Keyboard layouts
It is obvious that each typable writing system has to have its own keyboard layouts. In addition, there are numerous rearrangements of keyboards for specific languages and countries. Many languages require specific letters not used in other languages. As a result, most locales have their own keyboard layouts, in some cases several.
The following examples, from Debian Linux keyboard layouts, are all incomplete. For alphabets with upper- and lower-case, only the lower-case is shown. No attempt has been made to indicate combining diacritics and other composed characters. See the images linked from the various language names for further details.
See also Keyboard Files for an explanation of Linux keyboard definitions.
Latin Alphabet
Latin keyboards mostly fall into a few basic arrangements, with many lesser variations to accommodate special characters. The most common are
QWERTY
Standard English-language keyboard
` 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 - =
q w e r t y u i o p [ ] \
a s d f g h j k l ; ´
z x c v b n m , . /
` 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 - =
q ü e r t y u i o p ö ğ \
a s d f g h j k l ı ə
z x c v b n m ç ş .
` ă â ê ô ` ~' đ - ₫
q w e r t y u i o p ư ơ \
a s d f g h j k l ; '
z x c v b n m , . /
Dvorak
US Alternate Standard Keyboard (ASK)
ANSI X3.207:1991 (previously X4.22-1983), "Alternate Keyboard Arrangement for Alphanumeric Machines"
` 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 [ ]
' , . p y f g c r l / = \
a o e u i d h t n s -
; q j k x b m w v z
` [ ] p f m l j 4 3 2 1 \
; q b y u r s o ^ 6 5 =
k c d t h e a z 8 7 -
' x g v w n i , 0 9
` 1 2 3 4 j l m f p / [ ]
5 6 q > o r s u y b ; =
7 8 z a e h t d c k -
9 0 x , i n w v g '
Norwegian Dvorak
| 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 + \
å , . p y f g c r l ' ~ <
a o e u i d h t n s -
æ q j k x b m w v z
Swedish Dvorak
§ 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 +
å ä ö p y f g c r l , "'
a o e u i d h t n s -
. q j k x b m w v z
French AZERTY
² & é " ' ( - è _ ç à ) =
a z e r t y u i o p ^$ *
q s d f g h j k l m ù
w x c v b n , ; : !
German QWERTZ
^ 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 ß
q w e r t z u i o p ü + #
a s d f g h j k l ö ä
y x c v b n m , . -
Greek
Follows various Latin layouts to some degree. There are a number of other Greek layouts, including Polytonic Greek for Classical literature.
` 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 - =
; ς ε ρ τ υ θ ι ο π [ ] \
α σ δ φ γ η ξ κ λ
ζ χ ψ ω β ν μ , . /
Cyrillic
There are four keyboard layouts for Russian, with variants for other languages written in Cyrillic. During the Soviet period, there were more than 200 of them. Several of the newly independent states of Central Asia have changed to other alphabets, according to national preference, including Arabic, Latin, and Mongolian. (The independent former Soviet republic of Mongolia returned to Cyrillic soon thereafter. The Chinese province of Mongolia continues to use its traditional alphabet.)
Russian
This is the standard Russian layout for Linux systems.
ё 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 - =
й ц у к е н г ш щ з х ъ \
ф ы в а п р о л д ж э
я ч с м и т ь б ю /
Ukrainian
' 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 - =
й ц у к е н г ш щ з х ї ґ
ф і в а п р о л д ж є
я ч с м и т ь б ю /
Mongolian
= 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 е щ
ф ц у ж э н г ш ү з к ъ !
й ы б ө а х р о л д п
я ч ё с м и т ь в ю
Uzbek
ё 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 ў қ
й ц у к е н г ш х ъ ғ ҳ \
ф з в а п р о л д ж э
я ч с м и т ь б ю .
Tajik
ё 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 - =
й ц у к е н г ш ¸ з х ъ \
ф ы в а п р о л д ж э
я ч с м и т ь б ю /
Indic
Other
Armenian
՝ ֆ ձ – , ։ ՞ ․ ՛ ) օ է ղ
ճ փ բ ս մ ո ւ կ ը թ ծ ց »
ջ վ գ ե ա ն ի տ հ պ ր
ժ դ չ յ զ լ ք խ շ ռ
Thai
_ ๅ / - ภ ถ ุ ึ ค ต จ ข ช
ๆ ไ ำ พ ะ ั ี ร น ย บ ล ฃ
ฟ ห ก ด เ ้ ่ า ส ว ง
ผ ป แ อ ิ ื ท ม ใ ฝ
[ Pattachote]
_ = ๒ ๓ ๔ ๕ ู ๗ ๘ ๙ ๐ ๑ ๖
็ ต ย อ ร ่ ด ม ว แ ใ ฌ ๅ
้ ท ง ก ั ี า น เ ไ ข
บ ป ล ห ิ ค ส ะ จ พ
TIS-820.2538
๏ ฿ / - ภ ถ ุ ึ ค ต จ ข ช
ๆ ไ ำ พ ะ ั ี ร น ย บ ล ฅ
ฟ ห ก ด เ ้ ่ า ส ว ง
ผ ป แ อ ิ ื ท ม ใ ฝ
Lao
ຢ ຟ ໂ ຖ ຸ ູ ຄ ຕ ຈ ຂ ຊ ໍ ົ ໄ ຳ ພ ະ ິ ີ ຣ ນ ຍ ບ ລ ໜ ັ ຫ ກ ດ ເ ້ ່ າ ສ ວ ງ ຜ ປ ແ ອ ຶ ື ທ ມ ໃ ຝ
Burmese
` ၁ ၂ ၃ ၄ ၅ ၆ ၇ ၈ ၉ ၀ - ၒ
ဪ ဲ ာ ီ ူ ဗ ဟ ဂ ဒ ဇ ဍ ည ၎
ဩ ဧ ္ ိ ု ပ ရ က တ စ ဋ
၌ ့ မ န ဗ လ သ , . /
Dzongkha/Tibetan
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Dzongkha is the principal language of Bhutan.
༉ ༡ ༢ ༣ ༤ ༥ ༦ ༧ ༨ ༩ ༠ ༔ །
ཀ ཁ ག ང ི ུ ེ ོ ཅ ཆ ཇ ཉ ཝ
ཏ ཐ ད ན པ ཕ བ མ ཙ ཚ ཛ
ཞ ཟ འ ཡ ར ལ ཤ ས ཧ ཨ
More keyboards needed.
- Hebrew and Yiddish
- Arabic and related, including [ Urdu, Hausa, Farsi, and more
- Georgian
- Ethiopic
- Sinhala
- Thaana
- Cambodian
- Mongolian traditional alphabet
- Korean Hangeul
- Chinese Zhuyin (Bopomofo)
- Japanese hiragana and [ katakana]
- Canadian Aboriginal Syllabics
- Cherokee
- Yoruba
- Igbo
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See also Input methods for typing languages whose character sets will not fit on a single keyboard layout.
External Links
- Keyboard stickers for numerous languages. Images of keyboard maps are provided for most supported languages.