I’ve long been a fan of the software keyboard implementation in iOS, especially from the point of view of someone who frequently switches between languages. I do however sometimes prefer to work with a hardware keyboard since, despite the general accuray and flexibility of the on-screen keyboard I can go faster on hardware. Plus I get to use the entire iPad screen for content.
However, this brings me back into the ugly world of hardware keyboards and the language based dependencies. If I’m using my French (AZERTY) bluetooth keyboard, I need to switch the software keyboard to French so that the layout matches. If I select the English (QWERTY) layout in the software keyboard, that’s also what I get on the physical one. Bleah.
The problem comes when I want to type in English on the bluetooth keyboard since the autocorrect dictionary is based on the selected language and as a result it keeps trying to correct my English with French words. Now I can try and pay attention to the autocorrect pop-ups and cancel them as they appear, but this will pollute the French autocorrect dictionary with a pile of English words. Or I can disable autocorrent globally, but it really is nice to have most of the time. And since the option is buried a few layers deep in the Settings, it’s not something I want to be switching on and off as frequently as changing language context.
I realize that I’m a bit of an edge case here, but it would be nice to be able to disassociate the keyboard layout from the autocorrect language.
Or I need to carry around two keyboards…