Keyboard Builder for eScriptorium ⌨️

This browser app lets you build virtual keyboards for eScriptorium with ease.

It's also useful if you want to transition from another transcription client with an already existing virtual keyboard, without having to manually add all your custom Unicode characters again (which is a drag!).

Features:

• Junicode2 as standard font for displaying a wide range of Unicodes. ↗ Junicode Font by Peter S. Baker
• Filter by Unicode categories (e.g. Greek and Coptic, Hebrew, Latin Extended-A ...) for easier access to the Unicode range you have in mind
• Search for a specific Unicode by name (e.g. "Greek Capital Letter Omega"). You don't have to memorize the complete name, a part is enough (e.g. Greek Cap) ...
• Paste a single Unicode character you copied elsewhere and add it to your keyboard
• Paste a string of Unicode characters (e.g. £q«±²ſē∓ↄ) and add each individual character to your keyboard automatically
• Adjust the order of your keyboard via drag and drop
• Adjust the layout of your keyboard by increasing or decreasing the column / row count of your grid (i.e. you can design a keyboard layout in a 2 x 10 grid or 4 x 5 and so forth...)
• Download your keyboard as an eScriptorium compatible .json file

Table of Contents

1. Requirements
2. Installation
3. Usage
4. Acknowledgement

Requirements

• Python 3.9 and above

Installation

1. Clone this repository

git clone https://github.com/th-schmidt/keyboardBuilder4eScriptorium/

2. Change to the project folder

cd keyboardBuilder4eScriptorium

3. Create a Python virtual environment

python -m venv venv

4. Activate your virtual environment

source venv/bin/activate

5. Install the app

pip install .

6. Run the app

>>> keybuilder --help
Usage: keybuilder [OPTIONS]

  Run the Keyboard Builder 4 eScriptorium web application server on the
  specified port and with the specified debug mode.

Options:
  --host TEXT     The hostname or IP address to listen on. Defaults to
                  127.0.0.1.
  --port INTEGER  The port number on which the server will run. Default is
                  8000.
  --debug         Enable or disable debug mode. Debug mode is enabled by
                  default.
  --help          Show this message and exit.

Usage

User guide

You can find a detailed user guide by clicking on the logo graphic in the top left corner.

Import an existing virtual keyboard

If you want to import an already existing virtual keyboard (e.g. in Transkribus) to eScriptorium you can use the Keyboard Builder like this:

1. Simply paste all Unicodes of your existing keyboard in a new Transkribus document without any whitespaces between them.
2. Copy the resulting string (e.g. £q«±²ſœē∓ↄ)
3. Paste this string to the "Paste character(s) here" field of the Keyboard Builder.
4. Click on the "Add Character(s)" button and every single unique character of the string will be added to your custom keyboard.

Acknowledgement

This app was built with help from OpenAI's GPT-4o and uses Junicode Font by Peter S. Baker, licensed under Open Font License, v. 1.1.