Islamic metadata and Word Processor

By Gregory (Abdul Muid) Morse

Introduction
The need for an Islamic word processor is ever clear given the abundance of English
literature on all Islamic subjects from Quranic sciences to study of Hadiths. There is
a common theme of inconsistencies, errors, innumerous conceived systems of
transliteration and the beginnings of the acceptance of rabic names, places and
other loan words often even with multiple accepted transliterations. I have to !nd a
single source te"t where even at my basic level of #nowledge I would not !nd minor
errors which even if insigni!cant highlight not a problem with the scholars but with
the tools which are failing to provide them with a way of accomplishing what they
need to do. $eferences have become cumbersome especially regarding hadiths
where the translations tend to re%number the hadiths and often even the chapters
or volumes ma#ing tracing it bac# to an authenticated rabic te"t di&cult. The
Hadith science studies the hadiths but the way of referencing translations, and
authenticated te"ts and doing so in a consistent fashion is still an un%standardi'ed
process.
Metadata
The metadata project needs to be complete in a great many aspects to actually
wor# as intended. The comple"ities inherit to linguistics are hard to e"press in
mathematical rules yet nevertheless they can be e"pressed therein with enough
e(orts and computeri'ed translation systems have been cropping up all over
recently highlighting the possibility of even having a certain level of semantic
processing and application of algorithms of arti!cial intelligence to solving many of
the problems.
)etadata Islamic%ally spea#ing is needed thus !rst at the most basic level with the
roots of the words and the particles. *rom the roots, a system to e"press their
various noun and verb forms would allow derivation thereby. )etadata would also
need to e"press the grammatical forms of nouns, verbs and the implications or
e(ects of the particles on other words.
The ne"t layer is e"pressions and phrases where compound words combine to form
a meaning that would not necessarily have been apparent based on the individual
words. +ountless e"amples are seen in basic Islamic studies.
Transliteration schemes and the rabic symbol listing would need comprehensive
metadata too so they could be rendered.
The rules of tajweed through all the methods of recitation would also need an
e"pression in metadata and the mar#ed up metadata of the tajweed would then
also need to have a way of being transliterated.
*inally organi'ed metadata regarding names, times, places, or other proper nouns
would need to be listed.
)etadata for loan words which have crept into English sometimes in mainstream
dictionaries and sometimes in encyclopedias or less #nown dictionaries should be
documented. If a loanword e"ists with un%ideal transliteration, options could be
provided to go with the loanword or render it with whatever the chosen
transliteration system is in place. In general loanwords are preferred if they have
become e"tremely standard. If multiple loanwords e"ist, then an predominate or
preferred one must be used as diphthongs and ambiguity in transliteration has
made even some common loanwords ta#en on multiple forms and proper nouns
especially have many ways of being e"pressed. If using a ,-, transliteration
scheme though, sometimes the loanwords become undesirable.
The metadata would only describe the rabic and would not have any
transliteration scheme present unless using a ,-, system such as the .uc#walter
e"tended transliteration system solely for the purpose of ma#ing the metadata !les
more maintainable though it could easily be converted to pure rabic.
Every available translation also needs metadata essentially mapping the original
rabic to the translated one. *or the Quran, the verse structure is well de!ned that
most translations re/uire no metadata. 0et even this re/uires some thought and
study as many translators have added useful introductions to chapters, footnote
commentary or references, or titles to attempt to divide the verses into sections and
subsections.
Transliteration
The many transliteration schemes out there need to be presented in a simpli!ed
and easy way so one could /uic#ly loo# at a list of all the schemes and choose
which one is desired. 1aming them is a possibility but it would be better to show
the things which are distinguishing feature namely the rabic letters which lead to
ambiguous or entities unable to be transliterated. n automatic transliteration
chart generator should be part of the options as either an appendi" or a reference
table.
The most notable project re/uiring some new e"perimental schemes is to do a plain
roman character yet unambiguous or nearly unambiguous transliteration. The idea
is to facilitate ease so every possible means of doing this should be used especially
since a lot of te"ts or parts thereof end up being so called 2copy and paste3%d all
over the place while !nding the underlining or e"tended diacritical roman
characters are lost and with it a part of the proper pronunciation which with plain
roman could have been better e"pressed.
Endless things such as morphology, audio recitations, translations, even the display
of rabic letters, or the display of bloc#s of word, then the display of verses along
with side by side display of transliteration and translation are things which could be
e"pressed most 4uidly using a series of metadata.
Authentication
system of authenticating te"ts needs to be done not only to computeri'e them
but to validate the various claims of te"ts still e"isting. The name, original author,
scribe, year written, current and past locations, current availability, name of the
authenticators, and appendi" should be included. If an original manuscript
contained errors, this must not be changed in the original authenticated or
computeri'ed te"t. If vowels or other changes or additions are to be made then this
should be done separately and still reference the original untouched te"t. This way
the original te"t can be computeri'ed and authenticated and veri!ed by any person
with access to the location where it rests and the more useful one perhaps
containing the diacritics and such could also be there but as such is !rmly bac#ed
by the original untouched version. There are various nuances and comple"ities also
to be considered for e"ample if a part of a page were torn out or something was
illegible or interminable which letter it was. uthentication science is a whole !eld
and topic which must be 4ushed out in detail so the metadata of the original
sources can be as !rm and accurate as possible. )etadata must describe the
authenticated sources, these issues and any references to enhanced versions which
also enumerate e"actly what was enhanced.
Rendering
The actual format would need to be easy so that it could facilitate instant 4ow of
thought and recording of #nowledge without fumbling and faltering every time a
reference to a term or name or verse or Hadith were needed. *or e"ample-
5*i/h6
5Ibn bbas $6
5)uhammad 7.8H6
5Quran 9-:6
5Hadith .u#hari ,-,6
;enerating footnotes or generating it in rabic or specifying a translation te"t or
specifying transliteration scheme or even multiple schemes is all possible
automatically thereafter. Even these schemes of using braces 56 or other
characters and the way to ma#e the reference inside could be e"pressed with
metadata so multiple schemes of e"pressing what is to be rendered are also
possible. The tool itself should ma#e it e"tremely easy to do this perhaps utili'ing
autocomplete or other modern features that enable rapid loo#up.
The main idea again is to allow the author to focus on the desired wor# and not get
caught up in references yet without worrying about having to go bac# in !ll the
references at a latter point because they are already completed. The amount of
scholarly wor# that could be easily produced while the references immediately
trustworthy would be astounding.
<ome authors would love to put a Quraan verse into a paper and then see the
perfect authenticated rabic alongside with a well%#nown English word%by%word
translation and transliteration automatically appear in a properly tabled view. This
does not have to be di&cult. .ut the tools currently are not designed speci!cally for
this purpose.
Conclusion
This paper presents the project very generally as though English is the primary
medium being utili'ed right now, other languages must be considered and are going
to become highly important when spreading Islam to large populations of the world
who would learn faster or be more comfortable in other languages. =asting time on
dealing with these issues of transliteration, accurate and valid references and
consistency is not necessary if the right tools and metadata become available to aid
in this. Transliteration into many languages people have not even yet e"plored
would become very easily possible simply by adding metadata into the right place.
The comple"ity of the various projects should be seen. To scienti!cally and
mathematically e"press authentication, rabic grammar, Quran science,
translations, transliteration schemes, tajweed and Hadith mapping among other
things are all comple" topics where a lot of what I will term meta%metadata or
metadata describing metadata will come out of it do to the comple" nature of
language and speech. The further along the path of mathematical and scienti!c
understanding and brea#down and classi!cation of these features however, then
the more it will allow us to brea# the barriers of time spent on these areas which
despite great care that is ta#en, inconsistencies, great varieties and little agreement
is even to this day seen. )any human hours are wasted doing these processes
which are better suited for machines such as enumerating, listing and cross%
chec#ing. Human time is better spent understanding and applying the #nowledge.
+urrently the #nowledge of sciences Islam are in various collections of disunited and
disparate boo#s and volumes over centuries and the computer is being under%
utili'ed in bringing this all together such that it still re/uires many scholar hours to
accomplish anything. Islamic software developers are wasting time doing the same
thing over and over independently and few metadata projects which aim to combine
and unite the e(orts towards advancement.
This idea is a bit li#e the idea of computer programming which uses metadata
e"tensively to allow compilation of a program into binary along with autocomplete
and all sorts of helpful tools to allow e"pressing the logic and the speci!c details
side by side in a /uic# and 4uid manner. The programming model applied to Islamic
wor#s will ma#e things easy enough to achieve advancement. The well%studied
scholar can produce many tremendous wor#s very easily while even a person new
to Islam can put something at least properly referenced and accurate together in a
short time. 7rojects currently e"ist in these directions yet advancement is not
happening with the gravity and force that is needed. )orphology projects and
authentic Quraan te"ts and even calculations of prayer times are out there in one
form or another and proving what is possible.
The future will hopefully see the Islamic metadata project succeed and word
processors focused on writing Islamic publications will go side by side. )ore
applications for computer and phones using such a project are possible with far less
divergence and e(ort e"pended doing that which has already been done. This is a
bright future indeed.
nd llah #nows best.