Updated Below A new Indic Keyboard released by the software collective Swathanthra Malayalam Computing allows users to type in 15 Indian languages on Android. The app is currently available as a free download on Google Play Store and is compatible with all Android devices running on Android version 4.1 (Jelly Bean) or later. This app was developed as part of the ongoing Government of India-supported Android R&D project of ICFOSS (International Centre For Free and Open Source Software), an independent organisation set up by the Kerala government to popularize open source software. Supported Languages: The app currently supports Indian languages like Assamese, Bengali, Gujarati, Hindi, Kannada, Malayalam, Marathi, Nepali, Oriya, Punjabi, Sanskrit, Sinhalese, Tamil, Telugu, Urdu. What’s worth noting here is the support for lesser spoken languages like Sanskrit. Remember that while other third-party input apps like Swiftkey, Swype and Adaptxt also offer Indic keyboards to users, these offer fewer options for Indian languages as of now: Adaptxt supports 12 languages while Swype supports four languages and Swiftkey offers a Hindi keyboard. Google also has a Hindi input & transliteration app on Android. How does it work? Once installed, users can open the app and follow the on-screen instructions to set the keyboard as their preferred input method and enable the languages of their preference. Alternately, one can also enable the keyboard from the language & input option in the phone settings, quite similar to other third party keyboard apps on Android. What’s interesting here is that the app offers three types of keyboard layouts…
