Re: Solutions Linux 2005

[Youcef Rabah Rahal <y dot rahal at gmail dot com>]

On Mon, 7 Feb 2005 13:40:28 +0200, Abdulaziz Al-Arfaj
<aalarfaj at gmail dot com> wrote:

> I noticed this in a big way during my visit to Casablanca. I dont know
> much about this issue, but the problem you might face most with
> Tamazight localization is the broad spectrum of different dialects.
> Arabic has many forms and dialects, but it still has the standard
> classical Arabic to over-rule all of these. To the best of my
> knowledge, Tamazight might not have such a standard form. (btw in
> English Berbère is Berber :-)

Yes, many dialects that have a unique root.

In Algeria, the version of the language which is a 'national' one (it
is not considered as an 'official' language yet, but only 'national')
is an attempt to unify/standardize the dialects. In practice, it is
not spoken. There is also the problem of the script, which lacks
standardization. And I believe that there's not much coordination
between the Algerian and Moroccan officials to standardize things:
Morocco has lately submitted a proposal to Unicode to standardize
Tifinagh, the Tamazight script, but I'm not sure if the Algerian
officials approve it, or if even they are aware of it, that is. These
two countries have the majority of the Tamazight-speaking population
of North Africa, AFAIK, but they don't seem to agree on this. Too much
politics is involved ;-)

Salam,

-- 
Youcef R. Rahal