The Soft Input Panel is a special on-screen input method for devices which do not have standard keyboards. SIP is commonly used in Microsoft Pocket PC

Pocket PC

A Pocket PC is also known by Microsoft as a 'Windows Mobile Classic device'. It is a hardware specification for a handheld-sized computer, personal digital assistant , that runs the Microsoft 'Windows Mobile Classic' operating system...

 and Tablet PC

Tablet computer

A tablet computer, or simply tablet, is a complete mobile computer, larger than a mobile phone or personal digital assistant, integrated into a flat touch screen and primarily operated by touching the screen...

 devices, where there is no room for a keyboard. In Microsoft Windows

Microsoft Windows

Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...

 there is a similar on-screen keyboard used as a Microsoft Active Accessibility

Microsoft Active Accessibility

Microsoft Active Accessibility is an Application Programming Interface for user interface accessibility. MSAA was introduced as a platform add-on to Microsoft Windows 95 in 1997...

 (MSAA) which also has an ability to change its layout according to current keyboard language and key layout. It was patented by Microsoft

Microsoft

Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...

in November 2004 under the patent number 6819315.



Picture 1: Windows XP on-screen keyboard

Picture 2: Windows Mobile SIP		Picture 3: Windows Mobile SIP with additional characters