Urdu Blogging and Web

ا آ ب پ ت ٹ ث ج چ ح خ د ڈ ذ ر ڑ ز ژ س ش ص ض ط ظ ع غ ف ق ک گ ل م ن ں و ہ ھ ء ی ے

Problems Viewing Urdu Text Above

I am using the Tahoma font for writing Urdu. Unicode is the standard character set for such things nowadays and the Arabic script part of it contains characters for Arabic, Persian, Urdu, etc. Some other fonts provide the Arabic characters which are a subset of Urdu ones, but not all Urdu characters. Tahoma has support for Urdu characters.

I have checked both Windows 2000 and XP and the Tahoma versions (2.80 and 3.00 respectively) installed with these two operating systems support Urdu properly. Windows 98 by default does not. However, installing a newer version of the font might help you viewing Urdu pages.

Older web browsers won’t display Urdu correctly. You should use a recent browser, like Internet Explorer 5.5 or later, Mozilla 1.5 or later, Netscape Navigator 6.0 or later, Opera 6 or later. Alan Wood has a detailed list and description of different browsers’ support for Unicode. He also has specific information about Arabic support.

Mac OS 9.2 and Mac OS X also support the Arabic script. I am not sure about Unix/Linux.

This website has a list of operating systems, browsers and fonts that support the Arabic script.

If you have more information about viewing or creating Urdu web pages on Macintosh or Unix, please let me know. Also, let me know if you would like me to include other Mac- or Unix-specific fonts in my style class for Urdu and how my weblog’s Urdu posts look in other browsers and operating systems.

I have set up my weblog so that if your computer does not have a Tahoma font, then it is provided from my website automatically. This should work on both Windows machines and Macs. I am not sure about Unix. However, if you have a really old version of Tahoma which does not contain all Urdu characters, then my newer version of the font is unfortunately not downloaded (I am actually not sure about this.) I am using Microsoft WEFT 3 to embed the fonts.

If the font is downloaded, it is installed only temporarily to view my weblog. This is due to the licensing provided with the Tahoma font. I can only do “editable embedding” which means temporary installation. “Installable embedding” which would allow a font to be permanently installed is not allowed.

Umair has a font for download as well as instructions on how to install it at the bottom of his Urdu weblog. That should help all Windows users.

UPDATE: Asif has an installable package of Urdu fonts for Windows.

How to Type in Urdu

I’ll only describe the Windows options here since they are the only ones I am familiar with. For other systems, please take a look at the links at the end of the post.

You have two options: You can either install full Urdu/Arabic support or use an Urdu Unicode editor.

Urdu support based on Unicode is available only in Windows 2000 and XP. The Microsoft website has the instructions on how to install Urdu language support and keyboard. Once you have installed it, you can simply switch language to Urdu from the taskbar and start typing in Urdu.

If you are like me, you might not like the Urdu keyboard layout. Shehzad has designed a phonetic Urdu keyboard. This maps Urdu characters on your keyboard such that phonetically similar Urdu and English characters are mapped to the same key. This is good for us who are used to typing in English. I recommend that you install that as well. The installation instructions are on his page.

UPDATE: I like this phonetic Urdu keyboard layout better.

Another thing you might need to get used to an Urdu keyboard is the on-screen keyboard. This is available from the accessibility options of Windows. You can either click on the keys of the on-screen keyboard or just use it as a guide while you type.

If you are not using Windows 2000 or XP or you don’t want to install the whole Arabic/Urdu support stuff, you can download some Unicode editor. A good one is Unipad. The free version allows you to type upto 1000 characters. For longer text, you have to buy it. It comes with a built-in Urdu keyboard and font. You can display the Unipad keyboard on-screen as well. Unipad does not require that you have the Urdu/Arabic language support installed on your machine. Once you have typed your text in Urdu, you can copy and paste it into other applications. If you are planning to put the text online and are afraid if you might not have support for Urdu setup properly, you can select the Urdu text in Unipad and convert it to XML/HTML entities. All the Urdu characters will change to &1651; or some other number. This is useful sometimes, though the problem is with editing. Unipad comes through, however, since you can convert the entities back to the characters as well.

How to Type Urdu Comments

Now, let’s talk about how you can type Urdu comments on this weblog. You can follow one of the two methods from the last section.

There is, however, the little matter of correct alignment of the text since Urdu is written from right to left while English is written left to right. To get that correct, you should do the following:

  • At the start of every Urdu paragraph, type in English: @p[ur](urdu). @ followed by a space.
  • If you have an English word within the Urdu paragraph, surround it with some code like this: %[en-US](en)Word%.
  • If you have an Urdu word in an English paragraph, it needs something similar: %[ur](urdu)لفظ%.

Urdu Blogging

Let’s now talk about what stuff I had to do with my blogging software to get the Urdu blogging going properly. This is obviously Movable Type specific, but the general principles apply to other blogging tools as well. I might later add stuff about Blogger. If you are blogging in Urdu, please write up something about how to setup your blogging tool for that and let me know.

First of all, you need to make a few changes in mt.cfg. Find the line about PublishCharset. Uncomment it (by removing the # at the start of the line) and change it to PublishCharset utf-8. This will change the character encoding of your weblog from ISO-8859-1 (Latin 1) to the Unicode one. Also, uncomment the NoHTMLEntites line and set it to NoHTMLEntites 1. This will leave your Urdu Unicode character as is instead of changing them over to HTML entities like &1649; etc.

There is one more change that I did in mt.cfg. This one was for comments. Since I am allowing comments in Urdu, I have to allow some extra HTML tags than the default to take care of the alignment. I’ll explain the tags later, but here’s my sanitize line in mt.cfg:

GlobalSanitizeSpec a href,b,br/,p,strong,em,ul,li,blockquote,p class lang,span class lang,i

If your web server is running Apache, you should also add the following in the .htaccess file in the top weblog directory (if the file doesn’t exist, create a new one):

AddType 'text/html; charset=UTF-8' html

This tells the server that all your files with .html extension should be served as of type text/html and with the character set of UTF-8.

The next problem was that the Movable Type interface was using fonts that did not display all Urdu characters properly. So I was seeing a lot of squares while typing my Urdu entries. To fix that, we need to make changes to the Movable Type interface style file. This is styles.css in your Movable Type directory. I am providing my styles.css file with the necessary changes.

The changes basically are to add “tahoma” as the first font in “font-family” for the following classes/styles: a.list, input, textarea, textarea.width500, textarea.wide, textarea.short310, and textarea.short340.

The last thing that needed to be done was to define the alignment for Urdu text in a style class for the weblog. Here is my CSS file. I am using the following two classes:

.urdu {
font-family: tahoma, "Arial Unicode MS", arial, georgia, verdana, sans-serif;
font-size: medium;
text-align: right;
direction: rtl;
unicode-bidi: embed;
}
.en {
text-align: left;
direction: ltr;
unicode-bidi: embed;
font-family:georgia, verdana, arial, sans-serif;
}

Whenever I have an Urdu paragraph, I use <p class="urdu" lang="ur">...</p> around it. I don’t use anything around the English paragraphs.

When I have a few words of Urdu in an English paragraph, I use <span class="urdu" lang="ur">...</span> around the Urdu words. Similarly, when I have some English words in an Urdu paragragh, I put <p class="en" lang="en-US">...</p> around them.

Actually, since I use the MT-Textile plugin, I use the simpler Textile codes as I showed in the section about commenting.

Resources

  1. Alan Wood’s Unicode Resources
  2. Unicode
  3. Browsers and Fonts that work for Arabic
  4. Shehzad’s website about Urdu websites creation
  5. Mac OS 9 Language Pack Installation
  6. Alan Wood’s List of Arabic Unicode Fonts
  7. Urdu Support for Windows
  8. Justifying Arabic Text
  9. HTML lang and dir attributes
  10. A better way for language-based styles
  11. Authoring HTML for Middle Eastern Content
  12. U-Trans: A program for converting ArabTex transliteration code into Unicode plus an Urdu Nastalique font
  13. Unipad: A Unicode text editor
  14. Urdu Phonetic Keyboard Layout for Unipad
  15. Syed Rizwan Rizvi’s Urdu-related page
  16. Hugo’s Urdu Page
  17. Urdu Alphabet
  18. Yahoo! Group for Urdu Computing

UPDATE: More here and here.

By Zack

Dad, gadget guy, bookworm, political animal, global nomad, cyclist, hiker, tennis player, photographer

63 comments

  1. All thumbs up Zack bro! You’ve never been as awesome as here. This post should rank higher than the Kashmir one or Elections’. All details seem to be correct and URLs too. A great post indeed!

  2. Ejaz: Thanks. Now if I was able to find more Urdu blogs. Three is too small a number. We need some publicity. Any ideas?

  3. Yeah, I shall be emailing you about that soon Inshallah. Was just busy in updates of new issue of Erudition Online. But hopefully, we can get it moving. I had couple of friends coupled with ideas who could drive it through.

  5. موقع مجلة النعمة يقدم كلمة الله الكتاب المقدس الإنجيل رسالة السيد يسوع المسيح مجاناً وقراءات مختارة مواضيع مصيرية قصص واقعية شهادات شخصية ترانيم وأشعار ردود مؤكدة كتب بنّاءة رسوم مواقع مهمة تأملات يومية
    Bible Read search in Arabic Studys Stories Testimonies Hymns and Poems Answers Books Links Daily devotions/Alnemat Journal Arabe Chrétien ( La Grâce ) La Revue Arabe sur Internet offre La Sainte Bible ( Al-Injil ) L’Evangile de Jésus Christ gratuit, Bienvenue a La Grâce.

  6. Dear Zack,

    Your Urdu blogging guide was really very informative. Though I am still unable to write urdu properly on my weblog but I think I need to reconfigure some thing that I missed.

    Thank you so much

  10. irshad: What operating system are you using? I am not sure about Mac OS or Linux/Unix, but my weblog’s Urdu entries should be readable in Windows 2000/XP using a recent version of Internet Explorer, Netscape or Firebird, etc. If you are using Windows 98, you might need to download a newer version of the Tahoma font. Check Umair’s Urdu blog for instructions.

  11. I was looking for some Unicode text editor specially something with no time or document size restrictions like Unipad. I looked around and found Namaber Urdu editor. Though there are some bugs in the software but the phonetic keyboard layout was of great help. I would recommend Notepad which is the best unicode editor for Windows but just incase if you dont have XP or 2000 and you want to write longer Urdu pages then give Namaber a try.

    http://www.iways.net/namaber/

  12. Danial: I use Notepad or a browser window on my XP machine for typing Urdu posts, but have to use Unipad for my wife’s Win98 PC. I did look at Namaber but I am not sure why I didn’t include it in my list. Might have forgotten.

    Anyway, thanks.

  13. Urdu on the web

    Some regular readers of my web log, like Haris and some new readers like Stalker think that I should not write in Urdu. They think that it is difficult to read Urdu on the web and also they think that…

  14. Dear Sir,
    I am facing some problems in using Urdu in Windows98.I have used Unipad it works quiet well in Win200,Xp but does not work in Win98.
    By an example I want to brief my problem,”When I write ZUBAIR in Unipad it is quiet well but when I cut and past it in MS Word In Win98, it comes in this way RIABUZ (IN URDU).
    Please guide me which software or technique I shall adopt to avoid this problem.
    Thanks and waiting for your reply.
    Yours sincerely,
    Zubair Ahmad.

  15. Zubair: From what I know the regular version of MS-Word 98 does not support Urdu or any other language that’s written right to left.

  16. In the name of allah has most gracius & most Mercifull
    in this site U are visiting this channel
    Urdu
    Love
    Musiq
    & That Serviceise
    Em@il
    SmS
    Yahoo Room
    Chating Tools
    And That Links
    A-Z WEB links
    All information Have U Want
    & Above 1000 Games
    No 1 Tele directory

  18. Dear Sir,
    Please tell me how I can write Urdu in win 98.
    Secondly I have used a software for urdu (Pras Negar)but when I cut and past it in MS Excel file it starts sentence from bottom to top.
    Please tell me how can I control this problem.
    Thanks,
    Yours sincerely,
    Zubair Ahmad.

  19. Zubair: Win 98 and Office 98 don’t have any good support for Urdu or other right-to-left languages. Win98 did not have much of multi-lingual support.

  22. ہیلو دوست ذکریا، میں اردو میں بلاگ لکھتا ہوں ، کیا آپ بتائیں گے کہ یہ rss کیا ہوتا ہے؟ کیا rss بلاگ پر فیڈ کرنا ضروری ہے؟ پلیز گائیڈ کیجئے بڑی مہربانی ہوگی ـ

  23. Here are a couple of articles about RSS:

    1. What is RSS?
    2. Introduction to RSS

    RSS is used by news aggregators to collect news or blog posts from different sources. A lot of people use these aggregators or RSS readers to read weblogs because then they can see all their favorite weblogs together etc.

    It is a good idea to have an RSS feed for your blog since it would be useful to some readers. I think Blogger gives you an option for that.

  24. dear
    a o a
    i want to paste urdu text from inpage to office xp.whenever i paste urdu text from inpage,the text is converted in strange words.plz guide me about it.thanks

  25. zahid: Inpage doesn’t use standard Unicode fonts I think. Therefore, you can’t copy and paste from Inpage to other programs.

  27. اسلام علیکم
    جناب میںآپ سے پوچھناچاھتاھوںکہ میںاردو میںای میل کیسے کر سکتا ہوں۔میں نے اردو میں میل کرنے کی کوشش کی ہے لیکن وہ عجیب زبان میںبدل جاتی ہے۔
    مجھے کچھ بتایں
    شکریہ

  28. a o a
    dear
    dear i want to know about urdu email.how i can mail in urdu.which can be readable .
    thanks for previous guidence.

  32. Task List — First Draft

    I started blogging in Urdu almost a year ago. I haven’t written much in Urdu, but it has been a good experience. Two of my posts about blogging in Urdu have been among the most popular posts here. The Urdu…

  33. Urdu Blogging Resource

    I started blogging in Urdu almost a year ago. I haven’t written much in Urdu, but it has been a good experience. Two of my posts about blogging in Urdu have been among the most popular posts here. The Urdu…

  36. اسلام و علیکم

    کیبعد عرض کرنا چاہوں گا کہ ایک یونی کوڈ اردو ایڈیٹر جو سب سے بہتر معلوم ہوتا ہے اور وہ مُفت بھی ہے۔

    وہ Urdu Link E-mail ver2.00 ہے.

    اۤپ اِس میں پانچ عربی رسم الخط کی زبانوں(اردو، سندھی، فارسی، پشتو اور عربی) اور انگریزی میں بھی لکھ سکتے ہیں۔

    یہ اردو لنک کی سائٹ پر موجود ہے جسکا پتہ نیچے دیا گیا ہے۔

    اِسکے علاوہ اپنی مرضی کی فارمیٹنگ کر سکتے ہیں۔

    ایک قباحت یہ ہے کہ یہ برقی خطوط کیلۓ اپنی تحریر کو ایک تصویر میں تبدیل کر کے منسلک کر دیتا ہے۔

    اسکا اۤسان حل یہ ہے کہ خط لکھکر اسکے علاوہ اسکو

    ایچ ٹی ایم ایل داکیومنٹ کے طور پر محفوظ کر دیں۔ اور اُسکو اپنے برقی خط کیساتھ منسلک کر دیں۔ مزید برآں انگریزی میں درج زیل نوٹ تحریر بھی کر دیں۔
    Please Set your Browser’s encoding to unicode by the following way:
    Internet Explorer: View>>Encoding>>More>>Unicode(UTF-8)
    انشااللہ اسطرح اۤپکی تحریر دوسروں کو اردو میں ہی دکھائ دیگی۔

    اسکا سب سے بڑا فائدہ یہ ہے کہ اسکا ٹائپنگ کا طریقہ فوناٹک ہے جو “اِن پیج” اردو کے استعمال کنندگان میں بہت زیادہ مقبول ہے۔ یہ قدرتی اور اۤسان بھی ہے۔

    اب اجازت چاہوں گا،

    اللہ اۤپکا حامی و ناصر ہو۔۔۔ شکریہ۔۔۔ دُعاؤں میں یاد رکھۓ گا۔

    اۤپکا بھائ

    عادل

    پتہ براۓ رابطہ: m_j_adil@hotmail.com

    مہربانی فرما کر کسی گروپ وغیرہ میں شامل نہ کروا دیجۓ گا، کیونکہ بہت مشکلات کا سامنا کرنا پڑتا ہے۔ شکریہ۔

    سافٹ ویر ڈاؤن لوڈکرنے کا پتہ

    http://www.urdulink.com

  37. فرنگیوں کو عطا خاکِ سوریا نے کیا!

    نبّیِ عفت و غم خواری و کم آزاری!

    صلہ فرنگ سے آیا ہے سوریا کیلۓ

    مَے و قمار و ہجوم زنانِ بازاری!

  38. Miscellaneous

    I have read a number of books in the past month or so and owe you guys about five reviews. Hopefully, I’ll get to them in the next couple of weeks. Asad has informed me that he has created a…

  39. aoa
    dostoo main ne ye site pahle martba dekhi hai mujy achi lagee hai aap se guzarish hai ke main unicod urdu likhna cahta hoon is ke liye koi software bata dain jo asani se unicode likhta hoya phir urdu ko unicode main convert kar deta ho plzmujy batana zaroor
    allha hafiz

  43. اردو کمپیوٹر اصطلاحات

    کمپیوٹر کی پیدائش کو کئی دہائیاں بیت چکیں، مگر ہنوز ہم انگریزی اصطلاحات کے عادی ہیں۔ ہم سے تو عرب اور ایرانی اچھے رہے، جنہوں نے اصطلاح سازی میں وہی تیزی دکھائی جو کمپیوٹر کی ترقی کی تھی۔

    اردو کمپیوٹر اصطلاحات کے لئے ابھی ہم صرف سوچ بچار کر رہے ہیں۔ یہ کب لاگو ہو ں گی یا پھر ہو بھی سکیں گی؟ اس بارے کوئی پیشینگوئی نہیں کی جا سکتی، تاہم اپنی سی عملی کوشش ضرور کی جا سکتی ہے۔

    آمدم برسرمطلب! مجھے “انفارمیشن ٹیکنالوجی کی مکمل انفارمیشن” پاک آئی ٹی مارکیٹ ڈاٹ کوم کے اردو ورژن کے لئے کمپیوٹر اصطلاحات درکار ہیں۔ اگر آپ احباب میں سے کوئی اس سلسلے میں مدد کر سکے تو نوازش ہو گی۔

    اس طرح کی چند مزید جامع قسم کی اردو ویب سائٹس بھی تخلیق پا جائیں، جنہیں کسی خاص معلومات کے لئے کھولنا کمپیوٹر سے منسلک ہر فرد کی ضرورت بن جائے تو اردو اصطلاحات زبانی جمع خرچ سے نکل کر حقیقت کا روپ بھی دھار سکتی ہیں۔

    آپ کا اس بارے خیال ہے؟ کیا آپ میری مدد کرتے ہوئے اردو کی خدمت کرنا پسند کریں گے؟

    عبدالستار منہاجین
    http://www.pakitmarket.com

  49. Urdu Blogging Resource

    I started blogging in Urdu almost a year ago. I haven’t written much in Urdu, but it has been a good experience. Two of my posts about blogging in Urdu have been among the most popular posts here. The Urdu…

  50. میں اردو میں بلاگ بنا نا چاہتا ہوں مجھے اردو میں بتایں آپ کی بڑى مہربانی ہو گی

Comments are closed.