Russian Phonetic Keyboard
Posted by Vadim on January 10, 2010
Download
If you just want the keyboard layout and don’t want to bother to read this post, here’s the download link.
My dad finally is using Windows 7. He’s very happy with the new OS but he had a huge complain. He wasn’t able to type Russian.
Of course Windows 7 has standard Russian keyboard layouts that looks like this:
If you not familiar with this layout, you’ll need to put stickers on every key to know where each letter is. What my dad needed is a phonetic Russian keyboard where Russian letters correspond more or less to English ones. For some reason I couldn’t find a free phonetic Russian keyboard layout that will work nice on Windows 7.
In my search I got across the Microsoft Keyboard Layout Creator. I was surprised how easy to create your own layout with this tool. It’s a little bit tedious but very easy.
This is the keyboard that my dad and I are currently using:
If you are in need of free Phonetic Russian Keyboard, feel free to Download it.
Instruction to download and install Phonetic Russian Keyboard:
- Download Ru_PhoneticLayout.zip file from here.
- Unzip the file to any temporary directory of your choosing
- Double click on setup.exe. If your UAC is enable, you will need click on Yes button to allow the application to be installed.
Installation should be very fast. When it’s done, you should see following dialog:
It should work with any current version of your Windows OS. I tested it on Windows XP 32-bit, Vista 64-bit, Windows 7 32-bit and 64-bit.
Now you can start typing Russian. To switch between languages you can use Alt + Shift keys on your keyboard or click on the language letters in your task bar and select the language you want.
You need to realize when you change a language you change it only for application that currently is active. For example let assume that you have two application open: MS Word and FireFox. If you switch to Russian when FireFox has focus, you will be able to type Russian only in FireFox, in MS Word you still will type English.
In case you are not happy with this keyboard layout, you can easily remove it like you would uninstall any Windows application form Uninstall or change program window.
morhetz said
I’ve tried such kind of phonetic layout, but found it too awkward cause of some mismatched letters (“Q” -> “Я”, etc). So i prefer to bind such letters to paired russian + AltGr. E.g: “Я” -> “A” + AltGr, “Ю” -> “U” + AltGr, “Ш” -> “S” + AltGr, “Ж” -> “Z” + AltGr, etc.
Vadim said
I agree with you that it’s impossible to map one to one each letter. Plus Cyrillic alphabet has more letters. Using Microsoft Keyboard Layout Creator you can create an layout that most scenes to you.
Boris said
Like in the standard Russian keyboard layout. On key “4″ and “6″
Anonymous said
morhetz, Excellent idea!!!
I,ll use it Thank you very much
Boris said
Nice one!!! Thanks.
Where is such signs like :,;,” and etc?
Vadim said
Boris, you’d have to switch to English in order to type ;:”‘ characters. I always open to suggestions. Tell me where would you put these characters on Russian layout?
Bill said
I put the ; and : as shift plus comma and shift plus period. No one needs the symbols.
Aaron Bean said
Thank you so much for this! I’m a Peace Corps volunteer in Kazakhstan, just bought a new computer, and I was dying hunting and pecking the Russian standard layout. You made my life a little easier.
Oleg said
Vadim, Thanks a bunch!!!
O
Vadim said
I’m glad that you found it useful.
tomas said
thanx mate, really helped and was looking for it for a long while! appreciate!
Igor said
Just installed it and does not work – I go into MS Word and types like it used to. Can you tell me why?
Thanks.
Vadim said
Did you switch to Russian keyboard layout? In your task bar you should see letters for your current language (For English it’s ‘EN’). You can click on two letters abbreviation and switch to ‘RU’ for Russian. You also can try by pressing Alt-Shift on your keyboard to toggle between two or more languages (in case you have more than two languages installed).
Hope it helps.
Igor said
I guess I was not clear – I installed and when I switch, it types russian letters, but not phonetically according to your layout.
Igor said
I got it to work – when I was pressing alt-shift, it was switching to Ru layout, but when I actually clicked on settings, Ru phonetic was there as an option that I switched to. works great. Thank you
Vadim said
Glad it works for you.
Agne said
Hello! I have a good news. The phonetic russian keyboard now are available in iPhones and iPod touch. It is realy great supplement if you want to write russian with standart englich keyboard.
Paul said
Agne, could you please provide more details?
Anonymous said
Yes, of course. What would you like to know?
Paul said
I wanted Agne to tell us where a user of an iPhone or iPod can get phonetic Russian keyboard layout, how to make it work there, who (and may be shortly how) made phonetic Russian for those devices.
Johny said
I guess Agne was thinking about http://apps.isimpleness.com/translit/
I’m using couple days, it’s nice App to write phonetic in russian.
Take care, John
Agne said
Yes! I was talking about this App. It’s realy good.
iPad and Russian Keyboard « Vadim's Weblog said
[...] Posts WPF Margin PropertyRussian Phonetic KeyboardIntegrate FxCop 1.36 & VS 2008WinMerge and Beyond Compare with StarTeamPodcasts in iTunes don't [...]
Алик said
Классно! Я изпользую твою програму что бы напечатать это!
Zeev said
I am used to write Russian using translit.ru. Its distinguishing feature is that one can use two-letter combinations; say, “SH” for “Ш” etc. Is this possibe using the Microsoft Keyboard Layout Creator? Any programs known which would allow this?
Andrei said
yes is possible to do this in MKLC, this feature is called Dead Keys, and you can do eg “SH” for “Ш” , and also I use for a long time a small program called Letter Zu. Try it ;)
Sandra said
Дорогой Вадим: This keyboard is perfect, большое вам спасибо!! There are some phonetic layouts that I don’t like as well – this layout is what I had on my old computer. I was dreading getting the new one set up – until I saw your weblog.
Olga said
I just installed it and it works,thanks!
Vadim said
You also can use http://www.softcorporation.com/products/cyrillic/ It has Phonetic layout and no need to install any program at all.
pv said
thanks…sposibo vadim!
Anonymous said
Thank you Vadim, great job! Very useful app!
Alex said
спасибо
Andrei said
Worked as soon as i installed it all i had to do is change from EN to RU in the task bar, Thank you very much.
Гриша said
Спасибо! Очень чорошо!
Emma said
Hi Вадим,
thanks a lot for this program, now I can type phonetically in my favorite language, Наконец-то!
Anonymous said
how do you spell “life” in Russian? the letter “Zh” for zhizn’????
Vadim said
It’s ‘Ж’. Жизнь. On this phonetic keyboard it’s a key for single / double quote (‘) / (“).
The Linguistic Teacup said
Thank you. I have been in need of a phonetic keyboard for so long!!! <3!!!! Спасибо большое!!!
Abhishek said
Thanks a lot. I am learning Russian language and this keyboard is great. Must have.
Спасибо!
Mike said
Thank you so much. I’m making a very painful transition for Mac to Windows. You really helped my out
Anonymous said
The download link to Ru_PhoneticLayout.zip does not work anymore. It would be great to have this program available.
Thanks
Vadim said
The download link is fixed.