Wolof/Keyboard

This resource is open-sourced under the MIT License (2023)

To download keyboard use this link: link for git repo with keyboard

Documentation of rationale:

• Note: None of the creators of this keyboard speak or read Wolof, and this resource was not created in consultation with Wolof speakers. We have done our best to create a keyboard that reasonably accommodates the Wolof language.
• We have based our keyboard off of the AZERTY keyboard because it has some of the diacritic characters we needed for Wolof and because French is an official language of Senegal and is spoken in other regions in which Wolof is used (e.g. Mauritania).
• Since the Wolof alphabet does not have V or Z, we moved these off of the main key block for letters. We kept them because they are useful for typing in English and French, which are the official languages of countries in which Wolof is spoken. Also, V is used in roman numerals.
• We added e with diaeresis, o with accent aigu, n with tilde, and the ŋ character because these are commonly used characters in Wolof.
• We added e with diaeresis to the main key block rather than e with accent aigu because it had higher frequency of use in the text of Wolof Wikipedia pages.
• Accent aigu and accent grave are easily accessible dead-keys because they are used in common Wolof characters in addition to French characters. Alt-2 and Alt-7 can also add circumflex and diaeresis for French compatibility, and we have included the cedille for this same purpose.
• We have kept many of the other symbols from the AZERTY layout for convenience, and we have dispensed with characters with infrequent use cases as needed (e.g. paragraph symbol).

Existing Resources

• Microsoft layout exists
• Doubled Latin letters are common: see this 63-letter alphabet
• Other keyboard that could be useful for ideas:

• Here's a basic Wolof layout based on a U.S. English layout:

*
ã

1
&

2
z

 

3
"

^

4
'

5
(

6
-

7
~

8
_

9
ç

0
à

°
)

+
=

       

A
a

 

Ë
ë

E
e

R
r

T
t

Y
y

U
u

I
i

O
o

P
p

`
´

Ó
ó

        

Q
q

S
s

D
d

F
f

G
g

H
h

J
j

K
k

L
l

M
m

%
ŋ

V
v

           

W
w

X
x

C
c

Ñ
ñ

B
b

N
n

?
,

.
;

/
:

|
!

the V key is documented to be at the end of the third row but it’s actually at the end of the second row. -TD

Combinations of inputs that result in other inputs include the following:

[ and { are dead keys that type ´ and ` respectively. Alt-2 and Alt-7 are used as deadkeys for ˆ and ¨ respectively.

• ◌́ e = é
• ◌́ o = ó

• ◌̀ a = à
• ◌̀ e = è
• ◌̀ i = ì
• ◌̀ o = ò
• ◌̀ u = ù

• ◌̂ 3 = ^
• ◌̂ a = â
• ◌̂ e = ê
• ◌̂ i = î
• ◌̂ o = ô
• ◌̂ u = û

• ◌̈ a = ä
• ◌̈ e = ë
• ◌̈ i = ï
• ◌̈ o = ö
• ◌̈ u = ü
• ◌̈ y = ÿ

,]