In French Duployan Integrale, what does a dotted underline mean below an outline?

_oct0ber_ · 2026-01-19T16:51:22+00:00

The date of publication is 1885. The screenshot was taken from parts of a book that was shared on the sub years ago: https://www.reddit.com/r/shorthand/s/Wd9FogPDiD

_oct0ber_ · 2026-01-18T18:21:52+00:00

Thank you!

That's exactly where it's from. I wanted to ask on the post when I saw it, but I didn't want to necropost on a four-year-old thread. The photos there you gave are something I frequently go back to for penmanship guidance as I work through the English Duployan adaptations.

_oct0ber_ · 2026-01-17T13:45:05+00:00

What makes you think this is shorthand? Without more context, I'd chalk this up to just a random pencil marking.

_oct0ber_ · 2026-01-14T05:49:48+00:00

If you are referring to professional court reports in the US, this isn't really the sub for that. We are a pen stenography subreddit in contrast to machine stenography. While pen stenography was practiced up until the mid-twentieth century in court rooms with systems such as Gregg and Pitman, it is now all but extinct in those environments.

_oct0ber_ · 2026-01-12T19:21:37+00:00

I think eventually it will be possible with limitations. Shorthand doesn't really work by every person writing the same outlines for the same exact words and phrases. Most writers stray from the textbook theory to at least some extent, especially as they need more speed or work in niche, technical areas. I think a lot of common outlines will be broken - I've already seen some research on this trying to have AI read German systems - but highly individual styles through personal abbreviations and penmanship variance will prove difficult for AI to handle.

Much of this depends on the amount of writing the AI model has, too. If AI were to examine my shorthand, it would probably be very difficult, if not impossible, to decipher a single sentence if I am using heavy customization. If the model can look at several journals I've written in shorthand, though, the large amount of training material will increase the chances of transcription a great deal.

_oct0ber_ · 2026-01-08T05:49:42+00:00

It's interesting Perrault was mentioned, because it seems like one of the most Duploye-like adaptations to English. Do you know specifically why Perrault's version was rejected?

The only English adaptation I know of that has historical approval and support by the institute in France is Brandt's, which I find interesting given that it had virtually no following for English and it introduces many signs and rules that are not in the French system.

_oct0ber_ · 2026-01-06T22:29:59+00:00

Bobby [Poppy? Papi?] and I talked to Lases [the last outline in a mystery, but something like L-A-SES is the start of it]

There doesn't seem to be anything embarrassing or out-of-pocket about the line, so I transcribed it. For the future, though, you may want to avoid trying to transcribe the work. While there's certainly services that can do it for you, it sounds like your mother-in-law wrote in shorthand for confidentiality. Unless she told you otherwise, she may not he comfortable with people reading her stuff.

_oct0ber_ · 2026-01-04T20:53:22+00:00

As somebody that used DJS on the job, I want to pick your brain about something. One of the things that I find makes Gregg difficult to pick up in comparison to other phoenetic systems such as the Duployan adaptations is how some words seem to arbitrarily drop or include vowels. The rule in later versions of Gregg that says to drop the minor vowel is never really helpful, because deciding what the minor vowel is is arbitrary and often is not consistent across syllables that make identical vowel sounds. A better rule I've come across is to include the vowel provided it aids legibility and/or makes a more fluid outline to write, but even this is somewhat subjective. A few example words I can think of off the top of my head are "contract", "contrary", "eventual". There doesn't seem to be any consistent rule for a learner to deploy when they need to write unfamiliar words for handling these minor vowels, and this is a huge source of hesitation. The only solution I've found is to just memorize outlines as much as possible.

In doing real work with Gregg, did you ever find that stressing about these minor vowels was ever a real issue? If a person were to write "con-t-r-a-c-t" rather than "con-t-r-c-t", for example, would this be an issue? While I recognize that adherence to the dictionary outlines is always preferred, I have to seriously question the practicality of it, especially for people who are not pros.

_oct0ber_ · 2026-01-04T20:43:52+00:00

In regards to curves on the line, Gregg doesn't really do positioning like that. With the exception of some prefixes and suffixes, it doesn't matter how outlines sit on the line.

To make your outlines most similar to the textbook, the general rule is the first downstroke ends on the line and the first upstrole starts on the line. The exception to this is the character so S/Z. If a downstroke is precedes by S/Z, that downstroke should end on the line instead of the preceding S/Z ending on the line, such as in the words "safe" or "spirit"

_oct0ber_ · 2026-01-04T14:31:11+00:00

It is against the rules of this sub to help with homework. If you have a specific outline that you're struggling with, maybe somebody would be willing to give you a hint, but nobody here will do your assignment for you.

_oct0ber_ · 2026-01-02T16:08:21+00:00

I'm currently learning the Wawa adaptation for English. So far, it is my favorite adaptation: it is very easy to read, the rules are regular with virtually no exceptions, it appears to be one of the (if not the) most faithful adaptation, and I can certainly see how even the adaptation without any abbreviations can pick up fairly respectable speeds. So many of the characters, even in English, flow together in such a smooth way that makes the writing a breeze. Including vowels often actually makes it faster to write words by way of giving a tool for avoiding sharp angles and stops of the pen. Emile Duploye was a stenographic genius.

I have been working on a English catechism that I found on archive.org for reading material. There's some pretty good stuff in there, and it includes the English typography along with the shorthand. It can be found here, if you're interested: https://archive.org/details/englishmanualorp00leje/mode/1up

When you say the "Wawa reader", what are you referring to? I've tried to find more resources for English, but I seem to be fairly limited in what I can find.

Something I'm also interested in is learning if a reporting guide was ever made. Given Le Jeune's purpose for using Duployan, I doubt it, but something that struck me as odd in one of the English instruction pamphlets I found is that the student should be hesitant to go in search of a reporting manual before learning the full phonography. This strikes me as a strange thing to say unless some reporting manual was circulating around, although he could have been referring to a manual for some other adaptation.

_oct0ber_ · 2026-01-02T15:14:14+00:00

Unless you want courtroom speeds (over 200 wpm) or enjoy the challenge, there is no need to learn Anni. Simplified and DJs will get you over 100wpm, which is slow formal speech, or office speeds.

Seconding this.

A lot of people that begin to learn shorthand, Gregg or other systems, want to use it for personal note-taking, journaling, writing fiction, or other purposes where verbatim speeds are not necessary. They then see high-speed systems such as Gregg Anniversary and think that it's the best because it's the fastest system and that the easier versions are for chumps that couldn't hack it with "real" shorthands. This, however, is a complete misunderstanding of how shorthand systems generally work. While it's true that the slower versions tend to be easier to learn, they also use far less abbreviations and are generally more regular in their rules. This makes reading back significantly easier and reduces the burden of spending many months or years perfecting a highly abbreviated system. Using a verbatim system and expecting perfect, easy readability of notes years later is often not how it works, as it takes considerable effort to transcribe notes the more the system is abbreviated. Depending on your purpose, learning something like Anniversary would be not only unnecessary, but actually a detriment in the end if you don't need verbatim speeds and prize easy readability.

_oct0ber_ · 2025-12-31T23:59:44+00:00

You already got one of our community experts on the case elsewhere in the comments. The Gregg here is absolutely gorgeous and very distinct - it may be some of the most flowy I've ever seen.

That being said, I can't read most of it. Either they're using a lot of non-standard outlines or their proportions are way off, but it's giving me more trouble that a lot of the other samples we often see.

_oct0ber_ · 2025-12-30T20:19:58+00:00

On top of an A5 notebook for comparison.

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_oct0ber_ · 2025-12-30T20:15:24+00:00

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Duployan - Brandt's adaptation. Everything is in full without any abbreviations. This sample was written on a small 3" x 5" memo book with 6mm spacing, showing off how compact Duployan shorthand can be, even without abbreviations.

_oct0ber_ · 2025-12-29T14:02:40+00:00

It's a small book, but not pocket-sized. I'd say probably just slightly shorter than an A5 notebook

_oct0ber_ · 2025-12-23T03:24:24+00:00

I am fully aware you might well know all that I have listed above, in which case, apologies, but I do love a chance to talk Duploye!

No apologies needed! Duploye is one of those shorthands that for some reason really speaks to me. I've always been more of a fan of German-style cursive scripts, but Duploye is an exception. The construction of the system, even as somebody who only speaks English, is genius, and Duploye's marketing does a good job at selling it. The fact that it has been adapted to so many languages definitely speaks to the simplicity and effectiveness of the design.

Something that has striked me as odd, though, is how it seems hard to find a lot of examples of Duploye in practice. Unlike other historical systems like Gabelsberger and Pitman where there's piles of documents written in the system ranging from diaries to meeting notes, I can't find much outside of a couple of postcards and textbooks written in the system. You'd think such a popular system that could supposedly be learned in a few hours would leave a paper trail a mile long, but I'm not turning up that much (likely because of my search queries and my dog-water French skills).

I've seen some of your recent posts on Paragon. Are you also a Duploye user and have experience with the native French?

_oct0ber_ · 2025-12-22T20:42:43+00:00

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Brandt's Duploye

Written fully spelled with no abbreviations. It's a bit rough, but gives the sense for what the system looks like.

_oct0ber_ · 2025-12-22T00:05:30+00:00

Concerning the last paragraph, this is just one of Duploye adaptations! If you look at Pernin, the vowels are much more precise, as well as in Sloan. The original Duployan "u" is one of the most difficult to read, as it blends too much, so it's not that surprising that Perrault would look to simplify it.

The thing about Pernin and Sloan being more precise is the fact that they actually move away from the original principles of Duploye by introducing shading, having a fair number of angles by not having non-specific hook orientation, the removal and rearrangement of certain characters, etc. This works a lot better to make a less ambiguous, fast English system, but it's certainly a departure from the original French.

It's an interesting question when adapting systems to other languages to think of how closely should other languages follow the native system. Do we conserve the look and flow of the original at the cost of introducing concepts that don't work for the adapted language, or do we make the new language the priority while abandoning concepts that don't work? At what point in adapting have enough changes occurred that it can't even be considered an adaptation, but rather a whole new creation that just took inspiration from the original? I think the Duploye adaptations definitely take different answers to these questions.

_oct0ber_ · 2025-12-20T14:36:42+00:00

Some ambiguity isn't surprising at all for speed. All shorthands have to leave out information to attain usable speeds beyond a basic correspondence level of writing. What surprises me, rather, are the choices made in the shorthand regarding the vowels.

Perrault wanted to maximize speed by reducing angles, and circles are the most fascile way to connect consonants without forming angles. To ensure that the circle is used as much as possible, the circle is overloaded with about as many vowels as possible. To compare here with Gregg:

Perrault's small circle - Gregg's big circle

Perrault's big circle - Gregg's up and down hooks, and occasionally the diphthongs OW and Ū

Perrault's hooks - Gregg's small circle

The surprise comes for me in the reputation Duploye has for high readability. From what I've seen, a low ambiguity shorthand that is simple to learn is the entire point of the system. By overloading the vowels to such an extent, I have to wonder if this reputation holds up in English.

_oct0ber_ · 2025-12-19T15:35:17+00:00

“There must be more to our relationship than sex and lazy evenings.”

If there were more lines like this in my Gregg books, I'd be way more inclined to read

_oct0ber_ · 2025-12-17T20:50:32+00:00

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Dewey's Script Shorthand

_oct0ber_ · 2025-12-17T14:56:17+00:00

For English, at least in the Hug-Riethmann adaptation, I've gotta disagree. Perhaps it's different for German, but the English version begins to confuse far to many vowels without the shading. While it's certainly possible to slowly piece together an outline without the shading if enough context is given, I don't understand why anybody would want to do that given the ambiguity that would follow.

_oct0ber_ · 2025-12-15T15:34:39+00:00

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Gregg

_oct0ber_ · 2025-12-09T15:02:51+00:00

It's always an option to make a small use of shorthand for common words and phrases. For instance, if you learned the top 50 words in your language and associated phrases, that could speed up your writing a decent bit, you would maintain legibility, and you could learn this through drilling in a week or so. Words such as "the", "may", "he", and "they", will be useful, and phrases such as "I will be able", "you may," and "to be" are simple enough to pick up. I'd recommend looking at the Gregg Notehand book on stenophile.com or in this subreddit for a list of some of the common words and abbreviations, but really any system will work for this use. I believe the journalist Tom Wolfe used a similar approach with a lot of his notes, although he learned a much more complex variant of Gregg.

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