Noon: The First Arabic Transliteration Keyboard on Android
Most Android smartphones include traditional Arabic locale support, which provides Arabic fonts and the option to change the entire interface into Arabic. But how, you may be asking, do you write Arabic on your Android phone? Many in the region still resort to typing in Arabazi, which is the use of the Latin script to communicate in Arabic. They resort to using online tools to type without using an Arabic keyboard. For Android users, this can be a daunting task.
The Noon Keyboard provides a simple solution; the app is a free tool that allows Arab Android users to type in their native language without using an Arabic keyboard. By offering Arabazi functionality, the app allows the user to simply spell out each Arabic word the way they would pronounce it. Noon then converts it to the corresponding Arabic word.
Nader Ayad, Noon's developer, discussed how Android operating systems' lack of user-friendly Arabic support inspired him to create a solution.
