Nov
07
2009

Google Urdu Transliteration Plugin for WordPress

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A few months back, I wrote about a wonderful tool that Google had released to the masses by the name of “Google Transliteration“. Put very simply, the tool allowed users to convert Roman Urdu text i.e. Urdu words typed with English alphabets, (e.g. Mujhe is waqt bhook lagi hai.) into a myriad of Asian right-to-left languages including Urdu, Punjabi, Gujurati and Hindi among many others. With the simplistic user interface that Google tools and apps are well known for, the tool became an instant hit with blogs and websites with content in these local languages and it would not be an exaggeration to say that it made transliteration a piece of cake.

Today, I am introducing to you the Google Transliteration WordPress plugin which adds this powerful tool right in the comment area of your blog. Reza Moallemi has done an excellent job with the plugin, especially the latest 0.8 release.

Once installed through the WordPress Plugins manager, the plugin puts a check box in the comment area which you can activate by enabling it. If not activated, simple English text shall be entered. Once activated, all text entered shall be transliterated to the language selected on the Plugin Settings page. And if you’re a keyboard guru like me, you can simply toggle between the two states by pressing Ctrl + g.

On the Plugin Settings page, the administrator can choose which language to select for transliteration to. If the option “Enable Google Transliteration by default” is activated, all text entered in the comment area is converted to the language of choice by default and in order to write in English, the user would have to manually disable the option before typing.

The only improvement I can think of at the moment is to put a drop-down list of languages right in the comment area. This would allow users to select their language of choice themselves, rather than restricting it to the single language allowed by the blog.

Do try out the plugin in the comment area below and let us know what you think about it and whether you can come up with any suggestions for further improvment.

I must say that it is definitely encouraging to see innovation in this area. This not only gives bloggers and publishers the power to publish content in local languages but also allows readers and users to interact with each other in the same medium, thus enriching the whole blogging experience.