The HamNoSys package consists of three parts:
HamNoSys Unicode font
HamNoSys Keyboard layout (macOS only)
HamNoSys Palette App
The documentation folder contains the macOS keyboard layout in different formats. The layout is also available as a menu item in the Palette app.
The HamNoSys handshapes chart is available as a menu item in the app as well. If you want to try it in a web browser, you find the German and English version in this distribution.
To install on macOS:
Select “Go to folder…” from the Finder's “Go” menu. Type in /Library/Fonts/ and click on “Open”.
The Fonts folder opens. Drag the file HamNoSysUnicode.ttf here. (You may be asked to provide an administrator's password to get this done.) Now switch to the enclosing folder (called Library) by choosing “Enclosing Folder” from the Finder's “Go” menu.
Within that folder, you should find a subfolder called Keyboard Layouts. If it does not exist, create it.
Move the file HamNoSys.bundle into that folder.
Finally, move the HamNoSys Palette.app into the Programs folder.
(If you prefer, you can also install to ~/Library/Fonts and ~/Library/Keyboard Layouts, in which case the font and the keyboard layout are only available to the currently logged-in user.)
Open the System Preferences and switch to Keyboard. Select the “Input Sources” tab and select “Show Input menu in menu bar”.
Now click the “+” button in the bottom left of the window. Choose “Others” in the left pane, and then “HamNoSys” on the right. Click “Add”.
Now you find the HamNoSys key layout in Input menu in the right part of the menu bar. (You can also rotate through the active keyboards by pressing command-space and keeping the command pressed.)
(In older versions of macOS you find the Input Sources in the ”Language and Text” or “International” system preference.)
Now you can launch the app HamNoSys Palette.
In the HamNoSys window, you can type a HamNoSys string.
If you are familiar with the HamNoSys keyboard layout, switch to it with cmd-space or choose HamNoSys from the Input Menu. Otherwise, just click on the five-fingers button to open the palette of HamNoSys symbols. The symbols are distributed over six panels corresponding to the context they are most often used in.
If you have entered a valid HamNoSys string, you may want to check it by sending it to the avatar: Just click on the avatar button once you have launched the SiGML Service Player. (If you have not yet installed the JASigning avatar player, you find it at http://vh.cmp.uea.ac.uk/index.php/JASigning.)
Via the “File” menu, you can open the HamNoSys Handshapes chart as well as a table of all HamNoSys characters.
To install on Windows:
Movie the HamNoSys Palette folder to your Applications folder. To start the program, open HamNoSys Palette.exe within that folder.
To install on Linux:
Movie the HamNoSys Palette folder to your Applications folder. To start the program, open HamNoSys Palette within that folder.
Web font
In the folder web you find the HamNoSys font in the usual webfont formats as well as a css style sheet showing how to use them. The HamNoSysInput.html shows the same layout as the palette app on a web page, but cannot command the avatar.
Changing the keys in the HamNoSys Palette app
If you want to add more keys to the palette or just re-arrange the existing ones, that is easy to achieve. In the Preferences folder, you find the file de.uni-hamburg.sign-lang.hamnosys-palette-layout.txt. Open it with any text editor.
The first line is a scaling factor applying to all button sizes and positions.
All the other lines define one button each, they consist of three numbers and a text, separated by tabs.
The first column is the panel the button shall appear on (numbered from left to right starting with 1).
The second and third column are the x and y coordinate of the button.
The fourth column is the names of the HamNoSys characters to be assigned to the button, separated by commas.
In case of any problems, please contact us at hamnosys-helpdesk@sign-lang.uni-hamburg.de.
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