This page is meant to help developers of webbrowsers to (to continue to) implement correctly the display of Arabic script.
After experimenting with lots of webbrowsers which I wanted to display fully
vocalized Arabic, my conclusion was that the Times New Roman font together
with Konqueror was the best way to go. As I have heared some news that
Konqueror will be put on a "side track" in favour of another filemanager,
I only can hope that the developers will maintain their excellent support for
displaying Arabic language. I also think it's a pity (or should I say "a crying shame") that there isn't more collaboration between the Konqueror and Iceweasel/Firefox
developers.
I have put some html-test-files and screendump-files here which can be used by webbrowser-developers to test whether their browsers display
fully vocalized Arabic correctly:
- test-file for Arabic script
- this shows
the "split-problem" which occurs with many browsers when using fully
vocalised Arabic i.e. the occurence of unwanted gaps between the characters)
- this
shows "vocalization-mash" i.e. vocalization signs being written _on_
the characters in stead of below or above, this was done with iceweasel
2.0.0.17), with Iceweasel 3.0.6 I still have this problem, same problem with Firefox 3.0.12
- correctly
placed vocalization signs and no split-problem, this was achieved
with Konqueror 3.3.5)
- Unfortunately with Konqueror 3.5.9 (using KDE 3.5.10 under Debian Lenny) a new bug was introduced: 'alif maqSuura no longer was displayed correctly, a white
rectangle appeared
instead. I also noticed this error in Konqueror 4.2.2 under Ubuntu 9.04
- test-file for displaying 'alif maqSuura
- this shows the incomplete 'alif maqSuura i.e. missing part displayed as a white rectangle
- I recently (september 2009) discovered a browser called Arora which works rather well for displaying fully vocalized Arabic. There are versions for Linux, MAC$ and
MS$.
- Download Arora
- problem for displaying hamzat el-waSl (notice white rectangles) in Arora 0.2, Konqueror 3.5.9,
Iceweasel 3.06, Opera 10.0 doesn't have this problem but still has the "split-problem"...
- html-code for displaying hamzat el-waSl in Arora 0.2, Konqueror 3.5.9,
Iceweasel 3.06
- hamzat el-waSl displayed correctly with Konqueror 3.4.2
