Talk:اب

In Arabic, اب is a misspelling of أب (with hamza). I guess this should only have Persian and Urdu since they don't use hamza, and the Arabic part is moved to أب (with hamza). --User:82.194.62.22

It’s not a misspelling at all. Spelling أب without the hamza is very common and perfectly acceptable. —Stephen 02:11, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes, it is common, but it's not correct at all. The word is listed as أب in all Arabic dictionaries. It's not acceptable as you said. In fact, the pronunciation of words that start with an alef (ا) that doesn't have a hamza is different. When the word is not in the beginning of a sentence, the alef without hamza is silent. The alef in أب is always pronounced, and it must have a hamza wherever it's used. There are rules for hamza's that many people just don't care/know about, especially those who are not good at Arabic.

By the way, even Microsoft Word underlines اب with a red zigzag and suggests أب. So unless this has been discussed on Wiktionary, this article and the likes of it make this project inaccurate. --82.194.36.245 21:46, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

It is not only common, it is completely correct. Furthermore, it is NOT listed as أب in all Arabic dictionaries. In Hans Wehr’s excellent dictionary, for example, it is only written اب. It is commonly written with the hamza in English-to-Arabic dictionaries, purely as an aid to pronunciation and etymology. In Arabic-Arabic dictionaries and Arabic-to-English dictionaries, it usually is not written. Moving from dictionaries (which have the need to show pronunciation and other information to the uninformed) to normal written text in books, magazines and newspapers, it usually is not written. In headline text it is even less likely to be written. The spelling without hamza is absolutely correct. —Stephen 03:35, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

أَبٌ

Can the spelling أَبٌ be mentioned somewhere in the article? Right now أَبٌ redirects here. 24.29.228.33 05:49, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

It is mentioned. It’s the first noun on the page, أبٌ. —Stephen 21:49, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Please check again; a CTRL-F search for "أَبٌ" doesn't show anything. 24.29.228.33 04:27, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

The difference is the fatha above the initial hamza (أَبٌ versus أبٌ). The hamza above alif already indicates the fatha vowel, so it doesn’t have to be written. If you add the fatha anyway, in most Arabic fonts used in the West it looks rather bad. أَبٌ redirects to أب because we don’t make pages using those vocalizations, and the word on the page is displayed as أبٌ, which is the same thing as أَبٌ but it looks better for most users. The only important diacritic is the final nunation over baa’, because some words take it and other words do not.

Most people will be working with plain اب, but some will have أب, some will have ابٌ, some will have أبٌ, and a very few will have أَبٌ. We can only have a page for اب, and we can only write the head word one way. أبٌ seems the best choice because it shows everything that a student of the language could want. —Stephen 05:09, 3 June 2009 (UTC)