Language and Regional Options.
- Click on Regional and Language Options.
- Click on the Languages tab as shown below.
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- Under the heading 'Supplemental language support' check the item 'Install files for Complex Script and right-to-left languages (including Thai)'.
- Allow the OS to install necessary files from WindowsXP disc
- Reboot
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2nd Step: What to Select as User Locale, Location and System Locale?
- Click on the 'Regional Options' tab to set User Locale and Location.
- Under the heading 'Standards and format' select Hindi or any other language as your User Locale from the drop-down box. This selection will determine settings for numbers, currencies, times and dates as well as sorting rules for the language.
- Under the heading 'Location', select a country where you are physically located such as India.
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3rd Step: Setting-up the Indian Language Keyboards or Input Locales
- In Regional and Language Options panel, click on the Languages Tab.
- Once Languages tab is selected click on the 'Details' tab to install different input locales or Keyboards.
- Click on the 'Add' button to add a keyboard for a particular language.
- In the drop-down box select Hindi or Marathi as the Input Language.
- A corresponding keyboard layout/IME will be automatically selected as shown below. Click OK to close the dialog boxes.
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Similar to Windows 2000, WindowsXP also offers following Devanagari keyboard layouts such as
- Hindi-Traditional
- Hindi-Devanagari-Inscript
- Marathi
- Marathi-Devanagari-Inscript
- Konkani-Devanagari-Inscript
- Sanskrit-Devanagari-Inscript
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| The Hindi-Traditional and Marathi keyboards contain all the characters that are traditionally used in Hindi and Marathi and include English punctuation without the need to change to the English keyboard to get at the punctuation. It is the recommended keyboard for most users. |
| The Devanagari-Inscript keyboard contains an extended Devanagari character set that includes characters for transliterating into Devanagari from other Indian languages as well as some Sanskrit and ancient Vedic characters. This keyboard is recommended for special users. |
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| Enabling Indic support on Windows 2000 |
1st Step: Enable Indic Functionality in the OS
- Go to Start -> Settings -> Regional Options -> General (Tab)
- In the Language Settings for the System, enable Indic.
- Copy necessary files from the Windows 2000 disc.
- Reboot the computer after files have been copied.
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2nd Step: What to Select as User Locale and System Locale?
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| User Locale: |
Once Indic language support has been enabled in the OS, we can select any one of the available Indic languages as User Locale. For example we can select Hindi or Tamil as the User Locale. User Locale in turns determines the various settings/formats for numbers, currencies, date, and time. However it is not necessary to select an Indic language as User Locale. Instead, we can select English (US) as the User Locale, if the situation demands.
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| System Locale: |
| This Setting is invoked by clicking on the Set Default command button at the bottom of the Regional Options. |
| By design, no Indian language can be selected as the System Locale. English (US) or (UK) is the best choice in any situation. |
| 3rd Step: Setting-up the Indian Language Keyboards or Input Locales |
| In the 2nd step if you select an Indic language as User Locale, Windows will automatically add a keyboard for that language. |
Otherwise to add a keyboard for a particular language,
- Select the Input Locales tab
- Click on the Add button located under Input Language display Box.
- This will take you to Add Input Locale dialog Box as shown below.
- Select desired language in the Input Locale drop-down box.
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The Devanagari keyboard layouts available in Windows 2000 are
- Hindi-Traditional
- Hindi-Devanagari-Inscript
- Marathi
- Marathi-Devanagari-Inscript
- Konkani-Devanagari-Inscript
- Sanskrit-Devanagari-Inscript
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| The Hindi-Traditional and Marathi keyboards contain all the characters that are traditionally used in Hindi and Marathi and include English punctuation without the need to change to the English keyboard to get at the punctuation. It is the recommended keyboard for most users. |
The Devanagari-Inscript keyboard contains an extended Devanagari character set that includes characters for transliterating into Devanagari from other Indian languages as well as some Sanskrit and ancient Vedic characters. This keyboard is recommended for special users.
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