ᓀᐦᐃᔭᐍᐏᐣ (Cree Syllabics) Keyboard Help
This keyboard is for typing nêhiyawêwin/Plains Cree/Cree Y-Dialect in syllabics (ᒐᐦᑭᐯᐦᐃᑲᓇ) on smartphones (e.g., Android/iPhone).
Alternate Names
- Plains Cree
- Cree Y-dialect
Tutorial
This ᓀᐦᐃᔭᐍᐏᐣ (Cree Syllabics) keyboard is a phonetic keyboard. That is, you type the way you say it in Cree.
For example, the word ᑮᑿᕀ: it's spoken as ᐠ + ᐄ + ᐠ + ᐤ + ᐊ + ᕀ
To type ᑮᑿᕀ on this keyboard, first press the first sound of ᑮ, which is ᐠ:
The keyboard has changed, and now the vowels (ᐁ ᐃ ᐅ ᐊ ᐄ ᐆ ᐋ) have been replaced by all syllables starting with the ᐠ sound (ᑫ ᑭ ᑯ ᑲ ᑮ ᑰ ᑳ, respectively).
Now, press ᑮ.
Pressing ᑮ replaces ᐠ with ᑮ, the first syllabic of ᑮᑿᕀ.
The next syllabic starts with the sound ᐠ yet again, so press ᐠ. We're back to this screen:
But this time, the syllabic we want to type, ᑿ, is nowhere to be found on the screen! This is because the next sound in the syllabic is ᐤ. We need to add the dot that makes the ᐤ sound. To do this, press ᐤ.
After pressing this, the keys will have changed yet again, with all of the syllables being replaced with syllables that start with the ᐠᐤ sounds, namely, ᑵ ᑷ ᑻ ᑿ ᑹ ᑽ ᒁ:
Now, we can press the syllable we want: ᑿ.
Our keyboard is back on the default screen.
Finally, we want to type ᕀ. Tap the ᕀ key, and our word is complete!
In this way, every word is typed phonetically — just as it sounds.
Normal and half spacebar
This keyboard has two spacebars: the normal spacebar on the very bottom row of the keyboard, and the half spacebar , on the second-to-bottom row. The half spacebar is not only half the size of a normal spacebar on the keyboard, but it also inserts a thinner space.
When do I use the half spacebar?
When you want to separate components within a word.
If you are familiar with Cree standard Roman orthography (SRO), you use a half space whenever you'd use a dash in SRO. For example, in ê-itwêt, you would write it in syllabics on this keyboard by typing ᐁ ᐃ ᐟ ᐤ ᑘ ᐟ (ᐁ ᐃᑘᐟ).
Other examples are complex words like ᓂᓇᓅᐦᑌ ᓂᐹᐣ. This is one word, but you can see it has two: the beginning, ᓂᓇᓅᐦᑌ (eng. “I always want to...”) and the core part of the word, ᓂᐹᐣ (eng. “sleep”). Use the half space between the two parts of the word to insert a small gap between the two parts. The small gap is noticable, but not as large as a normal space, which would indicate a new word.
Unlike the normal space, the half space is not a word-breaker. This means that, when apps see a half-space in a word, they will treat it and its surrounding syllabics as one whole word, rather than breaking it apart and treating it as several smaller words.
Keyboard layout
Default
Consonant pressed
A similar layout will appear when pressing ᑊ, ᐟ, ᐠ, ᐨ, ᒼ, ᐣ, ᐢ, or ᕀ.
Consonant and ᐤ pressed
A similar layout will appear when pressing ᐤ after having already pressed ᑊ, ᐟ, ᐠ, ᐨ, ᒼ, ᐣ, ᐢ, or ᕀ.
ᐤ pressed
Numeric
After pressing 123 from any other screen.
Punctuation Subkeys
Obtain this pop-up by pressing-and-holding the ᙮ key near the bottom-right corner of the keyboard.
© 2019 National Research Council Canada
All Documentation Versions
- ᓀᐦᐃᔭᐍᐏᐣ (Cree Syllabics) Keyboard Help 1.2.0
- ᓀᐦᐃᔭᐍᐏᐣ (Cree Syllabics) Keyboard Help 1.1.0
- ᓀᐦᐃᔭᐍᐏᐣ (Cree Syllabics) Keyboard Help 1.0.1
- ᓀᐦᐃᔭᐍᐏᐣ (Cree Syllabics) Keyboard Help 1.0.0
