Android Open Source Keyboard

Android Open Source Keyboard aims to be a simple to implement keyboard for the Android devices.

By default it is minimalistic with only 2 extensions,

• A simple view manager using compose for rendering
• A simple layout manager using compose for the view manager

It is possible to remove the layout and view manager [ see configuration ].

OBS

The keyboard stores lexicon data on the device ( by default ) but no data is shared with any external server.

If of project uses this keyboard it is up to that project to share data or use external servers. The base implementation, this keyboard, does not do that by default.

Usage and Importation

Add the dependency with Jitpack,

dependencies {
    implementation("com.github.Xtarii:AndroidKeyboard:<TAG>")
}

To add the keyboard to any application add it to the Manifest file,

<service android:name="android.open.keyboard.Keyboard"
    android:exported="true"
    android:label="Simple Keyboard"
    android:permission="android.permission.BIND_INPUT_METHOD">

    <intent-filter>
        <action android:name="android.view.InputMethod" />
    </intent-filter>

    <meta-data
        android:name="android.view.im"
        android:resource="@xml/method" />
</service>

The setting <service android:name="android.open.keyboard.Keyboard" ... > is to link the keyboard to the application. Any other settings may be changed to your liking or to what Android requiers.

Simple setup for configuration file

Configuration for keyboard, located in assets/keyboard/keyboard.settings.json

{
    "view":    "<path to view class>",
    "layout":  "<path to layout class>",

    "extensions": [
        ...
    ]
}

An example of a simple keyboard setup could be,

{
    "view":    "com.example.ViewManager",
    "layout":  "com.example.Layout",

    "extensions": [
        "com.example.LocalLexicon",
        "com.example.SomeOtherExtension"
    ]
}

Expanding with custom Extensions

There are 2 things a extension needs.

@Extension(ID = "Foo", description = "My Extension", version = "v0.1")
public class Foo implements IExtension {
    ...
}

The @Extension requires an ID but the other values are not required. For making a custom layout with Compose use the IComposeLayout instead of IExtension. Similarly a custom view manager is created with IViewManager instead of IExtension.

It is not required to use compose for the UI, XML version works aswell as it is up for the view manager to decide how the rendering should work.