libeek is a library to create keyboard-like user interface. Since it is designed as simple as possible, it provides only two kinds of objects. One is keyboard element (derived from #EekElement) and another is keyboard layout engine (which implements the #EekLayout interface). A keyboard element represents either a keyboard (#EekKeyboard), a section (#EekSection), or a key (#EekKey). Each element implements the Builder design pattern so that it can be converted into a UI widget (#ClutterActor, #GtkDrawingArea, aso). A layout engine arranges keyboard elements using information from external configuration mechanisms (libxklavier, XKB, matchbox-keyboard layouts in XML, aso) Here is a sample code which creates a keyboard-like #ClutterActor using the system keyboard layout using libxklavier: EekKeyboard *keyboard; EekLayout *layout; /* Create a keyboard layout using libxklavier configuration. */ layout = eek_xkl_layout_new (); /* Create a keyboard implemented as ClutterActor. */ keyboard = eek_clutter_keyboard_new (); /* Apply the layout to the keyboard. */ eek_keyboard_set_layout (keyboard, layout); clutter_group_add (CLUTTER_GROUP(stage), eek_clutter_keyboard_get_actor (EEK_CLUTTER_KEYBOARD(keyboard))); One of the most interesting features of libeek is that UI backends can be switched easily. For example, to create a keyboard-like #GtkWidget instead of #ClutterActor, all you need is to replace eek_clutter_keyboard_new() with eek_gtk_keyboard_new() and eek_clutter_keyboard_get_actor() with eek_gtk_keyboard_get_widget(). There is logical represention (model) of keyboard distinct from the UI widget (view). More precisely, a keyboard is represented as a tree of #EekElement -- #EekKeyboard contains one or more #EekSection's and #EekSection contains one or more #EekKey's. Each element can be event source when user events on the UI widget occurs. For example, with the following code, when a user pushed a key widget with keycode 0x38 assigned, on_a_pressed will be called. /* Find a key element in the logical keyboard. */ EekKey *key = eek_keyboard_find_key_by_keycode (keyboard, 0x38); g_signal_connect (key, "pressed", on_a_pressed); In this way, application developers do not need to know the differences between the underlying UI widgets after creation.