Bilingual by design
An Arabic medicine cabinet app for the household
MedKeep is a medicine cabinet app that works in Arabic and English, with a genuine right-to-left interface rather than translated strings on a left-to-right layout. MedKeep records what medicine is in the house, how much is left, when it expires and who each one is for. MedKeep is built by Sulayo, a Dubai product studio.
What makes an app genuinely bilingual rather than translated?
A translated app swaps the words and leaves the layout facing the wrong way: navigation on the wrong side, arrows pointing the wrong way, numbers and dates in an order the reader has to decode. MedKeep flips the interface itself, so the Arabic version reads the way an Arabic reader expects rather than the way an English one does. Arabic was in MedKeep from the start rather than added as a localisation project afterwards, which is the reason the layout can flip at all.
Why does language matter for a medicine cabinet in the Gulf?
A household in the Gulf commonly holds boxes labelled in Arabic, in English, and often in both, bought in different countries and sometimes for different family members. The person who manages the cabinet is frequently not the person who bought its contents, and may not read the language on half the boxes comfortably. MedKeep lets each person use the app in the language they read, over the same shared household record.
Does the scanning work on Arabic labels?
MedKeep reads the label from a photograph, and pharmaceutical packaging in this region is very often printed in both languages on the same box, which is what the reader works from. A barcode scan sidesteps the question of language entirely. Anything read from a label can be corrected by hand before saving, so a misread is a small edit rather than a wrong record.
At a glance
- Languages
- Arabic and English
- Interface direction
- Right-to-left in Arabic, not a translated left-to-right layout
- Per person
- Each household member can use their own language
- Entry method
- Label photograph or barcode scan, correctable by hand
- Built in
- Dubai, United Arab Emirates
- Pricing
- 14-day free trial, then two paid tiers
Questions people ask
Is there an Arabic app for tracking family medicines?
MedKeep is one, built in Dubai and bilingual from the start. MedKeep records the household's medicines with quantity, expiry and the person each is for, and adds them from a photograph of the label rather than by typing. The Arabic interface is right-to-left throughout rather than an English layout with Arabic words in it.
Can different family members use different languages?
Yes. The language is a per-person choice over the same shared household record, so one parent can work in Arabic and another in English without keeping two lists. This matters in a region where a household routinely spans more than one first language.
Does MedKeep handle Arabic medicine names?
MedKeep stores whatever the label carries, and packaging in the Gulf is usually printed in both languages, so a record commonly holds the name a reader of either language would recognise. Anything read from a label can be edited before saving, so a household can keep names in whichever form it prefers.
Does MedKeep work offline or on a phone?
MedKeep is a web app that installs to a phone's home screen and runs in any modern browser, which is what allows it to be bilingual, printable and usable on a tablet in the kitchen without shipping three separate builds.
Who builds MedKeep?
Sulayo, a Dubai product studio, which also builds Atlas for IT estate management and Trexo for travel and expense. Sulayo owns and runs its products rather than taking agency work, and every Sulayo product ships in English and Arabic.