Fiendish script? How can you say that about one of the most flexible, useful scripts extant? (It beats heck out of Roman for ability in just about any functional criterion you choose!)

My advice - ignore the bloomin' keyboard mapping and get started with writing it out yourself. It's not that difficult once you get started.

BTW, I went on a quest to look up Devanagari, and happened upon a fantastic resource - Hindi film song lyrics. (http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~navin/india/songs/) I can't think of a better way to get into it. Buy a few albums, download the lyrics (in Devanagari of course) and go through them together. I highly recommend Manna Dey's interpretation of Madhushaala. Not only do you get great music, but the poetry is the most renowned work by Harvansh Rai Bacchan, one of India's most distinguished 20c poets (and, incidentally, the father of Amitabh Bacchan, about the most famous actor in Hindi film history).

cheer

the sunshine "Hindi's not as bad as it looks" warrior