User talk:Amakuru

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Enjoy your stay at Wiktionary! --Lo Ximiendo 21:03, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

Lo, Thank you for your welcome! Hopefully we can make Wiktionary the number one go-to dictionary site on the web. — Amakuru 08:53, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Template:rw-noun

I changed this template a bit, so that it uses the standard formatting of noun classes. I based it mostly on {{zu-noun}}, but I don't know anything about Kinyarwanda grammar so I can't make it as sophisticated. I hope it helps anyway. —CodeCat 14:35, 3 June 2013 (UTC)

Hey, thanks, that looks pretty good. I was trying to find a way to succinctly summarise the various different options (two classes, shared word; two classes, different word; one class, singular only; one class, plural only). I think the way you've done it works quite well. Amakuru (talk) 15:06, 3 June 2013 (UTC)

If the template were converted to Lua, it would be possible to automatically form the plural if the classes are known. Lua can remove the prefix and attach another, but some knowledge of the grammar would be needed to make that work right. I know a bit about Zulu, but not much about Kinyarwanda. —CodeCat 15:38, 3 June 2013 (UTC)

Actually I think the rules for Zulu and Kinyrwanda may be quite similar, as they are with many other Bantu languages. Obviously the precise rules differ though. I'm not too sure what you mean by Lua... if there is an example from Zulu or other Bantu languages then I could probably try to apply the template myself. The rules are pretty simple. The only oddity is that prefixes vary depending on whether the following letter is a vowel and also according to a few funny rules for consonants. (For example in- becomes im- when followed by certain constants thus ingagi but impala). Thanks Amakuru (talk) 16:09, 3 June 2013 (UTC)

Zulu has similar rules but they are not a problem. I'm actually surprised that they are so similar considering how far apart they are. In any case, Lua is a programming language that was recently introduced to Wiktionary. It's intended as a replacement for template logic, and it's much better suited to many tasks than templates are. A particular advantage is that it can do string processing, so it can remove and change parts of words, and analyse the word and add different prefixes depending on the letters in the word. If the noun prefixes of Kinyarwanda are completely predictable (that is, if I give a singular form and two classes, can you accurately form the plural with that alone?) then it is possible to use Lua to automatically generate the plural and you wouldn't need to specify it at all. —CodeCat 16:27, 3 June 2013 (UTC)