gujaraatii hindii maraaThii sa.nskRRita baa.nlaa tamiz kannaDa telugu gurmukhii sa.nskRRita

English-Encoded Text converted to Indian Language Scripts Output in PostScript, GIF image, PDF, or HTML (Latin1 or Unicode) formats: Supports:   Gujarati,   Hindi,   Marathi,   Sanskrit,   Bengali,   Tamil,   Kannada,   Telugu,   Gurmukhi,   Romanized Sanskrit. Reference documents: Table showing ITRANS Encoding for all scripts Separate and detailed documentation on each Indian Language Script: ITRANS Online Docs. Quick reference ITRANS encoding table.

Online Interface to ITRANS

Tips, Examples, and Caveats

• To enter English text, surround it with ## ... ##
  [Both start and end should be enclosed with "##" - two hash-marks]
  Use same technique to enter any punctuation other text that should not be processed by ITRANS.
  The percent character % is a comment character in ITRANS - everything from a % to the end of the line will be ignored.

• To use multiple languages or multiple text sizes, specify {script-textsize} in the text itself. You can use the buttons on the form to enter that command automatically after selecting the appropriate language script/text size value. Note that if all your text is to a single size and a single script, there is no need to use the "Enter ..." buttons, and that these commands apply only to the "Verse" and "Prose" text formats; they are not used for other text formats.

• If the text format "ITRANS .itx input" is choosen, or if a filename is uploaded and the name of the file ends in ".itx", the input will be treated specially --- such text will be directly processed by ITRANS (LaTeX mode), without any pre-processing by this Online Interface to ITRANS (the {script-size} commands will not be processed). Example ITRANS .itx input.

• If the text format "ISONGS .s input" is choosen or if a filename is uploaded and the name of the file ends in ".s", the input will be treated specially --- such text will be processed as if the input were a ITRANS Song Book file, as shown in this ISONGS .s Example (2000+ .s files are available at the ITRANS Song Book archive). Example ISONGS .s input.

• Examples of the various options for the "Text Format":
  Prose,   Verse,   ITRANS .itx input,   and   ISONGS .s input  

• For advanced users: list of common errors and fixes on using this interface. [Not all tips applicable to this interface.]

• The button "Enter {script-textsize} below" will work only if JavaScript is enabled. All other features should work on any browser that supports forms.

• To view the .ps or .pdf files, the best viewer is Ghostscript with Ghostview or GSview. Using Adobe Acrobat for viewing PDF files results in very poor quality screen displays.

  If Ghostscript/GSview also displays text with jaggies, check to see that Anti-Aliaising is on - go to Media -> Display Settings, and select "4" bits for both "Text Alpha" and "Graphics Alpha".

HTML Output Issues

• HTML output is created in two formats: ISO-Latin1 (user-defined) encoding and Unicode UTF-8 encoding.

• Consider the HTML Latin1 output to be a quick but approximate way to test your input, the best formatted output is only available in GIF, PS, or PDF formats. The HTML Unicode output could be of use in certain cases - if you have a platform that supports Indian Languages using Unicode, you can then cut and paste or load the HTML Unicode output to your word-processor, and use that to edit and format your text as required.

HTML Unicode (UTF-8) Encoding

• For the Unicode UTF-8 format: there must be compatible Unicode fonts installed on your system for viewing.
  For Windows, there are a few Unicode fonts available, you can search for them on the web. One such font: Office 2000 - Arial Unicode MS Download [ 15 MBytes ]. Note that this font does not have conjunct consonants - it uses viraam to denote a half-consonant.

• The Unicode output can be viewed correctly on your computer if there is a Unicode font with support for Indian Language Scripts installed, and the web browser is configured to use that font for Unicode UTF-8 documents.

• If the browser is unable to display text in Indian Languages, but you know your platform has a Unicode font and Unicode text editor, another option is to save the output file to local disk, and open it using your text editor (like Word 2000 or Office XP), and changing the text to a Unicode font that has Indian Language characters.

• Browser settings: Netscape 4.77: Click on Edit -> Preferences -> Appearance -> Fonts. For the encoding "Unicode", select a Indian Language Unicode font for both the "Variable Width Font" and "Fixed Width Font". For IE 5.x: It is unclear how IE selects fonts - it does not show Unicode as a text encoding (Tools -> Internet Options -> General -> Fonts). There is a "Devanagari" choice available here, but there seems to be no way to assign currently available fonts to both "Web Page Font" and "Plain Text Font" for Devanagari. So, this may not work with IE at all, Microsoft is messy as usual. The only available option in that case is to save the output file to disk, as mentioned in a previous paragraph.

HTML ISO-Latin1 (User-Defined) Encoding

• The ISO Latin1 encoding is actually a "User Defined" encoding, and it can be viewed correctly only if the browser allows "fake" ISO Latin1 fonts (i.e., they have 256 glyphs, but actually contain Indic Script characters) to be used in a document.

• Only a few language scripts supported: Hindi/Marathi/Sanskrit, Gujarati, Bengali, Romanized Sanskrit. Even for these scripts, the output is approximate and punctuation is not handled very well.

• Only Microsoft Windows platforms will likely be able to display the HTML output. Internet Explorer 4.0 (or newer), on any platform, may be able to display the pages without requiring any font installation (embedded font objects used), but Netscape or any other browser will require installation of the TrueType fonts used in the output.

  [May 2001: Only Xdvng and NCS_CSX+ fonts are currently embedded, so as to keep the page loading times as low as possible. Bengali and Gujarati fonts need to be manually installed on all systems.]

  Here are the fonts for each supported script:

    Xdvng for Hindi, Marathi, Sanskrit: xdvng.ttf
    ItxGuj for Gujarati: itxguj.ttf
    ItxBeng for Bengali: itxbeng.ttf
    NCS_CSX+ for Romanized Sanskrit: ncpr____.ttf      [ from Dr. John Smith's FTP Site - Fonts ]

  All the fonts above are freeware, and copyrights are held by their authors. Visit the ITRANS section for complete documentation.

• Browser settings: Netscape 4.7: This should work without any settings. If not, use the View -> Character Set to select "User-Defined", hopefully that will fix the display. For IE 5.x: Click View -> Encoding, and select Auto-Select. Or, force select "User Defined". Even after installing the fonts and tweaking the browser settings, the Indic Script display may be inaccurate.

More fonts and other information available at other sites on the web:

• Fonts for Classical and Vedic Sanskrit and other languages of India in TrueType, PostScript Type 1, Unicode and OpenType Font formats. Website maintained by Ulrich Stiehl, Heidelberg, Germany.