Re: How about a typology for input methods

> From: suzmccarth [mailto:suzmccarth@...]


> > guess is the main one). And even in devanagari, lack of vowel or
> > consonant cluster isn't always indicated by virama or ligaturing,
> in
> > Hindi, anyway. (Since I only learned Sanskrit, where the
> inherent "a"
> > vowel is strictly observed, that always throws me when trying to
> sound
> > out Hindi, in which the inherent "a" is often--but not always--
> dropped,
> > from what I've heard).
>
> Same in Cree and Tamil, it depends on stress. The vowel can
> disappear without bothering to use a virama/pulli/ or Cree final
> (which are not only differentiated by size but can be a whole
> different set of smaller symbols. The same symbols only smaller
> seems to be a modern phenomena.)

My hypothesis regarding this has been that spelling has (in this
respect) remained stable while pronunciation has not. So, the vowel gets
dropped, but the spelling isn't changed to reflect it.

If anyone more familiar with Indic orthographies has other insights, I'd
be interested.


Peter Constable