Young-Key Kim-Renaud wrote:

>
> Dear Suzanne et others,
>
> Han'gul, in fact, can be written linearly. There have been various experiments to linearize han'gul by Koreans in Korea and those in Russia and the Soviet Union at the turn of the century, when Koreans found themselves in a very low point of their history, as part of a "reform" movement.
>
> Linear writing is called "p'uro ssugi (take apart and write)" in contrast with the usual "moa ssugi (gather together and write)". As far as Korean writing is concerned, writing linearly or in syllable blocks is an orthographic issue, not a typological question. That is why Korean writing is not a syllabary but an alphabet. The fact that the proposal for linear writing did not really go anywhere--in spite of the several orthographic reforms Korean writing has undergone--demonstrates the efficienc

Hi, Y-K! I think "effectiveness" would be a better word than
"efficiency."

[note what happens when line length isn't controlled]

> Han'gul keyboards in a linear fashion. Because the consonants and vowels are ordered within a syllable and not scrambled in a box, proper syllable shapes are created as the letters are typed in in sequence. Korean keyboards are arranged logically and ergonomically--a lot easier to learn than the English--because all the consonants are on the left side and the vowels are on the right.
>
> The Korean alphabet is really easy to learn. It is worth investing half a day of your life to learning it, especially if you are interested in the typology of writing systems.

--
Peter T. Daniels grammatim@...