Re: Proposal for the Basis of a Codepoint Extension toUnicodeforthe Encoding of the Quranic Manuscripts

[Gregg Reynolds <gar at arabink dot com>]

Thomas Milo wrote:

> Meor's luadable effort has helped me to return to my original position:
> encode graphemes, not glyphs. Keep the tanween graphemically intact, this
> will improve searchability. So I recently changed my position regarding
> tanween according to the following formula, that I hope this community will
> endorse:
>
> tanween = <vowel> <vowel> + [optional] <modifier>
>
> <vowel>=  fatha / dhamma / kasra
> <modifier>= tamweem / sequentializer
>
>
> For backward compatibility,
>
> <vowel> <vowel> = fathatan / dhammatan / kasratan

Hmm.  In my opinion, it would be both more useful and more accurate 
historically to simply have a couple of TANWEEN codepoints.  If I'm not 
mistaken, tanween was originally marked using a small nuun and later 
evolved into the doubled vowel mark.

For example, using latin-1:

	TANWEEN = ñ
	TANWEEN IDGHAM = Ñ
	TAMWEEM = %

Examples (x = kha, ç = sheen, ² = shadda):

	kitaabuñ
	xuçubuÑ m²usan²ada#uÑ
	min% ba at d

Now search and sort works much better, and the rendering isn't all that 
hairy.  Edit logic should also be simpler.

I wouldn't advise equating pairs of vowel marks with tanween marks at 
the level of encoding design.

-gregg