7 ms·

https://www.quora.com/Whats-the-quickest-way-to-offend-an-Iranian https://www.quora.com/Whats-the-quickest-way-to-offend-an-Ir...

by mavdi 7y ago

kick 7y ago
It's Arabic script, though, isn't it?
- koaladevops 7y ago
  No it's Persian alphabet. They look similar but aren't exactly the same thing.
- MrMorden 7y ago
  The writing system is based on Arabic (with several extra letters, and several retained from Arabic used only in loanwords), but Persian is a completely different language. https://medium.com/@eteraz/the-death-of-the-urdu-script-9ce935435d90 https://medium.com/@eteraz/the-death-of-the-urdu-script-9ce9...
  - kick 7y ago
    Thanks for sharing!
- asadhaider 7y ago
  I believe it's likely Farsi which uses the same Arabic alphabet but is a different language. People from Iran are Persian, not Arabs.
  - kick 7y ago
    Obviously they're not Arabs, but I was unaware until now that it wasn't Arabic script! Cool!
  - smnrchrds 7y ago
    > People from Iran are Persian, not Arabs. People from Iran are from many different ethnicities, including Arabs [0]; although Arabs are one of the smaller ethnic minorities of Iran. Only about 60% of Iranians are Persian [1]. 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iranian_Arabs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iranian_Arabs 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Iran#Languages_and_ethnic_groups https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Iran#Languages...
  - akhosravian 7y ago
    The preferred term for the language is “Persian”. The word for the language in the language (Like “English” in English or “español” in Spanish) is Farsi. The Wikipedia article on the organization that regulates the language has links to sources if you care to learn more: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academy_of_Persian_Language_and_Literature https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academy_of_Persian_Language_...
- ehsankia 7y ago
  That's like if I said that your comment is French. Just because it uses the same alphabet doesn't mean it's the same language.
- smnrchrds 7y ago
  It is based on Arabic script, but it has quite a few differences. There are a couple of extra consonants (گ چ پ ژ), some letters are different (ک vs ك), (ی vs ي), etc. Some letters simply do not exist in Persian (ڤ‎). There are quite a few differences between the two. Fun fact: during the era of Windows 9x, Windows did not have good (any?) support for Persian, but it supported Arabic. Since Iran is not a signatory to any international copyright treaties, that was not a problem. A company in Iran called Borna Rayaneh essentially patched Windows 95 and later 98 to make it work with Persian. Their patched Windows version was ubiquitous in Iran. It would take a couple of years and Windows versions until Windows' default installation was good enough for everyday use. Unfortunately Borna made some engineering decisions in making their version whose result has been a mess whose effects could still be felt almost a quarter century later. In order to make things work for Persian, they took the Arabic version and tweaked it just enough to make it usable. One of the things they did was taking an Arabic font, removing glyphs that Persian did not have, and replacing them with glyphs it did. Remember, this was the pre-Unicode days. This was the easiest way to make it work, as opposed to creating a new encoding system. Their fonts (called series B, because their names all started with B) are still widely used today, and they are far from ideal. For example, you open a document that has all ک encoded as ك. But the font shows it as ك, so you don't know anything is wrong. You search for a word with ک and it doesn't find any matches. And if you are a non-technical person, you get the impression that search doesn't work and start looking through the 582-page document manually to find the word you are looking for. Normalizing Arabic and Persian code points (to the best of my knowledge by manual replacement of one with the other, not built-in standard library functions, because they are actually different and the only reason they are sometimes mixed up is historical decisions) is a must if you want to implement any sort of search in a website or an app.
  - solstice 7y ago
    Thank you for the fascinating explanation and story
  - marcosdumay 7y ago
    > Since Iran is not a signatory to any international copyright treaties Getting off from a tangent, how does that work? Your copyrights are ignored on any other country? Or do your people do something to get some kind of "international copyrights"? I imagine it does not make much difference for patents, is that right?
- skrebbel 7y ago
  Sorry I don't understand your comment, I don't speak Latin
- bane 7y ago
  In the same way that Russian is written with Greek letters.
- hassancf 7y ago
  Yes, it’s the Arabic script. Many languages use the Arabic script, the same way many European languages use the Latin script.

https://www.quora.com/Whats-the-quickest-way-to-offend-an-Iranian https://www.quora.com/Whats-the-quickest-way-to-offend-an-Ir...

by mavdi 7y ago

https://www.quora.com/Whats-the-quickest-way-to-offend-an-Iranian https://www.quora.com/Whats-the-quickest-way-to-offend-an-Ir...

kick 7y ago

It's Arabic script, though, isn't it?

koaladevops 7y ago
No it's Persian alphabet. They look similar but aren't exactly the same thing.
MrMorden 7y ago
The writing system is based on Arabic (with several extra letters, and several retained from Arabic used only in loanwords), but Persian is a completely different language. https://medium.com/@eteraz/the-death-of-the-urdu-script-9ce935435d90 https://medium.com/@eteraz/the-death-of-the-urdu-script-9ce9...
- kick 7y ago
  Thanks for sharing!
asadhaider 7y ago
I believe it's likely Farsi which uses the same Arabic alphabet but is a different language. People from Iran are Persian, not Arabs.
- kick 7y ago
  Obviously they're not Arabs, but I was unaware until now that it wasn't Arabic script! Cool!
- smnrchrds 7y ago
  > People from Iran are Persian, not Arabs. People from Iran are from many different ethnicities, including Arabs [0]; although Arabs are one of the smaller ethnic minorities of Iran. Only about 60% of Iranians are Persian [1]. 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iranian_Arabs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iranian_Arabs 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Iran#Languages_and_ethnic_groups https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Iran#Languages...
- akhosravian 7y ago
  The preferred term for the language is “Persian”. The word for the language in the language (Like “English” in English or “español” in Spanish) is Farsi. The Wikipedia article on the organization that regulates the language has links to sources if you care to learn more: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academy_of_Persian_Language_and_Literature https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academy_of_Persian_Language_...
ehsankia 7y ago
That's like if I said that your comment is French. Just because it uses the same alphabet doesn't mean it's the same language.
smnrchrds 7y ago
It is based on Arabic script, but it has quite a few differences. There are a couple of extra consonants (گ چ پ ژ), some letters are different (ک vs ك), (ی vs ي), etc. Some letters simply do not exist in Persian (ڤ‎). There are quite a few differences between the two. Fun fact: during the era of Windows 9x, Windows did not have good (any?) support for Persian, but it supported Arabic. Since Iran is not a signatory to any international copyright treaties, that was not a problem. A company in Iran called Borna Rayaneh essentially patched Windows 95 and later 98 to make it work with Persian. Their patched Windows version was ubiquitous in Iran. It would take a couple of years and Windows versions until Windows' default installation was good enough for everyday use. Unfortunately Borna made some engineering decisions in making their version whose result has been a mess whose effects could still be felt almost a quarter century later. In order to make things work for Persian, they took the Arabic version and tweaked it just enough to make it usable. One of the things they did was taking an Arabic font, removing glyphs that Persian did not have, and replacing them with glyphs it did. Remember, this was the pre-Unicode days. This was the easiest way to make it work, as opposed to creating a new encoding system. Their fonts (called series B, because their names all started with B) are still widely used today, and they are far from ideal. For example, you open a document that has all ک encoded as ك. But the font shows it as ك, so you don't know anything is wrong. You search for a word with ک and it doesn't find any matches. And if you are a non-technical person, you get the impression that search doesn't work and start looking through the 582-page document manually to find the word you are looking for. Normalizing Arabic and Persian code points (to the best of my knowledge by manual replacement of one with the other, not built-in standard library functions, because they are actually different and the only reason they are sometimes mixed up is historical decisions) is a must if you want to implement any sort of search in a website or an app.
- solstice 7y ago
  Thank you for the fascinating explanation and story
- marcosdumay 7y ago
  > Since Iran is not a signatory to any international copyright treaties Getting off from a tangent, how does that work? Your copyrights are ignored on any other country? Or do your people do something to get some kind of "international copyrights"? I imagine it does not make much difference for patents, is that right?
skrebbel 7y ago
Sorry I don't understand your comment, I don't speak Latin
bane 7y ago
In the same way that Russian is written with Greek letters.
hassancf 7y ago
Yes, it’s the Arabic script. Many languages use the Arabic script, the same way many European languages use the Latin script.