281–290 of 377 posts
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On a Unix-like system with X11 and a compose key, I believe Compose + S + S should work (away from my computer, so can't test).
Do tell, which key is this "Compose"?
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I can see a lot of trouble coming from this. Sort order for one. If a language this old didn't need a glyph up to 2017 it can be done without, especially if the use case is limited to all caps words. But I guess in that case you could convert its occurrence to SS first and then do the sort.
Actually I was a bit surprised when I learned that Unicode only added a codepoint for it in 2008 (and even rejected an earlier proposal). While the spelling rules have said for some time to replace it with "SS" the glyph was used quite often, including official documents such as passports. For sorting there is standard (DIN 5007). Replacing ß with ss is correct (even in the lower case variant). The other letters are…
From Wikipedia ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ß ): In German orthography, the grapheme ß, called Eszett (IPA: [ɛsˈtsɛt]) or scharfes S (IPA: [ˈʃaɐ̯.fəs ˈʔɛs], [ˈʃaː.fəs ˈʔɛs]), in English "sharp S", represents the [s] phoneme in Standard German, specifically when following long vowels and diphthongs, while ss is used after short vowels. The name Eszett represents the German pronunciation of the two letters S and Z.…
> The grapheme has an intermediate position between letter and ligature.
It might have been a ligature in the past, but it is definitely not a ligature today. A ligature is a purely typographical device that is completely interchangeable with the non-ligature variant. This is not the case with ß.
> It behaves as a ligature in that it has no separate position in the alphabet.
Not having a separate position is not sufficient evidence that it is a ligature. ä, ö, ü also don't have separate positions when ordering stuff.
> It also has no traditional capital form (although some type designers have introduced forms of "capital ß" de facto).
It had the same traditional from for almost 130 years. Yes, there are a few stylistic variations on the traditional forms, as well as some early experiments trying something completely different which have never been widely adopted.
> It behaves like a letter [...]
It is a letter, just like w is a letter, not a vv ligature.
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How is using "ss" instead of ß in German any worse from using "th" instead of þ in English?
In the German orthography reform of the 1990s the "ss" replaced the "ß" after short vowels. But after long vowels it is still used. So with current spelling system, it's possible to distinguish words pronounced with long vowels from the ones with short vowels (e.g. by a German learner who sees a word for the first time). So it does have its advantages. I guess this goes back to the origins of the ß - it can be interp…
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In theory (standard language), ss and ß mark differences in pronunciation. That's why some words are written with ß. In practice, the differences are pronounced differently in different regions, which is why some German speaking people don't know the difference.
Really ? As someone who speaks natively German, can you give me an example or a source for this ? ß is after a long vocal, ss is after a short vocal. I don't know any regional problems with that (and I come from a region with a VERY different language than most of the German speaking people)
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I think those is more like ram/ewe, just words to signify specific objects having gender. But words themselves don't have grammatical gender, not like in Russian and German, where every noun is gendered and all (well, most) adjectives/verbs/etc. have to be modified to fit the gender of the noun. Presents tons of problems for localization, because a) you have to have 3 separate ways of saying the same and b) you can n…
Also the dispute this generates! You wouldn't believe how many friendships are torn apart over the question of whether it is "die Nutella" oder "das Nutella". It is "die Nutella", just so we are clear!
FTFY
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How are gendered nouns useful? (I'm referring specifically to assigning genders to nouns that refer to objects that aren't intrinsically gendered.) My native language is English, and I never have to remember whether a "keyboard" or a "rock" is masculine or feminine. I've studied a few other languages (French, German, Spanish) that do expect me to remember such things. To be clear, I'm not trying to refute your statem…
I'd imagine the use is that it sometimes makes pronouns more useful. Substituting "he" and "she" for gendered articles: "I have he keyboard and she rock. He is large and she is grey" Without that, I'd have to repeat the "keyboard" and "rock". The question of course is whether this is worth all that rote memorization (since no language I know is fully logical here - german's "Das Mädchen" - girls are apparently of neu…
The major argument for keeping gendered nouns as they are in existing languages is that speakers would be uncomfortable with having their language changed by some standards body.
As a german, I see this as a step in the wrong direction. The sharp S is a PITA to begin with, so I'd rather abolish it completely. Now there's a whole bunch of complications coming from this - how do I type this? To type lowercase "ß", I press the key above "p" (in the same position as with qwerty) and "ü" (to the right of it), which will do "?" when pressed together with shift. So do we move "?" somewhere else? QWE…
As a german, I see this as a step in the wrong direction. The sharp S is a PITA to begin with, so I'd rather abolish it completely. Now there's a whole bunch of complications coming from this - how do I type this? To type lowercase "ß", I press the key above "p" (in the same position as with qwerty) and "ü" (to the right of it), which will do "?" when pressed together with shift. So do we move "?" somewhere else? QWE…
As a German, I disagree with you. German's not English, even though you might prefer if it was. Others don't. It's fine that it uses the letters it ended up with historically. This change fixes an internal inconsistency, your reply seems fairly irrelevant. It feels like replying to some bugfix in, say, Ruby with something like "I never liked Ruby anyhow".
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How are gendered nouns useful? (I'm referring specifically to assigning genders to nouns that refer to objects that aren't intrinsically gendered.) My native language is English, and I never have to remember whether a "keyboard" or a "rock" is masculine or feminine. I've studied a few other languages (French, German, Spanish) that do expect me to remember such things. To be clear, I'm not trying to refute your statem…
If it's your native language, or if you're at a good level of fluency, you don't have to "remember" it, it comes naturally. I agree it's harder for students though.
Like tones in Chinese are another example of "easy enough for native speakers, really freaking hard to non-native".