Lenz

The IPA Keyboard Remapper

Version 1.6

Download Lenz 1.6 (US English Keyboard)

Changelog

This version is designed for US English keyboards. A version for Spanish keyboards can be found here.

Lenz - The IPA Keyboard Remapper is a free Windows program that allows you to type IPA symbols directly into Unicode-compatible applications (these include Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Praat, Internet Explorer, Firefox, etc.). With a little practice, it's possible to type in IPA at a nice, brisk pace -- far faster than can be done with solutions that involve picking, copying and pasting individual symbols.

Lenz requires that you have one or more of SIL's Unicode fonts installed. These include Charis SIL, Charis SIL Compact, Doulos SIL, and Doulos SIL Compact. The old SIL fonts (SIL Charis, SIL Doulos, SIL Encore, SIL IPA, SIL IPA93) are obsolete and should not be used. Likewise, while Microsoft's Unicode fonts (Arial Unicode MS, Lucida Grande, etc.) can show most IPA symbols, they have serious problems with diacritics, among other things, and are not recommended.

To use Lenz, simply download the ZIP file, uncompress it, and run the file Lenz-Eng.exe. A green icon will appear in the icon tray -- this shows that the program is running, and right clicking on it will allow you to suspend or close the program.

When Lenz is running, normal keys will produce the characters they always have. To generate IPA symbols, use the modifier keys CTRL, ALT, CTRL+ALT, CTRL+SHIFT and ALT+SHIFT along with the normal keys. The keyboard chart at the bottom of this page shows what key combination produces each symbol: for schwa [ə] use CTRL+e, for esh [ʃ] use ALT+s, for the aspirated symbol [ʰ] use ALT+SHIFT+h, and so on.

Note that the program is designed for US English keyboards. It will work on other keyboard layouts, but the keyboard map below will be slightly different.

TIP: If the program doesn't work as expected under Windows, run it as administrator.

NOTE: A few anti-virus programs produce a false positive when scanning Lenz due to the compiler I use to produce it. I assure you that Lenz contains no viruses, but If you're still uneasy about the possibility (and everyone should be!) I'd suggest scanning it at a site like VirusTotal. Typically, 39 or 40 of its virus scanners will give Lenz a clean bill of health, while one or two will produce a false positive and a rating of "suspicious" rather than "virus".