RTL world map

[Sam Foster]

I need a rough/approximate map of the areas of the world where RTL written script is prevalent. So far I have:

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/1719101/share/World_map.svg

This will be rather small and shown briefly as a part of a presentation at the upcoming Orlando work week. I understand this is not actually an easy question to answer, and countries like India have multiple written languages. And that there is a political and ideological aspect to this. But for our purposes, if its a part of the world where we might ship RTL user interfaces, I would like to represent it on the map. What am I missing?

thanks in advance,

/Sam

[mousav...@gmail.com]

Hi Sam,

With comparing this list[1] with the Wikipedia[2] I ended up with this list of countries that you have missed:

* Official RTL language:

Afghanistan, "Dari Persian, Pashtu (both official), other Turkic and minor languages"
Chad,"French, Arabic (both official); Sara; more than 120 languages and dialects"
Comoros,"Arabic and French (both official), Shikomoro (Swahili/Arabic blend)"
Djibouti,"French and Arabic (both official), Somali, Afar"
Mauritania,"Hassaniya Arabic (official), Pulaar, Soninke, French, Wolof"
Maldives, Maldivian Dhivehi (official); English spoken by most government officials

* Partial RTL Language

Turkey,"Turkish (official), Kurdish, Dimli, Azeri, Kabardian"
India, "Hindi 30%, English, Bengali, Gujarati, Kashmiri, Malayalam, Marathi, Oriya, Punjabi, Tamil, Telugu, Urdu, Kannada, Assamese, Sanskrit, Sindhi (all official); Hindi/Urdu; 1,600+ dialects"
Ethiopia,"Amharic, Tigrigna, Orominga, Guaragigna, Somali, Arabic, English, over 70 others"
Somalia,"Somali (official), Arabic, English, Italian"
Tanzania,"Swahili, English (both official); Arabic; many local languages"
Guyana,"English (official), Amerindian dialects, Creole, Hindi, Urdu"
Uganda,"English (official), Ganda or Luganda, other Niger-Congo languages, Nilo-Saharan languages, Swahili, Arabic"

Best Wishes,

Arash

[1] http://www.factmonster.com/ipka/A0855611.html
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right-to-left

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[Sam Foster]

With comparing this list[1] with the Wikipedia[2] I ended up with this list of countries that you have missed:

I came across at least some of the countries on this list while I was researching this. It seems that in some (most?) cases though an alternative latin or other LTR script is used for day to day use, while the RTL script is mostly used in formal, historical and religious contexts, not the kind of use that would lead you to expect it in user interface and digital content? I have no special insight here though, I'm just going on what I can google up.

In other cases the countries are too small to show up on this map!

Perhaps the map as it stands suffers from appearing over-precise. Maybe I'll just paint an amorphous blob over the middle east and north africa :) That said, I've added Chad, Afghanistan and Mauritiana and can add more if anyone can confirm. Still not sure if India should be on there.

/Sam

[Sam Foster]

Hmm, according to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manding_languages I should add most of west africa, where the N'Ko alphabet is in use alongside both latin and arabic. True?

[Simon Montagu]

On 11/14/2015 10:56 AM, Sam Foster wrote:
>
> With comparing this list[1] with the Wikipedia[2] I ended up with
> this list of countries that you have missed:
>
>
> I came across at least some of the countries on this list while I was
> researching this. It seems that in some (most?) cases though an
> alternative latin or other LTR script is used for day to day use, while
> the RTL script is mostly used in formal, historical and religious
> contexts, not the kind of use that would lead you to expect it in user
> interface and digital content? I have no special insight here though,
> I'm just going on what I can google up.
>
> In other cases the countries are too small to show up on this map!
>
> Perhaps the map as it stands suffers from appearing over-precise. Maybe
> I'll just paint an amorphous blob over the middle east and north africa
> :) That said, I've added Chad, Afghanistan and Mauritiana and can add
> more if anyone can confirm. Still not sure if India should be on there.

How about using another color, or mixed green and grey, for countries
with partial RTL languages?

BTW, I would put both India and China on the "partial RTL" list --
Uyghur is official enough to be on banknotes in China
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_of_China#/media/File:RMB4-1jiao-B.jpg