As the separation of the division between the North and South Korea is becoming more firm, the everyday language and even the technical languages are becoming more different every day. Language is important in suggesting actions, so it is important to organize a unification of languages between the people of North and South Korea. Especially the rapidly changing IT language which is very different in each country.
In this sense, it is preferable that the North and South scholars are contacting each other, such as opening seminars regarding the unification of the IT language. Pondering and solving such problems in everyday lives, together, can also speed up the unification. The most important thing in the IT area is the unification of the basic keyboard to enter data into the computer. The most crucial thing in character management in the computers is the typing characters. There was a technology called the "mechanization of Korean" in the typewriter era. A representative example is the Korean typewriter that copied the mechanical shapes of English typewriters in the 1950s. From the invention of such Korean typewriters, many people have been experiencing the battles between the 2 rows, 3 rows, or the 4 rows arrangements for about 30 years. That is because the keyboard arrangement or the entering technology is that important.
However, North Korea is showing much effort in developing IT personnel to advance the IT industry. What is the computer keyboard that is used in North Korea that is dreaming of the huge leap in the IT industry
First, the arrangement is different. In North Korea, the computer keyboard is normally called a keyboard. North and South Korea both use the 2 row systems that do not distinguish between the initial sounds and the last sound and the consonants are on the left side and the vowels are on the right side. However, the alphabet arrangement is different from South Korea's.
The reason the alphabet arrangements are different is because North Korea does not apply the rules regarding the initial sound of the syllable and use the consonants, such as the L and N quite often and have placed these consonants in the middle. The cause is the difference between the languages of the South and the North Korea. Also, in the arrangement order, South Korea generally organizes them in the orders of the shape of the characters but North Korea is using the phonetic value orders. The shape of the North Korean keyboard according to the national criteria (KPS) was compared with the South Korean keyboard in the figure.
North Korea has established the "Morning-Panther Computer cooperative company" to assemble and sell the computers, but because of the low hardware production, majority of the keyboards are foreign-made. Therefore, the majority of the keyboards used have the English alphabets but the Korean alphabets are not shown on the keyboard. Therefore, most of the computer users are using the keyboard by memorizing the order. Just like when we prepared for the music test by drawing the piano keyboard onto a piece of paper because there were very few pianos, the North Korean students practice their typing by drawing the keyboard on the pieces of paper. Also, on the North Korean keyboard, there is no Korean/English converting key or a Chinese character converting key.
If we were to achieve the unification unexpectedly, it becomes a serious problem when the computer keyboards are not unified between North and the South Korea. If the language and the entering system are different, then it can cause a chaos, just like the one we experienced in the earlier stages of computer distribution.
A scientific arrangement and education of the computer keyboards are an important basic technology in the IT era. Therefore, the Korean Language Information Association and the North Korean Language Association and Chinese Korean Language Associations have been carrying out much interaction and cooperation with the linguists and the information technology experts to establish the standards of the Korean arrangement and a unified keyboard since the mid-90s. However, the keyboard and the entering codes have not been established as a national standard for the whole of Korea. We need the continuous exchange, conversations and cooperation among the South, North and the Chinese (Chosun people) more than before.
It would be preferable to distribute the Korean computer unified keyboard under the agreement of the Korean IT scholars in South, North and the Chinese (Chosun) Korea. Also, if possible, hosting a South, North and Chinese "Korean unified computer keyboard competition" is a solution to unify the alienated language cultures.
Professor Sung Choi. Dept. of Computer Science, Namseoul University
