Kurkistan

Just keep saying good things about me and you can get quoted all you like . Also, I just added a new section to the Awakening post, to keep it all in one place. EDIT: I also also need some help generating falsifiable claims from MEC to apply to Forging in TES. Limitations or likely aspects would be nice. EDIT 2: I just yoinked this quote from the "Everything has three aspects" thread. I didn't remember that quote, and it actually lends a rather astounding amount of credence to my own theory. There remains the problem that Sazed attributes the entire decision-making process to the Cognitive realm, but I think we can chalk that up to inexperience, since we know for sure (Word of God and all) that gravity is Spiritual, the distinction from which most of my realm-dividing flows.

I may well be wrong as regards to supply lines. Still, though, these aren't really going to be armies on the move. It will be a series of relatively close-together forts with occasional supply runs and no pressing need for truly basic resources (food, water, etc.). It might be that you could get away with semi-regular caravans after the setup phase is over.

Well it's quite a relief to get a positive review from one of the old-timers. I'm glad people like it so much. I think I'll add a few more "critics rave" quotes to the OP while I wait with baited Breath for your reply after you read about Awakening.

Supply lines? Don’t talk about — supply lines? You kidding me? Supply lines? Soulcasting is da' bomb as far as supply lines goes, as we discussed here. Hint: It makes them obsolete. Also, I don't get the sense that Chasmfiends are normally in an "assaulting" mood. It's more like, "oh look, squishy" whenever they happen across someone by accident. EDIT: Also, when people say "supply lines" they don't actually mean unbroken lines of supplies flowing back and forth. If chasmfiends are a real threat, then Shardbearer's could simply accompany caravans which transited on a regular basis.

You just increased the quality of my reading experience by about 63%.

Yes yes, they can be left, but we know that the "Bubbler" has to remain inside the bubble or it goes away. So a Pulser can't just throw up a bubble and then run for the hills: he/she has to stay inside of it for the bubble to stay in existence. EDIT: Oops, didn't see that your post was in response to Lyrebon's. Quotes are good, people!

No worries about that, I think. Objects appear to follow an all-in or all-out rule with time bubbles: Anything else and some truly horrendous things happen to whatever is on the border. Something like the foundations of a building would probably just be entirely outside the effect of a time bubble.

Not "confirmed" per say, but definitely true in the books. Observe bullets leaving Wayne's bubbles: they're thrown off course (by a small amount the only time we saw it) but are still travelling at rather standard bullet velocities upon exit. If it wasn't the case that objects maintained constant velocities from their own frame of reference, then the bullet Wax shot at the end of AoL would have already been far gone by the time Wayne dropped the bubble for Wax's miraculous redirect. Instead, the bullet "moved forward sluggishly, spinning as it cut through the air" from Wax's perspective inside the bubble. As for the alteration of trajectories, it's been my impression that it's always a pretty small effect, enough to throw off a careful aim but not enough to through someone sideways. Most theories attribute the redirect to either agitated air particles at the borders of bubbles or to some form of refraction when crossing that self-same border. Also, because I can, my credentials: Definitive Allomantic FTL Theory (not so definitive, as it turns out) Traversing the Border of Time Bubbles I'd dare say that I've put as much thought into the nature of time bubbles as anyone in this forum, so I forgot that some people want this "evidence" to back up random claims they read on the internet. EDIT: It actually is confirmed directly, as it turns out. I'd forgotten about this one:

I think you're misunderstanding the nature of what happens when you transition through "time zones." If you fall out of the bubble falling at 30 m/s from your perspective, then you will still have that speed in the outside world. So a cliff-faller might take half an hour to fall the whole distance, but they're still going squish at the bottom without outside intervention.

I actually quite like this idea. We'll see what happens.

I haven't noticed anything besides that, although Peter hints fairly strongly that there are more Allomantic reasons behind the symbols than that.

There's also a ludicrous number of programs that read eBooks on PC's, if you lack any other options.

Note: I forgot that cool kids post on the forum thread instead of commenting on the announcement. Consider this a double post. I must say I think I like the hardcover cover art more than the eBook. *Spoilers* The "swirliness" of the hardcover accentuates the nature of the protagonist's condition more, shows the fluidity and ultimate ephemeral nature of his "aspects," while leaving the real man distinct, awash amidst the horde of his creations. The eBook cover, on the other hand, sends a far different message. It is visually more clean and perhaps even better conveys the true vastness of Leeds' mind, and also gives a much more put-together, assertive image of the main character. This is not representative of the book, at least in my opinion, where we see a thoroughly competent Leed (see what I did there? Huh? Am I right? ), but still understand that he's a bit overwhelmed whenever he's thrust into these situations, relying on his aspects moreso than leading them into battle. Leeds' facelessness in the eBook cover is also in stark contrast to his presentation in the hardback. The eBook gives the impression that Leeds is a blank slate with a plurality of personalities to step into, which is akin to Monica's misapprehension of his abilities in the book. The eBook cover also looks a bit samey. It's clean-cut to a fault, and visually pleasing, but I don't get a sense of uniqueness from it. This is all not to say that the eBook cover is bad, just that I like the hardback cover more. P.S. And it goes without saying that Brandon is a fantastic human being for going to the trouble of doing all of this.

I must say I think I like the hardcover cover art more than the eBook. *Spoilers* The "swirliness" of the hardcover accentuates the nature of the protagonist's condition more, shows the fluidity and ultimate ephemeral nature of his "aspects," while leaving the real man distinct, awash amidst the horde of his creations. The eBook cover, on the other hand, sends a far different message. It is visually more clean and perhaps even better conveys the true vastness of Leeds' mind, and also gives a much more put-together, assertive image of the main character. This is not representative of the book, at least in my opinion, where we see a thoroughly competent Leed (see what I did there? Huh? Am I right? ), but still understand that he's a bit overwhelmed whenever he's thrust into these situations, relying on his aspects moreso than leading them into battle. Leeds' facelessness in the eBook cover is also in stark contrast to his presentation in the hardback. The eBook gives the impression that Leeds is a blank slate with a plurality of personalities to step into, which is akin to Monica's misapprehension of his abilities in the book. The eBook cover also looks a bit samey. It's clean-cut to a fault, and visually pleasing, but I don't get a sense of uniqueness from it. This is all not to say that the eBook cover is bad, just that I like the hardback cover more.

If you bought a hardback, Brandon's offering to send you the eBook, with proof of purchase. I just got mine. Check out the Twitter feed.

Nothing on Earth is ever Cosmere-related (a nice rule of thumb), so I doubt it. Also, thank you for giving me an excellent excuse to spam this thread with a link to my Realmatic theory of unholy length, since, according to my theory, the Spiritual effect of time bubbles is such that they can't reach back in time, only speed or slow the perception of it's forward motion for the objects within the bubble.

Thank you. As for Shadesmar, that is quite an interesting question. Either soulcasting doesn't always require a jaunt to shadesmar, since Jasnah basically did battle-casting in that alley, or jaunts to shadesmar are simply instantaneous. Soulcasters' unique access to Shadesmar may very well be because soulcasting is such a powerful system (powerful in terms of possibilities, as well as raw power). You're messing with the fundamental stuff of the universe and making of it what you will. All of Brandon's other magic systems so far have been fairly limited so far as the choice of the user goes. The Metallic arts are all choices of degree within a relatively limited system, Elantris's magic requires complex runes for every spell, and Awakening requires precise Commands (although I think Awakening may end up being one of the more flexible systems). Soulcasting, on the other hand, appears to allow conversion to and from just about everything at the will of the user. It makes a certain amount of sense that those kind of options would necessitate a richer control interface, a more fundamental access to the system which Soulcasting affects. Speaking of Awakening. . . Magic Analysis - Nalthis (Warbreaker); Awakening: Summary for the lazy and/or those with lives: Breaths are a portion of the power behind the Spiritual aspects of living beings, fuelling mainly Spiritual interactions (as well as Physical health, apparently), but are not actually peoples' "souls" in that they neither retain nor impart any sense of identity to their holders. I also briefly discuss purely Spiritual traits. Commands are comprised of two parts, Vocalization and Visualization, with the Vocalization defining a task and the Visualization laying out how to go about achieving that task, in the general sense. The act of Awakening is to copy some amount of your Cognitive aspect onto the Cognitive aspect of your target (the Cognitive transfer fueled by color-draining), the effectiveness of that Cognitive aspect determined by the precision and utility of your Command. Breaths, being Spiritual energy, give motive force to Awakened objects which then try their best to carry out their Commands. Poorly given Commands are those which cannot be carried out due to imprecision or logical errors, and result in the Awakened objects "erroring out" and simply eating your Breaths and copying your (flawed) Cognitive specifications without actually doing anything in the Physical realm (besides draining color as a side-effect). Main Block: Length is fun. /> EDIT: Edited a bit for clarity. Now I just need someone else to post, then I can ambush them with a 5 page analysis of why the flaws in my theory of Awakening aren't really flaws. Or, alternatively, someone could try and take a club to my theory and we could all have a merry time watching me try to salvage it, maybe refining it a bit in the process. EDIT 3: More stuff incoming! Side note: looking at the Warbreaker annotations, it's confirmed that Breaths affect Determination and "irritability" (Connection, perhaps). Ch 22.2 Annotation Summary for sake of time: I examine the discrepancy in the number of Breaths required to awake different objects and its possible cause, concluding that power is imperfectly transferred as a proportion of the "life-like-ness" of the target, while color drain ought to remain the same because the same Cognitive aspect is being transferred. Mostly just pulling quotes and tidying up corners that I hadn't gotten to before. The fun begins when I talk about the Lifeless and why they can be reprogrammed, pulling quotes galore (the PDF is nice for that) and concluding that Lifeless retain a large part of their original Cognitive aspect, if not their Spiritual aspect, and so provide a much firmer, more robust and flexible foundation for Commands than inanimate objects. The initial Lifeless Command, which awakens it, is thus mostly about buttressing the Cognitive aspect of the target so that it is intelligent enough to accept and adapt to new Commands. I then briefly address why Lifeless are necessarily colorless (because the Cognitive aspect you're tacking onto them is actually a revival of what originally attached to them) and move on to bang my head against Nightblood's weirdness, concluding that he (yes, he's a he in my mind) actually did successfully import a definition of "evil" from his Awakener, as evidenced by his perfect ability to judge people and attract/repel them accordingly based upon their "evilness." Everything else about him is nigh incomprehensible, though, so I'll leave Nightblood analysis to another day. Length is still quite fun. EDIT 5: I realized that I hadn't incorporated the fruits of my discussion with Nepene. They are as follows: 1) Instinctive Awakening as intuitive communication: 2) Breaths possible bring over some small smidgen of Identity.

^I can't find the discussions right off the top of my head, but you can search a bit and take a look at them if you want. EDIT: I just now realized that I kind of shut you down there. Sorry about that. Don't worry! Plenty of other things to theorize about! In fact, why don't you head on over to my Realmatic theory thread so that I can get some comments *Crazed look*

It'll probably be moved by a mod pretty soon. As for who it is, I'm under the impression that we've settled on Shalash, since Brandon confirmed that she's in WoK. "The Mistress" is of the habit of destroying depictions of women in art (including, presumably, the statue of Shalash missing in the prologue), which are most likely about her, if she is Shalash.

Nice find. Remember, though, it's transliteration--not translation--when you just convert alphabets. Diction-Derethi strikes again!

I'm not sure how the rules work in Shadesmar, or if "walking" is a thing there. We saw Jasnah just saunter in with her raft-o-beads without, if I recall, anything keeping those beads together, so movement/change in the Cognitive realm might simply be a matter of power, knowledge, and will. A sufficiently strong, wise, and determined individual might be able to "imagine" themselves half-way across the world. Kind of like a Green Lantern, actually. Thanks for the "wow." Either this will be my opus or it will be the most time I've ever dedicated to making myself look foolish. EDIT: I'm really just waiting for one of the guys who's been thinking about this since Elantris to drift by and crush it all to dust. On a related note, I would like it if someone else could try to logically permutate what my theory (MEC, anyone?) means for some of the other magic systems (Nalthis and Sel's, to be precise). It would be a good test of how well I explained my theory, how much of the "theory" is just me making my own assumptions and artistically arranging them, and whether or not the theory is actually universally applicable (as it needs to be) without branching into the absurd (as it did a few times while I was trying to formulate it).

Critics Rave: "That's a very interesting way to look at it. The theory isn't all there, but it's thinking along the right lines." -BRANDON SANDERSON "a surprisingly coherent theory considering everything we don't know" -dj26792 "while I don't completely agree with the terminology you say, the ideas here are extremely extremely good." -Chaos "it's a great theory that makes sense with the Cosmere so far" -Straff Venture (before being cut in half, presumably) "supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" -Observer "good theory! Well presented and excellent concept, at least." -Odiums_Shard Table of Contents: Main theory (this post) Awakening --Start of the Greate War of Nepene (~25,000 words. You have been warned) --End of the Great War of Nepene ---New Orleans of the Great War of Nepene (Hint: I'm Jackson) Start of discussion about: -Cognitive/Spiritual interaction -Spren -Hemalurgy and Memory/Intelligence To Be Discussed in Depth: -Mostly Cognitive beings -Spren -Hemalurgy, specifically concerned with Memory and Intelligence theft -The relationship between Spiritual energy and Cognitive complexity -Predictions for how Forging works. -Senses of Awakened objects Related Theories: -Forms: --Forms: Simplified --Spren as Forms --Nature of Forms & Forgery ---Spiritual Realm as a Network of Connections -Realmatic Theory, Satsuoni edition --A bit divergent, but mostly on the same tack as mine. ---- Summary of theory so you can "get it" without reading the equivalent of a paper. -Lacks reasoning, evidence, and length. The Spiritual realm is the source of all motivation within the Cosmere, from gravity to punching someone in the face. It may or may not also provide the energy to enable these actions. Every object has it's own unique sDNA which specifies how it interacts with other objects and the Cosmere at large, once again from gravity to the sDNA of a Thug allowing him/her to burn pewter. Magic depends on this sDNA and can, on occasion, change it. The Cognitive realm (the least well-defined of the three so far under my theory) is where all of the computations and permutations of spiritual rules are considered--in the context of the layout of the Physical realm--on a moment-by-moment basis. It is, quite literally, where the cogitation takes place. Alterations to the Cognitive realm can alter how objects react to certain Spiritual directives, but not the directives themselves. It may, however, also serve as a natural interface between the Spiritual and Physical realms, allowing one to indirectly affect the other. The Physical realm is where everything actually happens, changes coming about in it as an end result of Spiritual directives being interpreted by the Cognitive realm. The results of those directives then affect the other two realms in turn and go on to determine what happens in the next "cycle." Main Block (Ridiculously Long): EDIT: Actually, my explanation for time-bubbles is far too simplistic. It may be that there are some rather sophisticated methods for determining what's in and what's out of a time bubble, and we have to account for frame of reference. Ugh. I suppose the "go faster" variable could be altered as a function of the frame of reference of the anchor, with an additional "time passes this fast" variable which is altered the same way no matter what (except for relativistic effects, perhaps. . .). EDIT 2: According to a Harmony quote, the Spiritual realm definitely provides the energy. EDIT 3: Unearthed another quote, this one from Elantris. A bit suspect, due to theological underpinnings, but the first concrete "the Dor/Spiritual motivates stuff" quote I've seen. So there's the theory. Read, gush over, criticize, analyze, substantiate, annihilate, and permutate to your hearts' content.

Will do in a few hours, have to actually leave right now. Thanks for the support. EDIT: Up now. Enjoy. EDIT 2: That may well be the case. I'm just trying to generate a self-consistent theory that explains all the fact we know and, hopefully, allows us to make some useful predictions for the future. I'll count this as a win if it even allows us to do some more thoughtful analysis on how the magic systems might work.

Thanks, sorry about that. It's been awhile. Honestly, I'm a bit swamped at the moment: I'll get back by this time tomorrow, probably, but I don't have time to think deeply right now. I don't know why I thought I had the time to polish and re-post the Transliterator, and I now regret the time spent on it. EDIT: Stolidly not double-posting. Also going so off-topic as to shame Tolstoy. Okay, all three realms: (Mild WoK spoilers). Spiritual: We already have confirmation that the anchoring of a bubble is based, at least partially, upon its caster's spiritual gravitational connection to the planet. I'm still a bit hazy on how gravity is a spiritual force, but we do have both in-world and Word of God confirmation that this is the case. Massive tangent on Realmatic theory to make the above fact not-absurd, as well as some further observations on the implications of this tangent: That actually brings up an interesting question of what exactly the spiritual realm is. I have tended to shy away from Realmatic discussion up 'till now, but after a quick Google I didn't really find much discussion on the nature of the Spiritual realm. While the answer, "it's where the souls go, duh" is obvious, we know that Shardblades are also stored there, so it's not just a realm of ethereal floatiness with Kelsier jogging Sazed's elbow occasionally. We also know that "Spiritual DNA" is a vital component of all of the magic systems. Given this, I would hazard that the Spiritual realm is the realm of motive force, the cause of all motion, change, growth, decay, etc. This is all very pre-Socratic, but essentially there is no fundamental difference between the human soul motivating action and an apple falling to the ground. Both are necessitated by rules and connections in the Spiritual realm. As I conceive of my Realmatic schema, the nature of the Spiritual realm is such that it filters its directives through the Cognitive into the Physical realm, with the Physical realm then altering the state of the Spiritual and Cognitive realms in turn. Each and every object has its own spiritual nature determining how it interacts with every other object (gravity, thermodynamics, etc.). Most of these objects have the same rules written into them, but you can sometimes use magic to alter the properties of specific objects. So while Rock_3.125x10^56 might normally have the rule "accelerate towards other objects based upon mass," a Basic Lashing at a 90 degree angle from the ground turns that rule, temporarily into "accelerate parallel to other objects based upon mass" for Rock_3.125x10^56 and Rock_3.125x10^56 alone. Or possibly it's changed to "accelerate towards other objects based upon mass; except for the planet Roshar, in which case accelerate parallel to its surface based upon mass." So while the Spiritual realm has the general rules and is (possibly) the source of power for motion, the Cognitive realm takes these rules as input and acts upon them based upon the situation at hand and the surroundings of each object. The Physical realm is where all of this is actually enacted and where the Cognitive realm gets its data for acting on the Spiritual realm's directives. As we've seen with people thinking and using magic, the Physical realm also appears to have some impact on the other two, at least on some small scale. Summary of Structure of the Cosmere: So: Spiritual: Motivating forces, rules, physical laws - the logos of the system. Cognitive: Middle ground between Spiritual and Physical. Interprets Spiritual directives in the context of the Physical realm, alters the Spiritual realm on occasion (soul-changing (?) and magic) as a result of behavior in the Physical realm, and has its own (malleable?) set of rules on how to interpret directives from either of the other realms. Physical: Where the directives of the Spiritual/Cognitive realms come to fruition, with these directives altering the nature and layout of the Physical realm and so being altered in turn. Where you see everything happening, while the other two realms are more behind the scenes. To put it in unnecessarily computer-architectural terms: The Spiritual is the rule set and command line, the Cognitive is where the computations are actually executed based upon inputs from the Spiritual, and the Physical is where the results of these actions are displayed and stored. Changes introduced in the Physical realm then alter the state of the Cognitive and, possibly Spiritual realms during the next cycle. Magic, in particular, hijacks the Spiritual realm and hacks in new rule sets to enable non-normal changes in the Cognitive and Physical realms. Nature of Magic as Relates to Spiritual Realm: Some magic might directly influence the Spiritual realm, such as the Lashings, while others might simply be enabled by them. A Thug using Pewter is not necessarily tapping into the Spiritual realm, but his "specification" in the Spiritual realm will include, along with all the normal human specifications and his soul, "can 'burn' pewter for increased physical endurance and general abilities." That's the Spiritual DNA that Brandon loves talking about, and fits perfectly with how vital S-DNA is to the operation of the magic systems. If my theory is the case, then accessing Shadesmar would allow consciously moving, creating, and/or altering values in the Physical realm, which would explain why it enables travel between Shardworlds and why accessing Shadesmar enables the transmutation of objects in the Physical realm. If my theory is true, then Shallan will never come back from Shadesmar with beads stuck in her hair, because she was never actually there. Likely, she was simply standing in place while her mind took an adventure, Matrix style. Shardblades, as suggested in this thread, are essentially Physical manifestations of the power of the Spiritual realm, "admin weapons," as it were. Shardblades are triggered into existence by a certain Physical/Cognitive key (enabled by alterations to the Spiritual DNA of its wielder), and then manifest as essentially a miniature bundle of violations of the laws of nature. They are not, then, actual persistent Physical objects which just happen to be stored in the Spiritual realm. They are simply tangible manifestations of crude Spiritual manipulation which did not exist at any point prior to their fashioning in the Spiritual realm, and can never exist in the Physical realm without magical intervention of some kind. So when we look at gravity somehow being a "spiritual bond," it makes sense because the law of gravity, the gravitational constant, etc. is actually recorded in the Spiritual realm. So "reassigning" the bond, as discussed, is simply a matter of editing the parameters of a single object as I described above (I here presume that aggregate's in the Cosmere are lumped together in the Realms, to avoid having to think about quarks and whatnot). And back on track: I would hazard that the temporal metals probably fall under the Spiritual category, just as the mental ones are Cognitive and physical are Physical. All magic comes from the Spiritual realm enabling certain extra-real behavior, but the temporal metals in this case would be primarily affecting the Spiritual aspects of the world. Bendalloy and Cadmium might actually function by re-writing the Spiritual aspects of everything in within the bubble, altering some "this is how fast you move" variable that they all have. This flows down to the Cognitive realm, which sees how much power it has at its disposal and how big/time-altery the Misting wants the bubble to be, then pours re-write power into everything it can reach in the Physical realm. Unlike stormlight, which sticks with the objects over time to keep their Spiritual aspects from reverting, essentially serving as a capacitor, time bubble's must provide constant fuel to maintain the timey-wimey effect on their surroundings. So as soon as an object gets too far away from the center of bubble--which is in turn fed by the presence of a Misting with the appropriate S-DNA triggering the appropriate metal--the entire object is released from the effect. This could either work through my "distension" theory or actually legitimize a scenario where an object is half-in, half-out of a bubble yet remains either entirely affected or entirely unaffected: the "bubble" is simply a manifestation of the rough range of the metal's effect. This could also explain why light remains unaffected without relying on an alloy of Handwavium--light particles aren't considered objects in the Cognitive/Spiritual realms, at least as far as Bendalloy/Cadmium go, so they get a free pass. As for FTL, this might actually does give hope to my off-the-cuff suggestion that "teleporting FTL" would work in space as time bubbles suddenly expand without an atmosphere. Without having to worry about all that pesky air moving in and out and in and out, and swirling around, and just being there, there might be a lot more power available for time bubbles to expand. Alternatively (although this goes against the RPG), you might be able to pour the extra power from nicrosil (both feruchemical and alomantic) into expanding the bubble rather than speeding it up, since it makes sense that you can either speed up 10 things to x2 speed or 5 things to x4 with the same amount of power, allowing the expansion of bubbles to include more objects. P.S. And that's what you get when you ask for my input. I might start another thread if if people like my shiny new Realmatic theory. P.P.S. There is also the problem of why Soulcasting and planet-hopping appear to "stick" whenever you do them while Lashings/time bubbles do not. It could be the case that Lashings/bubbles, besides changing the instructions of objects, also have to provide the energy to affect and/or maintain the changes they demand, due to the continuing violations of the normal laws of the Spiritual (and Physical?) realms that they cause. It could be the case that, while the Spiritual realm usually provides the motive force (or simply has unique access to the energy of the other two realms?), magical power is required to maintain "hacked in" instructions that co-opt existing instruction sets (Lashings/bubbles) to continually do otherwise impossible things. Soulcasting, however, simply switches out one valid set of specifications (the type of object the target is) for another, equally valid set of specifications (the type you want the target to become). The energy is required to initiate any unnatural change, but is no longer required once the laws of physics are done being violated. So Lashed objects don't bounce back to where they would have been if a Windrunner had never touched them and Soulcast goblets stay as blood. P.P.P.S. I also forgot to mention that my theory might account for cadmium bubbles being larger, since it's conceivable that the bubble co-opts some of the energy from objects it slows down. Entropy would kick in at some point so the bubble wouldn't just constantly expand, but it would still be cheaper than a speed bubble.

Since the original thread has gone a bit downward and the up-to-date components were a bit spread out, I've decided to re-post Turos's Alethi font and my own Alethi Transliterator. The font can be used to write in the Alethi alphabet on a computer, while my program transforms a plain-text file from written English to what is essentially phonetic English, but conforms to Turos's font conventions. How to use the font: Font download: AlethiTS Font.zip If your are using a non-Windows operating system and .tff fonts don't work on your computer, let Turos know what file type you need and he'll make one for ya. As a bonus, for people who want the entire sentence to fit on one center line, Turos has included a second font that adds the center line to the space character called AlethiTS_lined.ttf Version 2: AlethiTS Fontv2.zip The .zip file contains a ReadMe describing the font conventions and how to start using the font. How to use the program: Download: AlethiTransliterator_1_9_5_2.txt You have to change the extension from .txt to .java, since the forum hates .java files for some reason. You can run it using any java compiling program. I found this site, Turos wrote up this set of instructions, or you can just email me at [email protected] with the plaintext and a request to do it for you. Use: Place the text you want to transliterate into a .txt file. Run the program and then type in the file name (i.e. Example.txt) when prompted. A new file called Alethi_<YourFile>.txt will be created in the same directory as the original once the program terminates. I've also included a functionality to keep certain portions of text untouched: a <safe>[...]</safe> tag that protects the text within the tag from being touched by the transliteration aspect of the program. This way, particularly tricky words or proper names can be cordoned off and search-replaced manually. It's currently set to leave the tags in the final text, where they can be easily found and removed after manual transliteration. Ex. -"<safe>Wow, Xanthophyll is not necessarily the most transmorgraphical name to pronounce, is it?</safe>" becomes: -"<safe>Wow, Xanthophyll is not necessarily the most transmorgraphical name to pronounce, is it?</safe>" as opposed to: -".uau zanTofyll is not nesesarilee Te most transmorgrafikal neym too pronouns is it" Due to how this is implemented, '<' (outside of the <safe> and </safe> tags) and '*' are currently reserved characters. Use them and bad things will happen. This is still a work in progress, so I encourage feedback, though the school year may slow down the speed of my responses. Last Updated: September 2, 2012 -Fixed 'x' at the beginning of words. Should really have caught that one. . .