alif-toolkit

Origin

When I made crossword-unicode and wiki-crossword (which generates crossword puzzles from scraping random Wikipedia articles), Arabic script posed some interesting challenges. I open sourced my work, but it started me thinking about more general data and tools to make it easier to build language games for Arabic-script languages.

This module contains normalization and text-shaping options, for the first time in MIT-licensed JavaScript / TypeScript.

Setup

• npm install alif-toolkit

Usage

import {
  isArabic,
  BaselineSplitter,
  GlyphSplitter,
  Normal,
  CharShaper,
  WordShaper,
  ParentLetter,
  GrandparentLetter
} from 'alif-toolkit';
 
// splitters
let val = BaselineSplitter('كرة');
expect(val).toEqual(['كر','ة']);
 
let val2 = GlyphSplitter('كرة بلوخ');
expect(val2).toEqual(['ك','ر','ة',' ','ب','ل','و','خ']);
 
// normalization
 
// this is an alif + accent which can be split into two more common chars
let val3 = Normal("\u0673");
expect(val3).toEqual("\u0627\u065F");
 
// this is a presentation form (isolated, initial, medial, final)
// by default it is replaced by the standard typed letter
let val4 = Normal("\uFE9F");
expect(val4).toEqual("\u062C");
 
// you can tell Normal not to change any presentation forms
let val5 = Normal("\uFE9F", false);
expect(val5).toEqual("\uFE9F");
 
 
// text-shaping - individual characters
let val6 = CharShaper("\u062C", "initial");
expect(val6).toEqual("\uFE9F");
 
// text-shaping - words with context
let val7 = WordShaper("\u062C\u062C\u062C");
expect(val7).toEqual("\uFE9F\uFEA0\uFE9E");
 
// char in any Arabic Unicode range? (normal, extended, presentation forms)
if (isArabic(myChar)) { }
word.forEach((letter) => {
  if (!isArabic(letter)) {
    // not all Arabic in this string
  }
});
 
// parent / grandparent entry in the Unicode JSON reference
let alif = "\u0627",
    alifOptions = ParentLetter(alif);
console.log(alif["final"]);
console.log(alif["wavy_hamza_above"]);
 
let alif_hamza_below_isolated = "\uFE87",
    alif_hamza_below = ParentLetter(alif_hamza_below_isolated),
    alif = GrandparentLetter(alif_hamza_below_isolated);

Examples

TODO: alif-word-bank

• Fill-in-the-blanks example
• Animals crossword example

License

Content / data largely CC-BY-SA Wikipedia, Wiktionary, and Kiwix

Code open sourced under an MIT license