Re: License Islamic Holy material

["Meor Ridzuan Meor Yahaya" <meor dot ridzuan at gmail dot com>]

Abdalla,

First of all, I'm not an Arabic speaker. I think most Quran software
were designed by Arabic Speaker, which sometimes assume that users
will know the basics. I do learn Arabic, just the basics.

> Well, we go into the issue of computation vs. visualization again. The
> question is what do you want the user to do with the text. Read it? Recite it?
> Go for the 'uthmani script.
> Search it?

Why can't we have both? Is it too difficult? See below.

Do you expect  someone would search for
> a word that contains yaa-a, but types alif-maqSoora instead? Or do you expect
> someone to search for a word with a subscripted س, م, or لا? That would be too
> much for the user and the programmer. Why burden the program, the programmer,
> and the user with all the auxiliary symbols when performing computation?

As I mentioned before, I'm not an Arabic speaker. Most people here
does even know the differences between alef maksura and yeh. They
don't even know why the yeh is not dotted (final and isolated). And
they don't know how to spell. What they do know is they read from the
Mushaf, which mostly in Rasm Uthmani. So, if they were to search for
the word Ar-Rahman, al they know is it is spelled as alef lam reh hah
meem noon. I believe in rasm imlaie it is spelled with alef, or maybe
not, but you get what I mean. So, what do I get?

Actually, I was working to create a database, so this problem will be
solved once and for all. I do have the text for Rasm Uthmany, and then
I combine with the works of openburhan (that have the root words).
There are a few verses which are not match in terms of word count, and
I need to work on that manually. For now, time is a factor. I do not
have the text for rasm imlaie. It would be great if it can be merge.
If you are interested in it, I can provide you the details.

> I would kindly like to point out that I am not "debating" anything with
> anyone. Whatever anyone insists to do is not my business.

I'm not referring "we" as you and me, what I'm referring is to the
discussion last time among several people.

> > 3. How to accomodate the 7 mutawatir reading style, plus another 3
> > mashor? For the various narration, the verse, pause etc are all
> > different. Not considering the different marks used.
>
> There are a group of readings that are very similar to the extent that they do
> not exist as standalone hardcopies.

I believe this is not true. There are several hardcopies around.
Without it, it will be extremely difficult to read correctly. Pause
and stop are among the information required. Differences in letters
(yeh in one reading, teh in another) are more difficult to handle
without hardcopies.

The students know the very slight
> differences between those readings, and they apply the reading without the
> need of a text.

I don't think it is that easy, not without you remember every single
one of it (it can be in the range of hundreds). I would be much easier
if you use the appropriate text.

> Anyway, assuming all the readings are published to the public (which is very
> difficult to imagine), you create a sum for each sura in every reading. As you
> have seen, the sum's value is just one line. Anyway, people with the right
> experience will know what to do.

That's the problem. We do have have many people with the experience.
What I was trying to do is to let the information available so that
everyone could access the information. At the moment, muslim from
African continent who are used to different reading style will have
some difficulties adjusting to the text available on the internet.

> > 4. On the practicle side, who will be running the verification? Anyone
> > who wants to verify their text?
>
> Anyone or anything. It could be a person or even a Quran program or web site.
> We provided a simple routine, how it is applied depends on a lot of factors.

Just a thought, not sure if this will happen or not. Let say a person
type in the text using the African style. Then when they run it thru
the routine, they found out that the text is tempered. It might give
the impression that all the while, the text that they read is wrong.
Of course, we do not want this to happen.

Regards.