The next version of the Cinnamon desktop environment improvs the way alternative keyboard layouts and input methods are handled and configured.
Both the keyboard settings panel and the keyboard applet will show IBus input alongside traditional keyboard layouts “as if they were the same”, say Mint’s developers.
This will improve the user experience as, instead of managing “keyboard layouts” in one place and “input methods” in another, one can switch between, say, a French layout and a Japanese Mozc (IBus input method) from the same place.
(For those of us who assumed all keyboard layouts map physical keys to characters, IBus is an input method that enables (using IMEs) complex text entry for languages where, without being coarse, there are thousands more characters than there are keys! )
In the screenshot below, Cinnamon has two layouts configured for the same US ANSI keyboard: a standard XKB layout (using French characters), and an IBus input method for Japanese (using the Mozc IME to turn romanised text into Japanese characters).
Additionally, the keyboard applet in Cinnamon now supports both types of input and, Mint adds, all the features required by IBus, making it easy for those who often need to switch between different input types to do so.
Both Xorg and Wayland are covered, so the new input modes will in the default X11/Xorg session Cinnamon continues to default to on Linux Mint 22, as well as its experimental Wayland session.
What about the on-screen keyboard (OSK)? Well, Linux Mint says this will no longer rely on libcaribou but be implemented within Cinnamon natively. As well las adding input method and layout switching in the OSK, it also means…
Yup, it’s looking a whole lot nicer than the current squared-off design.
These changes are in development and subject to change, but you can reasonably expect to see them included in the next major Cinnamon desktop release. That will be included in the Linux Mint 22.3 due for release late this year/early next.