Switching keyboard layout in Windows globally

I'm searching for a solution to switch my keyboard layout in Windows globally for all windows quickly.

When I switch the current layout by pressing the magic combination Alt+Shift or when I choose another layout in the language bar, this only changes the layout in the current window.

Answer

Windows 8 supports this out-of-the-box. It seems to have very good built-in keyboard layout switching functionality with the following features:

• Switches layout globally by default. (This can be changed if necessary.)


• Has a built in shortcut key to change layouts: Windows+Space. This also triggers a useful notification window. (This is like a keyboard layout version of Alt+Tab.)


• Shows you the current keyboard layout in the language bar icon.

I put up with the keyboard layout problems with previous versions of Windows for a long time, and I tried all of the programs mentioned in other answers, but I never found one that solved the problem reliably. I can confidently say that Windows 8 solves the problem.

Update

After spending a couple of weeks using Windows 8, I noticed that the keyboard layout seemed to intermittently be changing to a non-default one during normal use. It turned out that the problem was caused by the intrusive legacy Ctrl+Shift and Alt+Shift shortcuts. To fix this, do the following:

1. Open the Language control panel item.


2. Go to Advanced Settings on the left side.


3. Go to Change language bar hot keys.


4. Go to Change key sequence....


5. Unassign the shortcuts you don't want.