New auxlang: Atlas

[crush]

Avriku Qubaxi,
Britianu Berzami (not sure this is the best, but just for example)

It becomes a bit awkward to make the derivitives, but not significantly different than in English:

Avriki Qubaxi, Avrika Qubaxi, Avrikata Qubaxi, Avrikera Qubaxi, Avrikan Qubaxi
Britiani Berzami, Britiana Berzami, Britianata Berzami, Britianera Berzami, Britianan Berzami

For turning multi-word countries into adjectives, it is a bit more complicated, i'm not sure what the best way would be. If we treated them as derived words (Qubax-Avriku) it would be easier, but the forms you provided all look good to me with the exception of the first one, which does seem a bit odd. It might be easier to use 'de' here (odixinu de Avriku Qubaxi - a South African lake // duzue de Avriku Qubaxi - a South African custom), not sure. But with the two adjective forms together, it just looks a bit off. I think they should either be treated as a whole (QubaxAvriku) or we switch to the 'de' construction to form the adjectival form.

Also, how are gehi and dago different? To me gehi seems like der + dago:
Lugha esis alzi gehi de di - Lugha is about as tall as you
Lugha esis der alzi dago de di - Lugha is about as tall as you

If you keep "gehi" (as a sort of "approximate equality"), gehi la works for me, otherwise, i'd say "der la" or however you say "like, similar to" (eg. "Wi esas xeka de Atlas gehi de di." - I'm a student of Atlas, like you).

Btw, Atlas doesn't feel like a very "Atlas-y" word, would there be a translation for atlas that we could use in Atlas? Maybe atlasvale or even something like dunvale (world-language)

EDIT: I started a short list of verbs and their noun/adjective/adverb forms:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/ ... sp=sharing

[Rodiniye]

Word: doicint
POS: number
Meaning(s):
1. decimal zero zero zero two
Root(s):
1. doi
2. cint

Just noticed "cint" is very similar to "cent", maybe it would be better to change that? maybe to "zint"?

dago/gehi

OK. So the difference is:

"dago" is "X" is equal to "Y": al-direbo esis lambi dago de al-binu - The tree is as long as the building (exactly)
"gehi" is "x" is similar to "Y": al-direbo esis lambi gehi de al-binu - The tree is (more or less) as long as the building.

gehi as "as"

"gehi" in Atlas is a particle for comparison, so I would not use it as "as", in questions like:

do it as you prefer.
it happened as I told you.

To me, that "as" is exactly "w" in Atlas (manner, mode).

So "as if" would be "w la". Maybe we could use one word onlly. What about:

w+la = wa (as if)
dou+la = da (even if)
and we change "wa" (rather than) to "za"?

I think that would be easy to remember too, and simple.

I like that. It retains the country name that the natives use, and gives it an Atlas flavour. Some spelling changes could be made to adapt the names to Atlas spelling and pronunciation.

I kind of like that. So if we give countries -u endings and languages -e endings it is consistent with the grammar:

Doicu (germany), Doice (German)

Adding -a is ok too: doica (german person)

BUT, the problem is that the adjective -i could be both the language and the nationality, which I think would be acceptable. So:

al-itsa doici - the german person
al-vale doici - the german language

Actually it is quite clear.

dak (hit)
dak (collision)
Still in dictionary as separate entries. I think they are the same and should be combined dak (hit, collision)

kuk (cook)
kuk (chicken)

zel (sky)
zel (order, instruct)
zell (cell). Although zell is different than zel, I think they will cause confusion and probably one should be changed.

Will be changed very soon! Probably today

Prepositions. Earlier, there was a big purge of prepositions. I think there are currently just 24 but I still have six extra that I think are supposed to be deleted. (an, houn, qun, sein, von, za). Perhaps Rodiniye could confirm that these are gone? Four of those (hou, qun, sein and von) were formed by adding an "n". Can Rodiniye confirm that adding an "n" to prepositions has also been eliminated?

The -n ending is still there (it is in the grammar too). I think it is a good touch, it is easy to learn and the preposition is very versatile. "sei" for instance can be both "on" or "over", or "overhead", etc.

The -n ending is only added to location preposition sei, qu, vo, hou (to become sein, qun, von, houn). "za" is now gone I believe, same as "an".

[crush]

I think the language could still just be doicvale. So we'd have:
doicu = Germany
doica = German person
doici = German (related to the country)
doicvale = German language
doicvala = German speaker
doicvali = German (grammar, vocabulary, etc.), German-speaking (eg. community)

What are your thoughts for countries with two words? Like the United States, South Africa, etc.?

Edit: then for "as if" it's say w la, and dou la for "even if".

[tommus]

I think the language could still just be doicvale. So we'd have:
doicu = Germany
doica = German person
doici = German (related to the country)
doicvale = German language
doicvala = German speaker
doicvali = German (grammar, vocabulary, etc.), German-speaking (eg. community)

I like all of that.

What are your thoughts for countries with two words? Like the United States, South Africa, etc.?

I liked your suggestion of making them compound words (such as: Qubax-Avriku). That solves the awkward problem of having the adjective after the proper noun and the associated problem of applying the suffixes to the adjective.

Edit: then for "as if" it's say w la, and dou la for "even if".

So "as if" would be "w la". Maybe we could use one word onlly. What about:
w+la = wa (as if)
dou+la = da (even if)
and we change "wa" (rather than) to "za"?
I think that would be easy to remember too, and simple.

I like the single words (wa, da, za). That would make all the conjunctions 2-letters, ending with "a".

The -n ending is only added to location preposition sei, qu, vo, hou (to become sein, qun, von, houn). "za" is now gone I believe, same as "an".

OK. I'll update my preposition data.

[tommus]

So "as if" would be "w la". Maybe we could use one word only. What about:

w+la = wa (as if)
dou+la = da (even if)
and we change "wa" (rather than) to "za"?

I think that would be easy to remember too, and simple.

"za" is now gone I believe, same as "an".

They are gone as prepositions, but both are in the grammar as adverbs: "an" (on), "za" (off). How about making "af" (off) (which sounds good, and "af" is used in other languages for "off"? So "an" (on) and "af" (off). That will free up "za" (rather than).

[Rodiniye]

Countries/languages

I like the latest suggestion, so that will be the one used. Doicu/Doice for countries, Doicvale for the language.

(actually, I like countries more with "e". Can you really see a country? it is a difficult one! Both will be accepted).

Next entry on the blog will be about countries.

Btw, in names like "New York", adjective should be placed at the end, and with hyphen: Iork-Novi.

da, wa...

I will change them tomorrow if I can.

Remember, "f" does not exist in Atlas! it is "v"

And I emphasize this because I have seen it a few times . Frans is "Vrans", and "af" will be "av". I like the suggestion of eliminating "za" as an adverb and including "av" again (it existed when it was created).

particle "de"

I remember this came up in your messages. I know it has multiple meanings, but I love this little tiny thing. I think it is one of the things that makes Atlas so simple. I had my doubts about simplifying, but "de" really works. Very rarely it introduces ambiguous meanings. Basically "de" adds any kind of modification to an adjective, adverb or verb. it is "of" and "that/which" in English. It is based on Chinese particle "de", but with different meanings and characteristics (particle position, usage...).

New entry tomorrow, next one will be about this "de" particle.

compound words with hyphen

I have decided that for the meantime compound words will have hyphen when they have more than 2 roots (as agreed) AND/OR when one of the sides is a single letter word ("s", "w"..).

I have written a new small article on the news section, very basic, but these changes are already there.

Grammar and Dictionary will be changed soon as well in order to reflect this.

---

As I said, probably new entry tomorrow with countries. I will explain some things as well about the news.

[tommus]

Btw, in names like "New York", adjective should be placed at the end, and with hyphen: Iork-Novi.

The problem with having the adjective in proper names come at the end, is that you then cannot add the suffix to the adjective. I like crush's idea of making the compound country names as compound words, separated by a hyphen (such as Qubax-Avriku). There is not the problem of the adjective preceding the noun because it is now a root, not an adjective. That lets the noun come at the end, and you are free to add the required suffixes (i, u, a, an, etc). With the New York example, (Iork-Novi), a New Yorker would have to be Iorka-Novi, New York people would be Iorkan-Novi, and a New York building would be Iorki-Novi binu. I think these would be better as Nov-Iork, Nov-Iorka, Nov-Iorkan, Nov-Iorki,

Remember, "f" does not exist in Atlas! it is "v"

Of course, I keep forgetting.

I have decided that for the meantime compound words will have hyphen when they have more than 2 roots (as agreed) AND/OR when one of the sides is a single letter word ("s", "w"..).

OK. That is good.

[tommus]

Adverbs and demonstratives to JSON format, etc.

Adverbs were quite straightforward. However, yesterday, today and tomorrow (dodine, tedine, houdine) are listed in the grammar as adverbs, but they are abstract nouns. They are compound words with dine (day). te (this), hou (after), but why is yesterday "do"dine?

Adverbs:

Code: Select all

Word: an
POS: adverb
Meaning(s):
1. on

Word: cast
POS: adverb
Meaning(s):
1. often

Word: dahi
POS: adverb
Meaning(s):
1. again

Word: dou
POS: adverb
Meaning(s):
1. even

Word: duzu
POS: adverb
Meaning(s):
1. still

Word: haiek
POS: adverb
Meaning(s):
1. only

Word: itzei
POS: adverb
Meaning(s):
1. too
2. as well

Word: nithe
POS: adverb
Meaning(s):
1. neither

Word: shedon
POS: adverb
Meaning(s):
1. almost

Word: za
POS: adverb
Meaning(s):
1. off

Word: zuen
POS: adverb
Meaning(s):
1. already

Demonstratives.

I left demonstratives to the last because they give me the most concern. I think, for a simplified language like Atlas, two levels of demonstratives are sufficient, not three. I think they all should just be called demonstratives (not demonstrative adjectives, pronouns and determiners) (simple and easy to understand). And I think they should be stand alone words even if they are associated with a noun (not ce-, te-, cen-, ten-) because there already are perhaps too many hyphens with compound words and other prefixes. And they can be like this:

te (this, here)
ce (that, there)
ten (these)
cen (those)

In the human-friendly format, they would appear like this:

Demonstratives:

Code: Select all

Word: ce
POS: demonstrative
Type: singular
Meaning(s):
1. that, there

Word: cen
POS: demonstrative
Type: plural
Meaning(s):
1. those

Word: te
POS: demonstrative
Type: singular
Meaning(s):
1. this, here

Word: ten
POS: demonstrative
Type: plural
Meaning(s):
1. these

In section 9 of the grammar, "to-day" should be "today".

[crush]

Btw, in names like "New York", adjective should be placed at the end, and with hyphen: Iork-Novi.

As tommus mentions, the problem with this is that you can't use it for other parts of speech, say you wanted to talk about New Yorkians or the New York accent, if we had Nov-Iorku as the root, we could talk about "Nov-Iorkan" and the accent "Nov-Iorki". Your other changes all sound great.

However, yesterday, today and tomorrow (dodine, tedine, houdine) are listed in the grammar as adverbs, but they are abstract nouns. They are compound words with dine (day). te (this), hou (after), but why is yesterday "do"dine?

Was it intended to be "vo"dine?

Demonstratives.

I left demonstratives to the last because they give me the most concern. I think, for a simplified language like Atlas, two levels of demonstratives are sufficient, not three. I think they all should just be called demonstratives (not demonstrative adjectives, pronouns and determiners) (simple and easy to understand). And I think they should be stand alone words even if they are associated with a noun (not ce-, te-, cen-, ten-) because there already are perhaps too many hyphens with compound words and other prefixes. And they can be like this:

te (this, here)
ce (that, there)
ten (these)
cen (those)

That may be the case for English speakers, but many other languages make that distinction (three levels) so i'm not sure which way would be simplest for others. Though it does seem like "le" only has an use when talking about location and this/that whereas the others can be used for time, manner, quantity, etc.

[reineke]

The World Atlas of Language Structures (WALS) is a large database of structural (phonological, grammatical, lexical) properties of languages gathered from descriptive materials (such as reference grammars) by a team of 55 authors.

Syllable Structure

http://wals.info/chapter/12