Sunday, September 30, 2018

[jdxlngkq] Replacing h with an accent in digraphs

H participates in the following digraphs: ch gh ph rh sh th wh zh.

Consider replacing the h with a diacritical mark over the previous letter, maybe caron/hacek which is similar to what some other languages already do.  All the previous letters except t lack ascenders so there is conveniently room for a diacritic above.  The H comes back for text in all caps if there isn't room for the accent above a capital letter and the previous line.

th gets its own new letter, maybe thorn or theta.

gh is often silent, so I do like the idea of replacing ough with ô when silent: cookie dô not cookie douǧ, but sand is rouǧ.  though becomes þô.  þôt?

Then what about thigh, weighing, Hugh?  weîing wêiing wêîing wéìing wê wêing.  A spelling change that depends on pronunciation would be difficult to automate.  I don't know how shillelagh is pronounced, and it seems like something that could change or be pronounced differently in different communities.

kh sometimes occurs, but k has an ascender so isn't good for a diacritic above.  Just keep it kh.

Previously, replacing h with an apostrophe.

No comments:

Post a Comment