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Show HN: A modern way to type in African languages

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Re: Show HN: A modern way to type in African languages

#21

Post by azernik »

School-Cotton wrote: post #9
azernik wrote: post #2

Comment on the documentation/README more than anything - I couldn't find anywhere a list of specific languages supported. That's a pretty important data point for any speaker of an African language hoping to use this IME. If the library supports only Amhari and Ge'ez (the only two languages mentioned specifically) it's extremely important to a Wolof or Swahili speaker to know that when evaluating if the IME is in a u…

Isn’t Swahili compatible with ASCII (just like English)? Why would you need a special IME to write it?

Depends on location and time period. There's lots of historical stuff written in a customized Arabic script with unique characters.

Re: Show HN: A modern way to type in African languages

#22

Post by pythonbrad »

azernik wrote: post #2

Comment on the documentation/README more than anything - I couldn't find anywhere a list of specific languages supported. That's a pretty important data point for any speaker of an African language hoping to use this IME. If the library supports only Amhari and Ge'ez (the only two languages mentioned specifically) it's extremely important to a Wolof or Swahili speaker to know that when evaluating if the IME is in a u…

I understand your point, we should do a big work at the level of the documentation.

Re: Show HN: A modern way to type in African languages

#23

Post by yorwba »

firefoxd wrote: post #17
trompetenaccoun wrote: post #4

Apart from Ethiopia, are there any places where they don't use either Latin or Arabic scripts in everyday life? There are technically a whole bunch of alphabets of course but they aren't used much afaik. Maybe the Tuareg script? Is that used by people in North Africa beyond bilingual signs?

There is Adlam for Fulani [1]. Widely spoken in west Africa. However, I'm still trying to familiarize myself with the writing system. The word for "yes" in fulani does not translate in writing. The best way I can write it is HIiiII. Imagine the lowercase i goes down in tone. Then the last two uppercase i shoots up. I don't know if any writing system supports this. [1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adlam_script

If there are no two words that are only distinguished by tone, it might be unnecessary to mark it in writing, except as a learning aid for people who're not fluent enough in the language to predict this information from context.

E.g. in English, questions are marked by rising pitch, but that intonation is not indicated in writing.

Re: Show HN: A modern way to type in African languages

#24

Post by jiggawatts »

yorwba wrote: post #23
firefoxd wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is Adlam for Fulani [1]. Widely spoken in west Africa. However, I'm still trying to familiarize myself with the writing system. The word for "yes" in fulani does not translate in writing. The best way I can write it is HIiiII. Imagine the lowercase i goes down in tone. Then the last two uppercase i shoots up. I don't know if any writing system supports this. [1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adlam_script

If there are no two words that are only distinguished by tone, it might be unnecessary to mark it in writing, except as a learning aid for people who're not fluent enough in the language to predict this information from context. E.g. in English, questions are marked by rising pitch, but that intonation is not indicated in writing.

?

Re: Show HN: A modern way to type in African languages

#25

Post by pythonbrad »

firefoxd wrote: post #17
trompetenaccoun wrote: post #4

Apart from Ethiopia, are there any places where they don't use either Latin or Arabic scripts in everyday life? There are technically a whole bunch of alphabets of course but they aren't used much afaik. Maybe the Tuareg script? Is that used by people in North Africa beyond bilingual signs?

There is Adlam for Fulani [1]. Widely spoken in west Africa. However, I'm still trying to familiarize myself with the writing system. The word for "yes" in fulani does not translate in writing. The best way I can write it is HIiiII. Imagine the lowercase i goes down in tone. Then the last two uppercase i shoots up. I don't know if any writing system supports this. [1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adlam_script

Using the phonetic representation (IPA), you can obtain a writing system similar to the pinyin.

Hanyu Pinyin Hànyǔ Pīnyīn Fāng'àn

Bopomofo ㄏㄢˋ ㄩˇ ㄆㄧㄣ ㄧㄣ ㄈㄤ ㄢˋ

IPA [xân.ỳ pʰín.ín fáŋ.ân]

Cameroonian dialect are written using the GACL who is similar to the IPA.

Clafrica: Pookai2t peu2nze2e2 n*kut !

Shʉ̄pāpə̀m (Bamoun): Pookɛ́t pә́nzéé ŋkut !

Re: Show HN: A modern way to type in African languages

#27

Post by chungy »

beAbU wrote: post #15

It's interesting, having grown up in Africa, and lived there almost 35 years, reading, writing and speaking an African language, being surrounfed by at least 10 other African languages and seeing them written, that I have never ever in my entire life encountered this writing system. I think the product is a great technological achievement, but... I would warn against the generalisation of "African" in this context. I…

Africa is a very very big place. :)

Re: Show HN: A modern way to type in African languages

#28

Post by crazygringo »

I've visited all the links and honestly still don't have the slightest idea what this input method does, or exactly what problem it's trying to solve, or why it's a good solution to the problem. I found the video [1] but it has no audio or explanations at all.

I also don't understand why you'd want phonetic input methods, rather than wanting to input your desired character directly. For languages like Chinese I understand because there are thousands of characters, but aren't most or all African writing systems based on small alphabets? I shudder to think of having to learn to input English phonetically.

So if you're looking for opinions, my first one is that your pages need to do a better job at explaining what current problems are (with multiple clear examples for each), where current solutions fail (with clear examples of how), and how your solution is different and better (again, with clear examples).

Good luck!

[1] https://github.com/pythonbrad/afrim-keyboard/?tab=readme-ov-...

Re: Show HN: A modern way to type in African languages

#29

Post by ks2048 »

trompetenaccoun wrote: post #4

Apart from Ethiopia, are there any places where they don't use either Latin or Arabic scripts in everyday life? There are technically a whole bunch of alphabets of course but they aren't used much afaik. Maybe the Tuareg script? Is that used by people in North Africa beyond bilingual signs?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Writing_systems_of_Africa

I don't think any have very widespread use outside of Ge'ez (Ethiopian, etc). Maybe Tifinagh.

I do notice that iOS has built-in keyboards for N'Ko and Tamazight (Tifinagh) - pretty cool to try out if you have an iphone.

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