Scripts and Readings

Scripts and readings

Scripts come first

Where a language uses an unfamiliar writing system, learning the script is the first task. Each Indic course (Assamese, Bengali, Gujarati, Hindustani, Kannada, Marathi, Telugu) starts with script decks, digits included, and a script guide.

A script guide is a page that teaches how the script works: its letters, vowel signs and joined letters (ADR-0016). Open it from the course.

Learning without the alphabet

You may not want to learn the script yet. When you add a language that has one, the app asks "Learn it in the script?" You can instead learn in Latin letters only. Words show their reading first, you answer in Latin letters, and the script decks are left out. You can learn the script later from Settings (ADR-0023).

Choosing a script

Some courses have two scripts. Hindustani offers Devanagari or Perso-Arabic (Urdu). Chinese offers simplified or traditional. You choose which to learn.

If you already read a script through another language, a short test of its letters lets you skip its script lessons. The test also asks the letters the new language adds.

Readings

Every word in an Indian language has a reading: its Latin letters, shown on the card. The readings are based on ISO 15919. They depart from it where a learner is better served. For example, a word is written as it is said: कितना is kitnā, without the final vowel Hindi does not say.

More examples: Telugu పాలు, milk, is pālu, and పలు, many, is palu: the macron marks a long vowel. Hindi नहीं, no, is nahīm̐. Bengali কথা, talk, is kôthā, where ô is Bengali's own vowel.

Settings > "Your languages" has "Latin-letter readings". Turn it off to see only the script. A switch for showing how each word is said in the IPA is beside it.

See Readings and ISO 15919 for the full table of letters and where the readings depart from it.

Typing

In a typing question you can type in the script, or in Latin letters. If you have no keyboard for the script, the app suggests one (HeliBoard, on F-Droid).

Fonts

Some scripts need a font. The first time a course shows a script, the app asks whether a sample line reads. If it does, the phone's own font is used and nothing is downloaded. If it shows boxes, the app downloads the script's font with that course and shows the sample again in it. Settings, Look and language, Script fonts, lists each script and can check again (#803, ADR-0042).

See also: Learner guide, Home.