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Current assessment
statistics
Writing system articles by quality and importance
Quality Importance
Top High Mid Low NA ??? Total
FA 1 1 1 3
GA 3 3 3 3 12
B 16 84 93 186 18 397
C 17 76 91 222 30 436
Start 4 136 363 1,024 62 1,589
Stub 2 21 484 51 558
List 2 12 14 426 1 7 462
Category 330 330
Disambig 13 13
File 28 28
Portal 2 2
Project 6 6
Redirect 10 30 59 203 302
Template 439 439
NA 1 36 37
Other 6 6
Assessed 42 324 616 2,406 1,064 168 4,620
Unassessed 1 1
Total 42 324 616 2,406 1,065 168 4,621
WikiWork factors (?) ω = 14,252 Ω = 4.76

Some Wikipedians have formed a project to better organize information in articles related to Writing systems. This page and its subpages contain their suggestions; whilst by no means mandatory, it is hoped that this project will help to focus the efforts of other Wikipedians. If you would like to help, please inquire on the talk page, register your name on the Participants list and review this Project page. All contributions to articles and ideas for further development of this project are welcome. See this subpage for information about quality assessment of articles in this project.

This article is a child project of WikiProject Linguistics. For more information on WikiProjects, please see Wikipedia:WikiProjects and Wikipedia:WikiProject best practices.

Title

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WikiProject – Writing systems

This WikiProject aims primarily to provide Wikipedia (en) with a consistent treatment for each writing system and general information relating to the study of writing systems. Many writing systems already have extensive pages, and the systematic information on those pages is not presented in a consistent way. A main purpose of this WikiProject is to present that information consistently, that many notable writing systems are documented, and to ensure that each of the major subject areas relevant to each is covered, at least briefly.

Note: the abbreviation WS may be used on this project page as a shorthand way to mean "writing system".

Read further for more on proposed coverage, strategy, areas to be developed, etc.

Scope

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This project covers all articles describing writing systems, their individual symbols, their relationships with language, culture, and art, as well as their development in these areas.

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Related WikiProjects are listed below. Monitoring their development, usage and approach may be useful when considering this project's further expansion and direction.

Descendant WikiProjects

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Other WikiProjects whose subject matter is actually (or conceptually) derived from this one include:

  • Defunct WikiProject Latin alphabet
  • Defunct WikiProject Chinese characters

Similar WikiProjects

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Other thematically-related WikiProjects include:

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  • No related Collaborations have yet been identified.

Sister project searches:

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Task Forces

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Participants

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The following is a list of WikiProject Writing System participants who have been active in the last year.

Please add yourself in alphabetical order. (Don't put a blank line above or below your entry: it'll mess up the numbered list.) Feel free to sign up below if you'd be interested in helping out. You can add the userbox {{User WikiProject WS}} to your userpage after you've signed up. It will put you under Category:WikiProject Writing systems participants.

  1. Angr (talk) 17:15, 25 September 2011 (UTC) - I'm more or less familiar with the Latin, Greek, Hebrew, Cyrillic, Arabic, Devanagari, Burmese, Hangul, Katakana, and Hiragana writing systems.[reply]
  2. Ashertheaxolotl - I can read Latin, cyrillic, and greek writing systems. Currently studying those and the arabic, japanese, korean, and hebrew writing systems!
  3. Ænēās Québécois - History of Greek and Latin scripts, diacritics, Mediæval calligraphy
  4. Ano-tao-mo (talk2me) - New here, im interested in some Latin writing.
  5. BrightSunMan - Random user who can read nearly all Latin script letters, Russian Cyrillic, Greek, Devanagari, Bengali-Assamese, Gujarati, Gurmukhi, Brahmi, IPA, and a bit of Hangeul and Nunavik Inuktitut. He would love to transliterate stuff.
  6. Byrappa - Mainly expanding on existing articles.
  7. Cbdorsett Count me in. Ask me questions; I'm always happy to help. And yes, I really do speak Arabic. --Cbdorsett 10:12, 7 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  8. CBD 20:41, 22 September 2006 (UTC) - Mostly a template handyman, but will also look into possible improvements to Maya script, Sarati, Enochian, and various other dead and/or fictional scripts which I am familiar with. --CBD 20:41, 22 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  9. Chet Gray (talk) 08:00, 15 April 2008 (UTC) – I don't have a particular expertise in any writing system, but this has long been an interest of mine, at least since I taught myself Tengwar in grade school.[reply]
  10. cjllw added 9 Jun05; will be glad to help expand related articles where I can
  11. Codrin.B 05:23, 9 January 2011 (UTC) - interested in finding the truth about the controversial Dacian script, Sinaia lead plates and Rohonc Codex. Also in deciphering Thracian inscriptions and interpretations of Tărtăria tablets[reply]
  12. Coroboy 12:56, 12 July 2011 (UTC) - working on the letters of the Cyrillic alphabet.[reply]
  13. CrazyEttin (talk) 15:57, 14 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  14. Christoph Päper: primarily theoretical, but also applied graphem(at)ics and related linguistic topics, like orthography, also typography — Christoph Päper 13:29, 17 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  15. CsikosLo
  16. Dcmacnut: Japanese, Chinese, and Korean. Not sure how much help I can be, but am willing to pitch in.Dcmacnut 18:17, 23 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  17. User:Dhoru 21 Native to Thaana, and I understand Latin, Korean, Kana and some Kanji, and trying to learn more
  18. Dr Bug (Vladimir V. Medeyko) I've made numerous changes in this area, happy to know that there's a project. 07:00, 13 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  19. DrHäxer: Research interests include the origin of the Elder Futhark and more broadly the general early history of writing in Central/Northern Europe. — [[User:DrHäxer|# Esmost talk 08:48, 24 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  20. Evertype·✆ 08:10, 1 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  21. FrancisTyers · 08:52, 13 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  22. graymornings: I speak and read Russian, so I'm familiar with the Cyrillic alphabet. I'm willing to help in any way – just post a message to my talk page.
  23. Glennznl: I have contributed a lot to the Baybayin and Tai Le articles and created pages for the Sukhothai, Tai Noi, Tai Viet, Fakkham and Khom Thai scripts. --Glennznl (talk) 22:08, 31 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  24. Jomeara421 (talk) 29 December 2008 Languages and scripts of Algonquian family, Cree syllabary, roman alphabets used for Algonquian languages.
  25. User:Joost Trying to help sorting out and cleaning up some of the many writing systems. Started some work today on cleaning up the mess in the articles about the various Brahmic writing systems, including work on infoboxes, broken links, etc.
  26. JWB (talk) 02:40, 20 January 2008 (UTC) Familiar with most major scripts and writing system issues in general.[reply]
  27. Kabiryani I am working on a few articles that fall under this wikiproject! I can help especially with referencing and I would love to help out if there is still an active community here. 22nd March 2022.
  28. Kingsleyj: I can chip in with Tamil script as well Kingsleyj 23:20, 20 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  29. Kiwehtin Interested in writing new articles and improving articles on scripts and numeral systems in several areas. (Malay archipelago script families, individual scripts and numeral notation systems; North Indic Nagari scripts; East African and Malagasy Arabic scripts; sign language notation/writing systems by typology, families and individual systems; sign language manual alphabets and numeral systems — again, by typology, historical relationships, and individual systems.) Improving sidebar presentation of historical relationships between scripts to reflect substantiated claims in the primary literature. Adding material on variation in various scripts: historical, regional, handwriting vs typography etc. Kiwehtin (talk) 02:05, 15 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  30. Kwami: Have contributed to hangul, rongorongo, Cree syllabics, Middle Bronze Age alphabets, Mayan glyphs, SignWriting, IPA, &c., so I should probably throw my name in. Currently have access to a copy of Daniels & Bright, which is uneven but a good all-around reference. Glad to help where I can. kwami (talk) 08:59, 15 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  31. Lolinder (talk): Interested in writing systems, unsure how much help I can be.
  32. LonleyGhost I can read Cyrillic and a bit of Hiragana/Katakana howerver I'm more interested in making the styles of articles more consistent and adding ipa where possible.
  33. Mikhailov Kusserow
  34. ムーカオズルール(Talk to Moo) 05:33, 26 December 2008 (UTC), I can read Hiragana, Katakana, a lot of Kanji, some Hangul, Hanja, Hanzi, Bopomofo (a lot of the East Asian writing systems).[reply]
  35. Monozigote: Epigraphy, Palaeography, Italic languages, etc. - I'm expanding some articles right now.--Monozigote (talk) 13:12, 29 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  36. Msanford (talk) 19:12, 4 March 2008 (UTC) Arabic, Greek and interested in starting a task force to improve and audit transliterations into English for which the original text is not provided (i.e., provide the original text).[reply]
  37. User:Murraytheb Arabic
  38. MythicalAlien (talk) 22:51, 22 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  39. Njakonkalwa I can read the Latin, IPA, Cyrillic, Greek, Armenian, Mkhedruli, Coptic, Estrangela, Madnhaya, Serta, Arabic, Hebrew, Aramaic, Phoenician, Hiragana, Katakana, and Hangul scripts. I am also learning various scripts including Mongolian, Glagolitic, Caucasian Albanian, Asomtavruli, Nuskhuri, Samaritan, Ge'ez/Amharic, Old South Arabian, etc.
  40. node
  41. nohat
  42. ocrasaroon (talk) 23:22, 15 February 2009 (UTC) Native English with a moderate understanding of both written and conversational Latin. I zero in on grammar, spelling, sentence structure, etc...[reply]
  43. OwenBlacker
  44. PepperBeast (talk) Native English speaker. I can read French well, Spanish and Italian moderately well, and Latin a little. I'm interested in Brahmic scripts and I'm learning te reo Māori. Wikifairy, template tinkerer
  45. Pgfeller (talk · contribs)
  46. pjacobi
  47. Ragib - I can help with any Bengali language scripts. --Ragib 02:31, 5 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  48. Remsense
  49. sephia karta Mainly Devanagari and Abkhaz Alphabet
  50. Shannon Garcia – various Cyrillics, kana and some kanji, Kartveli
  51. Shruti14 can help with many including Indian languages
  52. user:ŠotiBriti Can read Latin, (English, French, German, Spanish, Estonian and Finnish), Cyrillic (Russian), Greek and Georgian.
  53. Sundar I can participate where I can and will also use any template we decide upon to Tamil script
  54. SuperNova422 Can read the Latin script, the Russian Cyrillic script, (most) of the Greek script, and the Elder Futhark.
  55. Thnidu (talk) Language freak, language geek. Scripts: Latin, Cyrillic, Shavian, Tengwar, runes (both Futhark and Tolkien), Stokoe notation, somewhat of Hebrew. Languages: Latin, French, some Russian, Esperanto, Klingon, some German, chunks of quite a few others. But I'm mostly signing up for the intersection between this group and being a WikiGnome... so I probably have less time for it than I think I do. 18:13, 8 October 2015 (UTC)
  56. TosachFrechrai - Ogham script
  57. Umofomia - mainly Chinese
  58. User:Universal Life Universal Life (talk) 09:19, 4 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  59. VanIsaac 16:49, 20 June 2011 (UTC) - Probably the go-to guy for shorthands (Unicode encoder of Duployan shorthand). Interested in syllabries, abugidas (esp. old Brahmic scripts), and Han morphographs - they symbolize morphemes, so they're not ideographs.[reply]
  60. Washi Interested in writing systems in general; have edited pages on Baybayin and the Arkolochori Axe. Washi (talk) 20:39, 11 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  61. WilliamThweatt I can help with Khmer script, Thai, Lao, various Cyrillics, Greek, Hebrew and related scripts. Just contact me and let me know how I can help!
  62. Xylemphone Chinese, Tibetan, Quikscript, and shorthand systems, especially Gregg
  63. Yenx I have little time, but know about 10 writing systems almost perfectly and would love to improve the articles, it's needed!
  64. Yung Wei綪永徽 00:23, 4 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  65. Jwabeck I speak English L1, Italian, Spanish, and French. I'm also a linguistics student so I can format IPA

Currently inactive participants

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The following members of WikiProject Writing Systems have been inactive editors for more than one year. If you find yourself on this list, but wish to remain on the active list, please move your entry back up to its place in the list of participants, above.

  1. Alteaven (talk) 22:21, 29 October 2013 (UTC) - Mainly edits Javanese script, but also interested in various Indonesian scripts such as Balinese, Sundanese, Buginese, and Batak script.[reply]
  2. Atura 14:17(AEST) 2 December 2006 - English is my native language, i understand some Japanese and can read Hiragana and Katakana and some Kanji, also understand the Greek alphabet. Im more involved in neating up pages making them 'universal'
  3. BalkanFever 02:16, 28 December 2007 (UTC) - Can help with Cyrillic, Latin and IPA.[reply]
  4. Codex Sinaiticus) – Have been working in this area. – ፈቃደ (ውይይት) 04:31, 13 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  5. DePiep: Coming from the Unicode universe, now that Unicode pages are tagged into this project. -DePiep (talk) 11:01, 17 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  6. Doc Rock: Korean, Japanese, Chinese, runiform scripts, Ogham, Tifinag,and others Doc Rock 00:34, 6 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  7. User:Ephraim6888 10 April 2007 (UTC) – Devanagiri, Telugu, Kannada.
  8. Irtapil I'm fascinated phonetic writing systems. I don't know if this is fitting or ironic given I always hated spelling as a kid. It still feels like English uses vowels and double letters at random. I know it's not true mathematical randomness; there's a history behind it. So, "chaotic" is the more exact term for why i cannot predict what i need to do to make the angry red squiggle under the word go away.) I like that Arabic expresses all of the hard bits from English spelling as optional diacritics. If they'd tried to teach me Australian English symaltaniously simultaneously in Arabic, Devanagari, and Latin scripts, i think i might have learnt more of English. (talk) 10:49, 11 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  9. John Carter (talk) 00:44, 3 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  10. K.A.David: I speak English, Filipino (Tagalog), Cebuano, I can read Japanese Kana, Hangul, a few Chinese Characters, the Greek Alphabet and a little bit of Hebrew. I hope I can help!DrHäxer]] (talk) 22:26, 12 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  11. Mbrutus 15:23, 31 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  12. MinYinChao
  13. Nightsky: What a great idea! I'm chiefly interested in Western European scripts, such as those of the Middle Ages. Nightsky 21:40, 13 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  14. Nofate I would very much like to work on this project in many aspects, but would probably be the most helpful with the Chinese Character WikiProject Nofate 00:12, 29 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  15. Novinha – various dead languages, primarily mesoamerican ones.
  16. N-true – mainly Caucasian and some South Asian ones; also IPA.
  17. pieandcheeseandcereal
  18. Randfan
  19. .Raven: Multiple language/script interests, see details at my user page to save space here. — .Raven (talk) 11:07, 26 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  20. Reliable♪ Forevertalk 23:26, 13 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  21. Rppeabody I have a strong amateur interest in writing systems, particularly ancient and undeciphered scripts. Unfortunately, the only languages I am familiar with are English, Spanish, and French.
  22. Sarayuparin
  23. Selethryth (talk) 02:36, 2 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  24. Siva 23:26, 19 July 2005 (UTC) Especially interested in beefing up the Shorthand articles (particularly Pitman's).[reply]
  25. Stammer. Hopefully I can help with Tibetan. Stammer 12:04, 22 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  26. 名無し

Retired participants

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The following users are retired:

  1. GSMR: I speak and read English, Sanskrit, Hindi (both use Devanagari) and Russian, which uses Cyrillic. If you need my help with anything, let me know.
  2. Geoking66
  3. User:Msheflin Arabic, Egyptian Arabic, some Hebrew, some Indonesian, can read the (at least individual letters of...) various predecessor Semitic scripts
  4. Qanada Ever I can read the Latin script, Arabic script, Japanese Hiragana and Katakana, the Elder Futhark, and the IPA; and I have rudimentary knowledge of the Greek and Cyrillic scripts.
  5. Tea and crumpets 03:20, 17 June 2007 (UTC) Interested in Japanese, and any other language that sparks my interest. Hope I can be of some help.[reply]

Example Article structure and format

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The appropriate infoboxes should be included (see template section)

  • Introduction: Cover the type of writing system (Alphabet, Syllabary, Abjad, etc.), which languages it transcribes, and its time period. Also cover information which is needed in order to understand further information in the article (i.e. something is not always the case, or the writing system has different names).
  • History: Cover the previous writing system(s) that it descended from and how it happened. Alternatively, if it is artificial, describe the creator(s) and how they made it.
  • Description: A chart of the writing system is given, as well as specifics about how it is written (printed and handwritten styles, whether it goes left to right or right or left, etc.)
  • Usage: When and where it is used, political situation, etc.
  • Unicode Specify any ranges the writing system possesses in unicode.

Classification and hierarchy schemes

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Writing systems can be discussed in a classified hierarchy.

For broader coverage of writing system article naming conventions, see WP:Naming conventions (writing systems).

Goals

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Common goals and protocols suggested for the project to be documented here.

  1. Standardise all writing system articles, utilize {{Infobox Writing system}}
  2. Improve the general quality of writng systems articles...bring a few to good and featured status
  3. Start a portal
  4. Include complimentary visual images of each writing system in its article (at least one per article)

Project Tasklists

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Here is an organized list of current projects, jobs, etc. which this project aims to accomplish, or at least aid in the success thereof.

To-Do list

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Open task assignments

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Project contributors may wish to identify some specific section or theme upon which they are interested in working on. If so, you may do that here.

Article adoption

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Individual articles, stubs, or proposed articles may be identified here for specific collaboration and coordination of efforts.

Award

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The Writing Systems' Gold Star can be awarded to any editor who substantially contributes to the goals of WikiProject Writing Systems, whether that editor is a member or not. Any member may award the Gold Star by copying {{subst:WPWSstar|your message ~~~~}} to the recipient's talk page.

Templates

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All writing system templates should be listed here. They should also be listed at Category:Writing system templates.

Infoboxes

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Stub templates

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General templates

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Script series templates

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Categories

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WS-related categories and sub-categories to be listed here.

Ideally, every WS-related article should be placed in at least one WS-related cat or subcat, as per the schema definition (yet to be supplied), above.

Primary category

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Parent categories

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Subcat— Terminology

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Subcat— Taxonomic

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Subcat— Linguistic Script families

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Subcat— Notational Script families

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Subcat- ISO 15924

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Lists

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Articles

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All articles related to writing systems may be linked to here, for ease of reference, monitoring recent changes, and annotating where appropriate the article's current "completeness".

"Missing" or proposed articles can also be listed as redlinks as a prompt for future development.

Main article(s)

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(i.e., primary or overview articles)

Writing systems

Writing system terminology

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(i.e., articles concerned with technical definitions and terminology used in the description or study of writing systems)

acrophony allograph grapheme orthography

Writing system taxonomy

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(i.e., articles concerned with the overall classification of writing systems according to common features, historical development, language relatedness, etc.)

Alphabet Abjad Abugida Logogram Syllabary Shorthands

(Note that Peter T. Daniels' attempts to retroactively narrow the meaning of the word "alphabet" have not fully prevailed, and that articles such as "Arabic alphabet" and "Hebrew alphabet" are unlikely to have their titles changed in the foreseeable future.)

WS— Ancient

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Article naming convention

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Further information: Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (writing systems)
Script

The term 'script' is used with four meanings:

  1. A general segmental writing system, as opposed to its local instantiations:
  2. In the plural for a family or geographic group of such scripts. 'Writing systems' conveys the same idea:
  3. A calligraphic style. In many cases 'hand' may be used instead, and this may avoid confusion with other uses of the term 'script':
  4. A non-segmental writing system, especially one which is logographic, mixed, or of unknown character:
Alphabet

'Alphabet' is used for national instantiations of a segmental script, usually with a defined sorting order:

The terms abjad and abugida, though often used in the text, are considered jargon and inappropriate for a title.

Syllabary
Exceptions

Exceptions may be made where a unambiguous conventional name exists, and thus 'script', 'alphabet', or 'syllabary' is not necessary:

Note: "hieroglyphics" is deprecated.

Exceptions may also occur where a different technical term is widely used:

Modifiers

Modifiers may be used for subtypes or other cases of disambiguation:

Characters

Names should include some indication that the article concerns a character, letter, or grapheme and not a word.

Resources and references

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Links to, or details of, commonly-used, important and authorative resources and reference works to appear here.

Writing system article information

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Article alerts

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Categories for discussion

Redirects for discussion

Requested moves

Articles to be merged

Articles to be split

Articles for creation

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