In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

That's a nice article..

Bhakthan — Mon, 24 Jan 2005 15:06:00 GMT

Thanks Kaplan

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

Andrew Quinn — Mon, 24 Jan 2005 16:15:00 GMT

In the table, 1,040 in modern Tamil appears to be 4,040.

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

Michael Kaplan — Mon, 24 Jan 2005 16:29:00 GMT

Whoops, you're right -- fixed now. Thanks!

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

Dr. N. Ganesan — Mon, 24 Jan 2005 19:34:00 GMT

It appears that the then government of Madras
(now, Chennai, capital of Tamil Nadu, India)
introduced the "zero" (0) in Tamil computations
in early 19th century. Found a school textbook
from 1825 CE describing both the traditional
and modern (which employs "zero"(0) ) methods
of writing Tamil numerals. This 1825 CE textbook
pages are reprinted in a work on the History of Tamil
literature in the 19th century (published 1962).
Those pages can be seen at
http://www.geocities.com/thamizh@sbcglobal.net/tamil_zero.PDF

Good to know the zero will be available in
Tamil code chart from unicode 4.1 onwards,
N. Ganean

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

Scott Hanselman — Tue, 25 Jan 2005 23:29:00 GMT

That would ROCK if you would do Ethiopic sometime.

Tenastilign'

"What is localization, anyway?"

JD on MX — Thu, 27 Jan 2005 04:45:00 GMT

is localization anyway?" href="http://blogs.msdn.com/larryosterman/archive/2005/01/26/361015.aspx">"What is localization, anyway?" Larry Osterman of Microsoft has a good short piece on five different things that are each often called "localization": (a) localizability: designing an app to easily accept alternate text; (b) translation: actually providing...

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

Ambarish Sridharanarayanan — Sun, 30 Jan 2005 05:59:00 GMT

Fascinating article. I had a question - in the traditional style, why is 1,000,000 ௰௱௲ rather than ௲௲? Similarly for larger powers of 10.

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

Michael Kaplan — Sun, 30 Jan 2005 06:12:00 GMT

The numbers came from a classical source, but if I had to guess, I'd say to match the build-up from prior characters.

Though since both forms would work, anyone who recognized one would probably be able to recognize the other...

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

Vatsan — Sun, 30 Jan 2005 07:15:00 GMT

Why is 1,000,000 ௰௱௲ and not ௲௲ ? The difference has to do with how the language is spoken.

100,000 is 1 lakh, which is called 'laksham' in Tamil. So, 1 Million is 10 * 100,000 = 10 Lakhs ('Pattu Laksham'). So, the representation of 1,000,000 would be

<symbol for 10> <representation of 100,000>

100,000 is 100 * 1000 , i.e., 'Nooru Aayiram'.
So, representation of 100,000 is

<representation of 100> <representation of 1000>

In effect, 1,000,000 is written as

<ten> <hundred> <thousand> = ௰௱௲.

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

Vatsan — Sun, 30 Jan 2005 07:25:00 GMT

"Though since both forms would work, anyone who recognized one would probably be able to recognize the other... "

The chances are, it would. In spoken tamil, two numbers uttered one after another is considered to have a multiplicative effect. For eg, 'eerezhu' (a form of saying, 'irandu ezhu', i.e., 'two seven') means 14. Similarly, 'Aayiram Aaryiram' (1000.1000) could be used to mean 1,000,000. So ௲௲ is probably also correct.

I must add though, this whole idea of the written notation of representing numbers closely following the spoken language is my conjecture, but I haven't been able to find a counterexample that disproves my theory :-)

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

Mani — Sun, 30 Jan 2005 16:03:00 GMT

Good article & discussion.
However anyone had a chance to explore in the other direction, which is decimals and fractions? In Tamil it is "binnam" (some examples like "arai" "kaal" "araikkaal" "veesam" so on). Oh yeah, whole new topic (somewhat related to this)...

-மணி

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

Michael Kaplan — Sun, 30 Jan 2005 16:51:00 GMT

I have not, myself -- not sure how the items between the integers are handled in the old style....

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

Paul — Tue, 08 Feb 2005 00:26:00 GMT

Not related to Tamil, but there's an interesting post by Ian Hickson on Traditional Hebrew numbering at http://ln.hixie.ch/?start=1033524738&count=1

Now THAT looks fun...

Roman numerals are Latin script!

Sorting It All Out — Thu, 10 Aug 2006 12:12:48 GMT

Earlier this year, I talked about the stability of the Unicode Character Database. And about how there...

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

kilikeluthi — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 15:09:41 GMT

வணக்கம்

உலகம் பரந்து வாழும் தமிழர்கள் தமிழில் எழுதமுடியாமல் தமிழை கொஞ்சம் கொஞ்சமாக மறந்து கொண்டிருக்கிறார்கள்_, இநத நிலைய மாற்ற ஒரு மிகச் சிறிய முயற்ச்சிதான் இந்த எலி-எழுத்தாணி, இதன் பெயர் "கிளிக்-எழுதி" இது ஜாவாஸ்கிறிப்றில் எழுதப்பட்ஒரு தனி ஏடு.

இந்த இணைய-எழுத்தாணியின் மூலம் கதையங்காடி, விவாதமன்றம், இலத்திரக்-கடிதங்கள் போனற இடங்களிலே தமிழை தமிழாக எந்த நாட்டில்லிருந்தும் விரைவாக எழுத வழி வகுக்க முடியும் .

கிழ் தரப்படடுள்ள இணைய முகவரியில் பார்கலாம்,

http://kilikeluthi.online.fr

இங்ஙனம் உங்கள் விமர்சனத்தை எதிர்பார்க்கும்

- கிளிக்கெழுதி

In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

That's a nice article..

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

Recommended Reading First Post

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

"What is localization, anyway?"

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers

Roman numerals are Latin script!

re: In Tamil -- sometimes, they are digits; other times, just numbers