Re: Arabic on Zaurus/Ipaq

[Abdulhaq Lynch <al-arabeyes at alinsyria dot fsnet dot co dot uk>]

On Monday 28 February 2005 05:05, Nadim Shaikli wrote:
> --- Abdulhaq Lynch <al-arabeyes at alinsyria dot fsnet dot co dot uk> wrote:
> > On Saturday 26 February 2005 07:52, Nadim Shaikli wrote:
> > Well the main thing is hosting the font packages for now - there is very
> > little code on the Qt/E side (a couple of small patches for tashkeel -
> > the hard part was finding out where to put the patches).
>
The font package doesn't really need maintenance any more than the current 
fonts on arabeyes - it's just a different format to ttf. I was hoping we 
could add the .ipk package file to the khotot project.

>
> > I think it might be useful to host the vocabulary program (which is in OK
> > working order on normal PCs). In order to run the arabic vocabulary
> > program on the zaurus I ported it from Postgres to SQLite. It is now much
> > more 'installable' on other people's machines so I am fairly sure there
> > would be interest in this program (running on a normal PC) with arabic
> > learners. In fact the program was originally written for me to create an
> > arabic vocabulary book but I soon realised that it could be useful for
> > revision also. Currently there are about 350 words in it and I am aiming
> > for 5001 of the most common words.
>
> How does this differ from QaMoose [1] and the EN->AR Wordlist projects [2]
> ? What is it that you do differently and is there commonality there aside
> from the GUI ?  Have you given any thought to a program to teach non-arabic
> speakers arabic (like starting with a 4-5 year old kid or similar) ?
>

This project (it doesn't have a name as yet) is entirely targetted at arabic 
learners rather than arabs who want to check the meaning of an english word.  
Most importantly, it includes all the (correct, fushaa) tashkeel and has 
associated information such as jidhr and masdar. Alternative meanings of the 
arabic words are stored for each kalima. It also goes both from English -> 
Arabic and also Arabic-English but that is something easily added to your 
current projects obviously. The GUI is not important really - the main thing 
is capturing all the data that a learner needs.

I'm not pushing to put it on arabeyes - it's entirely up to you. I'm fairly 
sure that it would be of interest to arabic learners but it doesn't 
contribute much to 'arabisation' of anything (except people ;-). There is 
some code in python for shaping (and it's not exactly beautiful) that I 
suppose might be useful to some.

Personally, I think arabeyes is a better 'house' for it than sourceforge as it 
would be found more easily. If I get hit by a bus, or stop answering my 
emails, then you can always remove it :-)

I hadn't considered releasing this to the public before because it was using 
postgresql and would have been very difficult for non-techies to install. Its 
main purpose had been to help me get the data for a vocab learning book. Now 
that it's using SQLite, it should be straightforward for linux newbies to use 
it for revision (I hope, I suppose PyQt can sometimes be hard to install).

Regarding a computer-based arabic course, that's a huge effort. There is a web 
site around that is web-ising the madina university books which are very 
good. However, their progress seems to be very slow. 
(http://www.madinaharabic.com/).

> >
> > Yes, I am currently trying to do that but it may take some time. I also
> > agree about the #ifdefs. One obstacle is that the OpenEmbedded
> > development environment is a bit of a beast and I am still getting used
> > to it and of course the maintainers have to get used to me.
>
> Sure, the Qt/E people will have to know about this work and will have to
> commit to some level of "OK'ness" if a patch were handed to them.  In
> other words a conversation with them regarding their requirements on what
> is needed to add this support might help (ie. what sort of patch will be
> accepted).  The Vim patch, for instance, went through about 1 year of
> back-n-forth before it was accepted but within about 2-3 weeks of initial
> talks I got the "if you give me a patch that is self-contained and doesn't
> impede on the code or style I will most likely accept it given I can fully
> disable it and its features" (or similar).
>
> In short, let us know (email to 'contact') if -
>  1. You want a Qt/E bidi/shaping patch project page (until the main
>     project adds its own and/or adopts the patch)
>  2. You want to house your 'vocabulary program' (didn't know what name
>     to use).
>

Is it worth adding a project page for what is just two small patches at the 
moment? Perhaps we should see how the qtquran migration goes.

I'll wait to see if you think the vocab prog. serves any useful purpose on  
arabeyes. If not, and I won't be offended at all, I'll consider putting it on 
sourceforge. If you think it is something that is appropriate then 'll email 
contact. Honestly, I really don't mind. The ball is in your court!

wassalaam
abdulhaq