Re: [bpfk-announce] Re: Next Up: Morphology

[Jorge "Llambías" <jjllambias2000@yahoo.com.ar>]

--- Nora LeChevalier wrote:
> Various comments in no particular order.

ki'e noras

> If we vote in the Morphology Algorithm, we are agreeing to the setting of 
> what the valid word-forms are.  It is obvious that fu'ivla forms and cmavo 
> forms have changed, but nowhere is there a reasonbly concise statement of 
> what the new forms are.

Nothing is definite yet. In particular, vowel clusters and
consonant clusters are under discussion.

> The "algorithm" is program code.  One usually checks a program against the 
> desired results to see if it works.  We have no statement of the desired 
> results.  I can't read the code without more explanation.  For example : "& 
> indicates that the element to the right must follow" [follow what?  it's at 
> the beginning - example: BU <- &cmavo (b u ) &postword] "but the marked 
> element itself" [the thing to the right of the &, I presume] "does not 
> absorb anything" [what does this mean?].

The PEG is a formal grammar, like EBNF. 

"BU <- &cmavo (b u ) &postword" means construct BU consists of 
construct b followed by construct u, and the construct must be 
followed by construct postword, but construct postword is not
part of construct BU. Construct cmavo must also be satisfied 
from the beginning in order to produce construct BU, but
construct BU could in principle be longer or shorter than
construct cmavo (in this case that would never happen, but
you can't tell that from this rule only).

I wrote the explanations of & and !, sorry if they are not
very clear. (Suggestions for better wording are welcome!)
I found the first few paragraphs of this paper:
<http://www.pdos.lcs.mit.edu/~baford/packrat/popl04/> 
very helpful to understand the symbols & and !.

> Correct me if I'm wrong, but have we just added things like "sia" /sya/ and 
> "rua" /rwa/ to the CVV space? 

Those are currently allowed by the PEG, yes. It is yet under discussion
whether they should be allowed or not.

> In making Lojban, we made a deliberate 
> decision to exclude these (which were present in Loglan) for 2 
> reasons.  Some of them are too hard to say ("rui"), especially as a single 
> syllable.  Some, like "sia", tend to degenerate into other sound sequences 
> (as English "sion" endings are now pronounced "shun").

OK, then they should be disallowed everywhere, right? If they are hard
to say or distinguish in cmavo they are equally hard to say or distinguish
in cmene and fu'ivla. And in fact, allowing them in cmavo causes less
problems because it is unlikely that more than a few cmavo will ever be
added to the language, whereas cmene and fu'ivla are much more productive.
For example, the name "Colombia" would be lojbanized as {kolombi'as}
if the sequence {bia} was disallowed.

> What are the valid fu'ivla forms? It looks to me like "jritata" is valid 
> (initial cluster OK, passes slinku'i test, doesn't break up into gismu 
> and/or rafsi).  So, given "All fu'ivla can be used as final 
> rafsi",  "prijritata" is no longer a valid fu'ivla because it is 
> "pri"+jritata", right? 

Extended rafsi can only be connected with y-hyphens. This was the 
case for the CLL proposal too. {prina zei jritata} can only be 
reduced to {prinyjitrata}. {prijitrata} remains a separate fu'ivla.

> Also, we need to revise "slinku'i" itself a bit if r-hyphens are allowed 
> when not required.  We have a valid lujvo "li'erla'i" (li'e + r + 
> la'i).  If we allow someone to add an affix on the front without removing 
> the "r" ("tos + li'e + r + la'i), we then need to disallow a potential 
> fu'ivla "sli'erla'i" (originally OK - good initial cluster, doesn't break 
> down into rafsi and/or gismu, used to pass to+sli'erla'i "slinku'i" test 
> but now will not). 

Yes. The rule for slinku'i is not that complicated though:

slinkuhi <- consonant rafsi-string

where rafsi-string is any string of y-less rafsi, including
CVV(r/n) types.

> Making fu'ivla is a mine-field.

Indeed it is. 

> In the presentation on Controversial topics, it looks like fu'ivla initial 
> clusters disallow sx (good!) - but not cx? 

"cx" is for some reason disallowed anywhere, so it need not be 
disallowed again as an initial cluster:

c <- comma* [cC] !h !sibilant !voiced-consonant !x

> "jl", "jr" "zl", "zr" are  allowed? 

That's a bug. Fixed.

> "jk"?

voiced-unvoiced disallowed everywhere:

j <- comma* [jJ] !h !sibilant !unvoiced-consonant

> If "non-y cmavo can have non-final rafsi by adding 'y", then are we 
> removing the restriction that there must be a consonant cluster in the 
> first 5 [non-'-non-y] letters?  "oi'ycai'ylujvo". 

Yes. 

> How do they attach on 
> the left if they're vowel-initial - eg: klama + o + sutra = klamy[what]sutra?

klamy'o'ysutra

Anything that starts with .V changes to 'V for non-initial rafsi.

> "cmene can have inital rafsi by adding iy".  Can names have "iy" 
> internally, or is that disallowed like la/lai/la'i/doi?

They can. Names with internal iy (or even plain y) can be thought of
as hyphenated names if so desired: {sanxiyn} could be thought of
as Sanx-N. It doesn't matter much because names don't have
internal semantics, but it doesn't hurt to think of them that way
either.

>  Must the name be 
> entirely unstressed if it doesn't have the penultimate syllable?  I don't 
> think it causes a problem, but I'm not yet sure.

It doesn't matter. {iy} plays basically the same role as the final 
pause in cmene, so stress remains irrelevant.

> I notice there are 2 things that are being allowed to have rafsi by 
> following them by 'y: cmavo and fu'ivla. 

In fact any brivla not just fu'ivla. The only exception being lujvo
that end in -yCVV. Probably klama'y- won't be much used given the
availability of klamy- and kla, but maybe in a context where one needs
to be very clear it could be useful.

(I'm considering adding final rafsi for cmavo too, by preceding with
an r-hyphen.) 

> Does this cause a problem?  Take 
> for example stura [gismu] + o'a [cmavo] + klama [gismu].  This would be, 
> stura'o'a'yklama (note: here, I'm presuming that the vowel-initial cmavo 
> will attach to the left using ', as vowel-initial fu'ivla do). 

It would be {stury'o'a'yklama}

> But, might 
> "stura'o'a'yklama" instead break down as stura'o'a [fu'ivla] + klama? 

That's the only possible break.

> Or 
> is stura'o'a not a valid fu'ivla because it could break down into stura + ' 
> + o'a when in front of something else (oh boy - another test for 
> fu'ivla)?  Which has precedence?

There is always a "y" separating extended rafsi on both sides.

mu'o mi'e xorxes


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