ARRANGEMENT AND METHOD FOR INPUTTING NON-ALPHABETIC LANGUAGE

A double-spelling soft keyboard is used to input characters in a non-alphabetic language, such as Chinese. These characters are represented by a combination of one or more of an initial sound, a final sound, and a tone. An initial soft keyboard allows the user to select the initial sound, if present. Based on which initial sound is selected, a final soft keyboard offers the user a choice of final sounds that combine to form valid characters with the initial sound. Tone information may also be supplied by the user. Based on the initial sound, the final sound, and/or the tone, the desired character is predicted. This prediction can also be informed by contextual information, linguistic patterns, and the user's previous input.