Introduction

Arabic Script Overview

Topic Keywords:

• Characters: Listing the characters—alphabet, diacritics, numerals, and punctuations—which are used with Arabic script. Distinguishing which character is used with which language. Provide sources for the classification (e.g. CLDR exemplar data).
• Direction: Breif description of bidi. Reference to further reading.
• Joining: Describe the joining/non-joining behavour and ligatures briefly and refer to Unicode Standard for in-detail description.
• Diacritics: Describe diacritics, their lack of effect on the joining, and combining them.
• Numbers: Brief description of different sets of numerals and their usage for Arabic and Persian languages.

Joining

Joining Behavior of Characters

Arabic script is cursive; i.e, characters are joined to their neighbors. For this purpose, each Arabic letter has at most four different shapes that allows it to join to its neighbors: beside the “isolated” form, there are “initial”, “medial”, and “final” forms. Their purposes, as their names suggest, are as follows:

• Isolated shape: Used when the letter is not joined to any other letter.
• Isolated shape:Initial shape: Used when the letter is joined only to its next (left-side) letter.
• Isolated shape:Medial shape: Used when the letter is joined from its both sides.
• Isolated shape:Final shape: Used when the letter is joined only to its previous (right-side) letter.

shows all four shapes of character U+0645 ARABIC LETTER MEEM (م).

For each Arabic letter, based on the joining behavior of its neighbors, one of its shapes is used in writing. demonstrates how letters join to form a word.

There are different categories of characters based on their joining behavior, but most of the Arabic letters are either “dual joining” or “right joining”. Dual joining characters can join from both sides. Like the character in image 1, these types of characters have all the four shapes mentioned above. Right joining characters only join to their previous (right-side) character. These characters only have isolated and final shapes, for they don’t join to their next character.

Almost all the non-alphabetical characters are “non-joining”. The few exceptions will be discussed in this document.

Please refer to The Unicode Standard Version 8.0, Section 9.2, for full explanation of Arabic cursive joining.

Ligatures

Almost all the writing styles of Arabic script use a special shape when letters lam and alef are joined. Most Arabic fonts include mandatory ligatures for this combination. Ignoring this ligature, as shown in , leads to wrong rendering of text.

This shape is not limited to the combination of U+0644 ARABIC LETTER LAM (ل) with U+0627 ARABIC LETTER ALEF (ا). Variations of letter alef such as U+0622 ARABIC LETTER ALEF WITH MADDA ABOVE (آ) and U+0623 ARABIC LETTER ALEF WITH HAMZA ABOVE (أ) and also variations of letter lam follow the same rules as well. Combination with diacritics does not affect these ligatures. Each of these ligatures also provides a special shape for joining from its right side (to the preceding letter).

Characters and Words

Topic Keywords:

• Arrangement and Joining Behaviour: Application of letter-spacing and its relation with elongation and cursive characterists. Description of different cases of dealing with joining and text alignment, such as behavior of ZWNJ and ZWJ, glyph overlapping, joining and text-shaping behavior across inline markup denoting style or font selection, single-glyph styling without breaking joining, and letter-spacing. Also, see topics under Lines and Paragraphs section.
• Spacing: Use of space as word boundary and exceptions ("و" conjunction in Arabic orthography, "ل" before a non-Arabic script noun). Misuse of space in place of ZWNJ in some Arabic script languages.
• Numbers and counting: An overview of different numbering solutions (digits, Abjad, …) and provide resources and guidelines on how to choose the right set of numerals based on the language.
• Font and Typographical considerations: Common typographical styles and their visual identity according to historical and contemporary usages. Font size considerations for mixed-script text. Ligatures and their categories (optional vs. mandatory). Use or misuse of some generic font-styles such as italic and oblique with Arabic script.

Font and Typographical considerations

Typography of body text is the first thing an author should care about.

Typography is simply an art and style arrangement of characters/words to make a language legible, readable, and appealing when displayed.

Typography then has and aesthetic and practical purpose. Good typography is a creative and skilled discipline @@..., and its is not our goal to describe it more here.

Typography has to do with typefaces (fonts), size of letters, word and line spacing, justifications and also the style, the arrangement, and the appearance of the letters and the layout.

Some of the characteristics Arabic scripts (dots, letters shapes, cursively etc...) are challenging for Typography, and to ... We begin this section by giving some background on Arabic style and Calligraphy and its history.

Arabic Style and Calligraphy

Arabic styling and writing has its origin in Islamic art and civilization, essentially used to decorate mosques and palaces, as well as in beauty manuscripts, books, and especially to copy the Koran. Arabic script is cursive making it viable to support different geometric shapes overlapping and composition. Words can bewritten in a verycondensed formas well asstretchedinto elongated shapes, so that scribes and artists of Islam labored with passion to take advantage of all these possibilities.

From the beginning of Arabic calligraphy, two tendencies or two types of styles can be seen emerging, the handwriting for the decoration of mosques and sculptures, complex and shaped enough, and writing style reserved for writing the Koran, easier to use and more readable.

Writings styles / Arabic Scripts then evolved according to cultural diversity, leading to regional calligraphic schools and styles (Kufi in Iraq, Farissi and Taʻliq in Persia or Diwani in Turkey), or to the purpose of writing, such as the copying and dissemination of the Korʼan.

In general we group under the generic term Naskh (copy/inscription) the scripts which are meant for reading at smaller sizes suitable for books and texts to be read, e.g. the Korʼan, and as Kufi (from city of Kufa in Irak) the stylish scripts ornaments oriented. Although further named styles appeared during the richer evolution of Arabic scripts.

Different Types of Writing Style

Basics and principles of Arabic writing were then defined by Ibn Moqlah (886-940 Higra) @@add a ref. Welch 1979@@ who defined the Six Styles of writing: Kufi, Thuluth, Naskh, Riqaʻ, Diwani and Taʻliq.

Kufi

One of the oldest and well known Arabic scripts. It is characterized by its decorative and prononced geometric forms well adapted for architectural design. The style grew up in the beginning of Islam for the need for Muslims to codify the Koran. @@ The script has some variations as Al Mouthafar, Al Mukhamal, Al Handassi...)@@

Thuluth

(The third) One of the finest Arabic scripts by its beauty and sight. Recognizable by the fact that the letters and words are very interleaved in it complex form. May be the most difficult in writing (need more skill), both in terms of letters or in terms of structure and composition.

Naskh

One of the clearest scripts at all, with clearly distinguished letters which facilitates the reading and the pronunciation. Can be written with small size (traditionally pens made of reeds and ink) which suits with writing longer texts written in boards and books intended for general population, especially the Koran. Currently Naskh is considered the standard script for almost all the Arabic and Muslim world.

Riqaʻ

The so-called in relation to a patcher, which is gazelle's leather. Designed to be used for education, daily (not artistic) writing and adopted in the offices (Diwan) of the Ottoman Empire.

Taʻliq

aka Farisi(Iran), Taʻliq (hanging) combines Naskh and Riqaʻ (and Thuluth?). Beautiful script characterized by the precision and stretch of its letters, its clarity and and lack of complexity. Considered as one of the best scripts in the world and is favored by many Arabs calligraphers.

Diwani

Used by Ottman court (Diwan) to write official documents. Still in use today (e.g. hand written documents by moroccan religious officers).

Nastaaliq Farissi

TBD as Persian version derived from Nas(kh) and Taaʻliq. It is like a Taaʻliq but easier to write and read...

Fonts and Styles

Until recent years, Arabic typefaces were not as common and various as the Western ones. Although Arabic was subjected of Western printing techniques, the number of different letters, absence of upper/lower cases, contextual shapes, the joining of the letters result in simplified typefaces.

The reasons might be both technical and historical / cultural.

Is this because Arabic world, like other parts in the world, came to the computer world more lately than the Western world?

According to Bil'Ak, "Not enough designers from Arabic word have paid attention to creating Arabic fonts or have been slow to address challenges presented by adapting Arabic script to screens", "May be because there are few specialized typography courses available in the Middle East."

Other possible reason, is that not all typographic concepts apply all to the Arabic script (e.g. serif, case...) and that other characteristics should be handled carefully for better readbility (@@to provide example@@).

Now, many tools are available to design Arabic fonts, to better reach the Arabic language flourishness.

Summary

Yet to be completed...

Style	Description	sample	Pic
Kufi (Diwan kufi here)	Early time of Islam 3rd or 4th century applied to the early scripts used to write the Koran difficult to write any long text	الإعجاب بالكتابة السحرية والمهارات
Naskh	The script of choice for the Koran Popular for writing books because of its legibility Adapted for printing The most common font in printed Arabic	الإعجاب بالكتابة السحرية والمهارات الإعجاب بالكتابة السحرية والمهارات
Nastaaliq	Developed in Iran in the 8th and 9th centuries (wp) Nas(kh)+Taaliq	الإعجاب بالكتابة السحرية والمهارات
Reqa'	This script evolved from Naskh and Thuluth...	الإعجاب بالكتابة السحرية والمهارات
Diwani	Used in the Ottoman court to write official documents Difficult to read and write Still in use today. Highly cursive with its letters unconventionally joined together.	الإعجاب بالكتابة السحرية والمهارات
Thuluth	Support Harakat Indicators Script par excellence for writing many different kinds of texts Used particulary for titles and architectural inscriptions	الإعْجَابْ بالكِتاَبَةِ السِّحْريَةِ وَالمَهَاراَت
Rabat aka Maghribi	Western Islamic world of North Africa and Spain Used for writing the Koran as well as other scientific, legal and religious manuscripts Not much used today.	الإعجاب بالكتابة السحرية والمهارات
Taaliq	Arabic calligraphy designed for Persian language. Until replaced by Nastaaliq	الإعجاب بالكتابة السحرية والمهارات

Remarks

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Lines and Paragraphs

Topic Keywords:

• Line composition rules: Characters which can not appear in start and end of the line. Mid-word and mid-sentence line breaking behaviour.
• Punctuations: Use and positioning of punctuation marks in the sentence. Use of paired punctuation marks.
• Mixed script text:
• Directionality and bidi: Special considerations for mixed script text.
• Paragraph adjustment and alignment: Paragraph spacing and indentation rules.
• Tab setting:
• Justification and Elongation/Tatweel/Kashida: Common justification considerations. Patterns of application of tatweel; e.g. only between or after certain characters or grapheme clusters, number of tatweels allowed per line or word, current length of a word and location of it prior to tatweel, flexibility of patterns according to font-families and typographic styles. Possible relationship between tatweel, letter-spacing and decomposition of ligatures.
• Hyphenation: Uses of hyphenation for breaking words across lines; a functioning of Arabic script or specific languages using the writing system?
• Word/Sentence boundaries:
• Special cases: Poetry, bullet lists, math, vertical text, drop-letters, etc.

Pages

Topic Keywords:

• Basic common templates:
• Page elements:
• Page-level directionality: Directionality of page elements. Bidirectional behaviour in mixed script texts on the page.
• Arrangement of elements on the page:
• Text columns:
• Header:
• Footers: Footnotes and numbering schemes.
• Illustrations:
• Tables: Directional behvaiour of tables. Mixed script text in tables.
• Page numbers: Positions of page numbers on the page. Mentioning contemporary and traditional use of Abjad page numbering.
• Page margins:
• Positioning and arrangement of content:
• Pagination rules:
• Specimens and examples:

Document

Topic Keywords:

• Distinguished requirements: book/ebook/page
• Inter-page spacing:
• First and last pages: Common practices for first and last pages.
• Table of Contents and lists:
• Indexes: Sorting of names.
• Appendices: Bibliographies, glossaries, endnotes, etc.