Editing Esperanto (section)

=== Orthography ===
{{Main|Esperanto orthography}}

==== Alphabet ====
The Esperanto alphabet is based on the [[Latin script]], using a one-sound-one-letter principle, with the exception of [d͡z]. It includes six [[Letter (alphabet)|letters]] with [[diacritics]]: five with circumflexes (⟨ĉ⟩, ⟨ĝ⟩, ⟨ĥ⟩, ⟨ĵ⟩, and ⟨ŝ⟩), and one with a [[breve]] (⟨ŭ⟩). The alphabet does not include the letters ⟨q⟩, ⟨w⟩, ⟨x⟩, or ⟨y⟩, which are only used in the writing of proper names and unassimilated borrowings.

{|class="wikitable" style="text-align:center; table-layout:fixed"
|+ Esperanto alphabet
! Number ||1||2||3||4||5||6||7||8||9||10||11||12||13||14||15||16||17||18||19||20||21||22||23||24||25||26||27||28
|-
! [[Upper case]]
|[[A]]||[[B]]||[[C]]||[[Ĉ]]||[[D]]||[[E]]||[[F]]||[[G]]||[[Ĝ]]||[[H]]||[[Ĥ]]||[[I]]||[[J]]||[[Ĵ]]||[[K]]||[[L]]||[[M]]||[[N]]||[[O]]||[[P]]||[[R]]||[[S]]||[[Ŝ]]||[[T]]||[[U]]||[[Ŭ]]||[[V]]||[[Z]]
|- 	
! [[Lower case]]
|a||b||c||ĉ||d||e||f||g||ĝ||h||ĥ||i||j||ĵ||k||l||m||n||o||p||r||s||ŝ||t||u||ŭ||v||z
|- 	
! [[International Phonetic Alphabet|IPA]] [[phoneme]]
|{{IPA link|a}}||{{IPA link|b}}||{{IPA link|t͡s}}||{{IPA link|t͡ʃ}}||{{IPA link|d}}||{{IPA link|e}}||{{IPA link|f}}||{{IPA link|ɡ}}||{{IPA link|d͡ʒ}}||{{IPA link|h}}||{{IPA link|x}}||{{IPA link|i}}||{{IPA link|j}}, {{IPA link|i̯}}||{{IPA link|ʒ}}||{{IPA link|k}}||{{IPA link|l}}||{{IPA link|m}}||{{IPA link|n}}||{{IPA link|o}}||{{IPA link|p}}||{{IPA link|r}}||{{IPA link|s}}||{{IPA link|ʃ}}||{{IPA link|t}}||{{IPA link|u}}||{{IPA link|u̯}}||{{IPA link|v}}||{{IPA link|z}}
|}

The alphabet was designed with a French typewriter in mind, and although modern computers support Unicode, entering the letters with diacritic marks can be more or less problematic with certain operating systems or hardware. One of the first reform proposals (for [[Esperanto 1894]]) sought to do away with these marks and the language [[Ido]] went back to the basic Latin alphabet.

==== Phonology ====
All letters lacking diacritics are pronounced approximately as their respective [[International Phonetic Alphabet|IPA]] symbols, with the exception of ⟨c⟩.

The letters ⟨j⟩ and ⟨c⟩ are used in a way that is familiar to speakers of many Central and Eastern European languages, but may be unfamiliar to English speakers. ⟨j⟩ has the sound of English ⟨y⟩, as in '''''y'''ellow'' and ''bo'''y''''' (Esperanto ''jes'' has the same pronunciation as its English cognate ''yes''), and ⟨c⟩ has a "''ts''" sound, as in ''hi'''ts''''' or the ⟨zz⟩ in ''pi'''zz'''a''. In addition, the ⟨g⟩ in Esperanto is always 'hard', as in '''''g'''ift''. Esperanto makes use of the five-vowel system, essentially identical to the vowels of Spanish and Modern Greek.

The accented letters are:
* ⟨ĉ⟩ is pronounced like English ''ch'' in '''''ch'''atting''
* ⟨ĝ⟩ is pronounced like English ''g'' in '''''g'''em''
* ⟨ĥ⟩ is pronounced like the ''ch'' in German {{lang|de|Ba'''ch'''}} or Scottish English ''lo'''ch'''''.
* ⟨ĵ⟩ is pronounced like the ''s'' in English ''fu'''s'''ion'' or the ''j'' in French '''''J'''acques''
*⟨ŝ⟩ is pronounced like English ''sh''.
*⟨ŭ⟩ in ⟨aŭ⟩ is pronounced like English ''ow'' in ''c'''ow'''''.

According to one of Zamenhof's entries in the ''Lingvaj respondoj'', the letter ⟨n⟩ ought to be pronounced as [n] in all cases, but a rendering as [ŋ] is admissible before ⟨g⟩, ⟨k⟩, and ⟨ĥ⟩.

==== Diacritics and Substitutions ====
{{Main article|Substitutions of the Esperanto alphabet|}}

Even with the widespread adoption of [[Unicode]], the letters with diacritics (found in the "[[Latin Extended-A|Latin-Extended A]]" section of the [[Unicode Standard]]) can cause problems with printing and computing, because they are not found on most physical keyboards and are left out of certain fonts.

There are two principal workarounds to this problem, which substitute [[Digraph (orthography)|digraphs]] for the accented letters. Zamenhof, the inventor of Esperanto, created an "h-convention", which replaces ⟨ĉ⟩, ⟨ĝ⟩, ⟨ĥ⟩, ⟨ĵ⟩, ⟨ŝ⟩, and ⟨ŭ⟩ with ⟨ch⟩, ⟨gh⟩, ⟨hh⟩, ⟨jh⟩, ⟨sh⟩, and ⟨u⟩, respectively.<ref>[[Akademio de Esperanto]] (2007): [http://www.akademio-de-esperanto.org/oficialaj_informoj/oficialaj_informoj_6_2007.html ''Oficialaj Informoj, Numero 6 - 2007 01 21''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190731050315/http://www.akademio-de-esperanto.org/oficialaj_informoj/oficialaj_informoj_6_2007.html |date=July 31, 2019 }}.</ref> The main issue with this convention is its ambiguity: If used in a database, a program could not easily determine whether to render, for example, ⟨ch⟩ as /c/ followed by /h/ or as /ĉ/. Such words do exist in Esperanto: {{lang|eo|[[wikt:senchava|senchava]]}} could not be rendered unambiguously, unless its component parts were intentionally separated, as in ''senc·hava''. A more recent "x-convention" has also gained prominence with the advent of computing, utilizing an otherwise absent ⟨x⟩ to produce the digraphs ⟨cx⟩, ⟨gx⟩, ⟨hx⟩, ⟨jx⟩, ⟨sx⟩, and ⟨ux⟩; this has the incidental advantage of alphabetizing correctly in most cases, since the only letter after ⟨x⟩ is ⟨z⟩.

There are computer [[keyboard layouts]] that support the Esperanto alphabet, and some systems use software that automatically replaces x- or h-convention digraphs with the corresponding diacritic letters (for example, {{lang|eo|Amiketo}}<ref>Amiketo and Tajpi are keyboard layouts which support the Esperanto alphabet for [http://www012.upp.so-net.ne.jp/klivo/amiketo/ Windows] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161123231615/http://www012.upp.so-net.ne.jp/klivo/amiketo/ |date=November 23, 2016 }}, [http://www012.upp.so-net.ne.jp/klivo/amiketo/makamiketo.html Mac OS X] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160405160459/http://www012.upp.so-net.ne.jp/klivo/amiketo/makamiketo.html |date=April 5, 2016 }}, and [http://www012.upp.so-net.ne.jp/klivo/amiketo/linamiketo.html Linux] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161207213204/http://www012.upp.so-net.ne.jp/klivo/amiketo/linamiketo.html |date=December 7, 2016 }}</ref> for [[Microsoft Windows]], [[Mac OS X]], and [[Linux]] and [[Gboard]] and [[AnySoftKeyboard]] for [[Android (operating system)|Android]]). On Linux, the [[GNOME]], [[Cinnamon (desktop environment)|Cinnamon]], and [[KDE Plasma 5|KDE]] desktop environments support the entry of characters with Esperanto diacritics.<ref>{{Cite web|title=typography - How do I type the Esperanto letters with accents on Linux?|url=https://esperanto.stackexchange.com/questions/378/how-do-i-type-the-esperanto-letters-with-accents-on-linux|access-date=2021-09-01|website=Esperanto Language Stack Exchange|archive-date=September 1, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210901164905/https://esperanto.stackexchange.com/questions/378/how-do-i-type-the-esperanto-letters-with-accents-on-linux|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|last=Donald|title=Linux|url=https://www.esperanto.org.nz/learn-and-use-esperanto/kiel-tajpi-en-esperanto/linux/|access-date=2021-09-02|website=Esperanto Association of New Zealand|language=en-NZ|archive-date=September 2, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210902005626/https://www.esperanto.org.nz/learn-and-use-esperanto/kiel-tajpi-en-esperanto/linux/|url-status=live}}</ref>