It will do away with hitches in fonts, says official
For the government staff in Vellore district, typing official documents in Tamil is all set to become hassle-free. The district administration has formally launched a software, Tamil word processor that has plenty of features in store.
Called ‘Amma Menthamizh,’ the Tamil word processor was launched by Collector S.A. Raman. It was developed by a team headed by N. Deivasundaram, retired professor and Head of Department of Tamil, University of Madras, and also recipient of the Chief Minister’s Tamil Computing Award for 2013.
“Other Tamil software feature font and keyboard drivers. This software offers word processing. It is based on Unicode. Users can take up spell check, grammar check and also refer to dictionary,” Mr. Deivasundaram said. For the last 20 years, the Tamil Nadu government was following a non-Unicode font following which the government issued an order to implement Unicode.
In fact, the software has been customised for government employees as it also enables them to refer to administrative dictionary in English to Tamil and Tamil to English.
Templates of official letters that government staff use on a regular basis is also available in readymade formats in the software, he said, adding, “It contains all facilities for editing any typed matter. It is a full-fledged software.”
One of the key highlights of the software is that it can change old files to Unicode in a fraction of a second. This is not just individual files but folders, he noted. “It is also available as a MS Office plug-in,” he added.
This software is being implemented in all 32 districts of Tamil Nadu. “We are conducting workshops for government staff on how to use the software,” he said. The launch of the software and workshop for staff was held in Vellore on Tuesday.
T. Lalitha, Deputy Director of Tamil Development, Vellore, said 200 CDs were provided for each district. “Implementing this software will do away with hitches in Tamil fonts. For instance, if we at Vellore use one Tamil font, while another is being used at Secretariat in Chennai, it leads to illegible text. With this software, we can avoid such problems,” she said.
[“source=thehindu”]
