Re: Arabic Quran XML data

[Mete Kural <metekural at yahoo dot com>]

Hello Ossama,

Thank you for your response. Please find my comments
below.

> I can't comment/decide on this. Some other more
> knowledgeable person (other maintainer/contributor)
> of the Qur'an project may know better.

OK. I'll try to contact other contributors.
Unfortunately I have not heard from Muhammad Yousif in
a while. I hope that he will answer some of our
questions in due time.
 
> Fixing? Like what? Mistakes, glyphs or what?

The current text in the CVS is missing many diacritics
and other special characters as you may have noticed.
I was referring to adding those special characters.

> As far as I remember, various previous threads noted
> that you'll not be able to modify things and that
> the content will be correct and solid.

I understand not being allowed to make changes once
the content is "correct and solid" but until that is
so someone has to make changes and correct it. As of
now, there are still many changes that need to be
made, i.e. adding special characters.

> As discussed before, the GPL wouldn't be suitable at
> all, because it allows _anyone_ to do _any changes_
> which is so dangerous.

I believe that changes should be allowed for purposes
of modifying the Arabic text to comply with
manuscripts other than the King Fahd manuscript, such
as the Tashkent Quran and other newer manuscripts.

> All I could say, at least to my knowledge extent,
> that
> we're contacting the QuranComplex (www.qurancomplex)
> for support on this issue.

That is great. Please let me know of the progress.

> I think this isn't 100% correct. Having different
> readings doesn't mean we also have different
> spelling.

Well, as you may be aware of it, there are visible
spelling differences among different Quran manuscripts
that are popular in different countries. For instance
many Quran manuscripts in Iran and Turkey have extra
alefs in them that are not in the King Fahd printing.
Some 19th century manuscripts have different spellings
as well. So it is not just a difference in reading,
but also spelling. Even if it was only a difference in
reading, it would still be necessary to change the
diacritics in the text in order to comply to different
readings.

> Also, not 'whomever' and not even 'some' people can
> change 'the spelling of such words to whichever
> style
> they prefer', other wise it wouldn't be Qur'an!

Well, it is a fact that there are differences in
spelling of certain words in various Quran
manuscripts. The differences are few, but still
important. I would recommend you to read this article
about this topic:
http://salam.muslimsonline.com/~islamawe/Quran/Text/Scribal/haleem.html

Note that in the Quran, it says that the original
Quran is preserved, not any written manuscript that is
available in the Islamic world. It is obvious that
since there are different spelling of certain words
among manuscripts, not all of them can be correct.

85:21-22 Indeed, it is a glorious Quran. In a
preserved master tablet.

> This is just my knowledge and I hope other
> add/correct
> any mistakes I may have done, if any.

Thank you for sharing it. I hope to hear from you.

Regards,
Mete