Message-Id: <9202111503.AA03933@relay1.UU.NET>
Date:         Tue, 11 Feb 1992 09:58:37 EST
Reply-To: "Mark E. Shoulson" <cbmvax!uunet!cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu!shoulson>
Sender: Lojban list <cbmvax!uunet!cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu!LOJBAN>
From: "Mark E. Shoulson" <cbmvax!uunet!cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu!shoulson>
Subject:      word spacing in Lojban
To: John Cowan <cowan@snark.thyrsus.com>
In-Reply-To:  "61510::GILSON"'s message of Tue, 11 Feb 1992 09:37:00 EST
Status: RO

>Date:         Tue, 11 Feb 1992 09:37:00 EST
>From: "61510::GILSON"
 <gilson%61510.decnet%CCF4.NRL.NAVY.MIL@cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu>

>It is my understanding that word spacing in Lojban is nowhere significant.
>Therefore, while Colin (and most people, including me) may find "se cmene"
>easier to understand than "secmene" etc., what Dave did is not incorrect
>Lojban.

Yeah, that's right.  Although Lojban requires stress in speech, that's only
to help find the *ends* of words, not their beginnings. {secmene} resolves
in writing unambiguously to {se cmene}, by the *tosmabru test.  It hinges
on the fact that {cm} is a legal initial.  Longer strings of
stuck-together cmavo and brivla might require the stress to disambiguate
though, and should thus not be written together (unless you capitalize the
stressed syllables, which gets hard to read).  Something like {burbu'aba'i}
is either {burbu'a ba'i} or {burbu'aba'i}, depending on the stress.  The
former is pronounced {burBU'a ba'i} and the latter {burbu'aBA'i}, I think.

~mark (shoulson@ctr.columbia.edu)