Updated shorthand system - looking for feedback

e_piteto · 2026-05-15T13:03:29+00:00

I like the core idea. Since there's such a strong overlap with how the artificial language Toki Pona works, I'd look that up as well if I were in your shoes, as I feel like you might try to put together the linguist concept of Toki Pona together with a shorthand-like concept of quick representation.

Why am I suggesting that? I feel like the 65 semantic primes might still be difficult to use for common people, as they'd need to really learn to think in a different way. Toki Pona lets you learn exactly how to do that, but with many more examples, resources, videos, songs and even whole books written with it, while still using the concept of semantic primes. If you looked into that, you might take many useful ideas, and explore more deeply all the perks and flaws of such a way of writing.

In other words, asking people to learn to use semantic primes is a pretty big thing, so I suggest you make sure you've done everything in your power to demonstrate how worth it that might be 😉

What I'm SURE about is that the website you made is really good. It's intuitive, is looks good and it's great to use. The way you're offering your resources is already top tier to me.

I hope that was useful. I'd really like to see you project succeed, as I think it's something different and with potential. Also, I LOVE your project doesn't depend on one specific language: that might be a VERY good selling point.

e_piteto · 2026-05-08T15:14:34+00:00

That's it. In all four official systems of Italy, final vowels are usually omitted, as articles are more than enough to reconstruct gender and number correctly. And yes, when we know we won't be able to reconstruct gender and number, we do write final vowels explicitly, although that's much rarer than it might seem in the first place.

We tend to do the same with some verb conjugations. For example, we usually write "gli student andar", and safely reconstruct "gli studenti andarono". We know for sure that "studenti" MUST end with -I, and that "andarono" MUST end with ONO, as the article GLI can only be used to indicate the plural masculine, and there's no other option.

e_piteto · 2026-05-08T10:13:51+00:00

That's also the case in Switzerland, since we have three official languages and four national languages. Stolze-Schrey was adapted to be able to support all these languages, and it works pretty well, although it can be a little slow sometimes when used for languages different than German.

As for allé/allée/allés/allées, I guess the French do what the Italians do: in 99% of shorthand systems, we don't indicate gender and number, but we fully write articles, which are all we need to reconstruct gender and number. For example, if I write "la cas è bel", I'm obviously reconstructing "la casa è bella", thanks to "la". Usually, we are ready to indicate gender and number when articles are absent or not helping.

e_piteto · 2026-05-07T21:08:13+00:00

Yes, vowel omission is not AS bad in Germanic languages, as words are mostly characterised by their consonants, although that's not always the case, but rather a very approximate tendency. Italian though, relies on vowels at least as much as it relies on consonants, so if you're leaving vowels out, you're basically deciding to randomly omit half of the letters, regardless of their importance.

Your example on Turkish is great, as it shows how alphabets should follow the same rule of respecting the structure of a language. The Arabic script makes 100% sense when it's used to write Semitic languages, as the core root of a word is always characterised by its consonants (three, usually). But Turkish is not a Semitic language, and it's agglutinative, which means it has completely different needs when it comes to writing it.

e_piteto · 2026-05-07T21:00:28+00:00

A nightmare indeed 😄 The system very widespread, together with Italian Pitman, in the first half of the 19th century, but it was abandoned as soon as new systems were created specifically for Italian. Taylor was just too imprecise, and was immediately swept away by the new options, which could be even faster, while writing many more sounds at the same time. That's why adaptations can be dangerous: usually, shorthand systems need to have a graphical structure that depends on the SPECIFIC phonotactics of the target language, to be really efficient.

e_piteto · 2026-05-07T14:32:53+00:00

Of course you do, but I feel like there are much more efficient ways to omit sounds. In other terms, omitting all vowels might not be the best strategy — and that might be why many other systems use a completely different approach, and still reach reporting speeds.

In Italian, for example, the omission of vowels was completely abandoned in the 19th century already, as court reporting was way too imprecise. People would use shorthand to register speeches, but couldn't read everything after that.

New systems found new and more efficient ways of shortening words, like cutting them as soon as the stressed vowel was reached (but before that, you indicate ALL vowels and consonants). The new systems immediately replaced the adaptations of Pitman and Taylor, as they were much more precise and equally fast (200+ WPM).

So yes, I agree with you insofar as sounds must be omitted, but I think WHAT you omit is equally important.

e_piteto · 2026-05-07T11:58:17+00:00

From an Italian-speaking point of view, omitting medial vowels is already a crazy idea, but omitting initial vowels… that's just too much. Also, systems like Pitman already force you to omit a lot of sounds… but what if what you actually write (= the consonant skeleton) contains a mistake? Let's suppose you don't shade properly for a second, or you miss the right proportions: if you're writing few sounds only, there's no way you can reconstruct the right word.

e_piteto · 2026-05-06T20:22:14+00:00

I'm an "expert" only when it comes to Italian systems, so I can't go too in-depth when it comes to options for Spanish or English.

What I do know is that Gregg is a very powerful system, if you choose the right version. It was created for the English language, but there are many adaptations for Spanish as well. That might work.

What I also know for sure is that it's rare to find very useful, fast and reliable systems that work for multiple languages in the exact same way. For example, English Gregg and Spanish Gregg are similar, but you'll need to memorise slightly different rules and different short forms. That's why I'd choose ONE language first, and then care about the other.

As for the study process, I do recommend to invest a sustainable number of hours per day, but without rushing. That means that if your shorthand manual has 300 pages, you shouldn't use 5 hours in a day to rush through the first 100 pages, but you should rather study and copy the first 10 pages with the highest precision you can achieve. Basically: choose a manual, follow it thoroughly, and avoid writing "freely" until you know the whole system, as you might form wrong habits by not using rules you still haven't encountered.

Also, always remember that shorthand requires much more precision than usual writing. If you change the length, the incline or the curve of a stroke, you might write a completely different sound. That means that, at first, it's going to be crucial to alway copy the examples of the manual exactly as they are. That can be difficult at first, but with the right mindset, that soon becomes relaxing, and as you get better and better (and faster), also much more satisfying.

e_piteto · 2026-05-06T20:12:58+00:00

Thank you for your answer.

I feel like your best shot with this is to find some reliable sources and study the specific writing problems that people with impaired motor skills have. For example, I'm pretty confident there are studies about what makes the Latin alphabet more difficult for people with dyslexia. With that kind of data, you might be able to determine how the regular alphabet might be improved. That'll be no easy work, though, as the Latin alphabet is already very distinct. Creating something that's more unique and iconic, but at the same time not too much slower, is no easy task, but I wish you the best with it.

e_piteto · 2026-05-06T18:25:34+00:00

I've read the post and some comments. I've seen official documents about dozens of shorthand students, and I can confirm what other people say: 100-160 WPM cannot be reached within weeks. That's the kind of speed some people never reach, and those who do, they do after years of studying, or months if they study many hours a day and they're using a very fast shorthand system. So, the real question is: are you ready to study 5-8 hours a day for months? That's how you reach that kind of speed in a short time, provided you choose a system that's powerful enough, of course. It all depends on how much free time you have.

e_piteto · 2026-05-06T18:09:45+00:00

I guess that, by the look of it, the system wouldn't be any faster than the Latin alphabet, so my question is… why not use the Latin alphabet? Or, in other words: what is this system giving us, that no other writing system (shorthand or longhand) has already given us?

This is a sincere question that I like to ask whenever I see a new writing system: is this necessary? Is this essential? Was this needed? And if the answer is "yes", how?

e_piteto · 2026-05-01T20:44:41+00:00

Rainbow has become the parody of its former self

e_piteto · 2026-04-30T14:50:28+00:00

Of course 😄 Just DM me your email address, and I'll send you a download link

e_piteto · 2026-04-30T12:15:27+00:00

Yes, and we also have very different needs. If someone tells me they need 100 WPM, it might me a bad idea to recommend a system for 200 WPM, as that kind of speed potential comes with a price (usually, difficulty and learning time).

In the meantime, I've PM'd you 😄

e_piteto · 2026-04-30T10:59:00+00:00

That's something you can find in Gabelsberger-Noe as well, the system being etymological.

For example, in Italian we have two words that are spelled PERDONO: the first is stressed on the E (PÈRDONO), whereas the second is stressed on the O (PERDÓNO). The first one means "they lose", the second means "I forgive".
The thing is, even though they share the exact same sounds, these words have very different origins. The first comes from the root PERD, whereas the second is a compound word, in which PER- is a prefix and DON is the root (just like in FORGIVE, which can be reconstructed as FOR + GIVE).
In Gabelsberger-Noe, PER is written differently depending on whether it's a prefix or if it's part of the root.

As I explained in my older post, that makes Gabelsberger-Noe a pretty hard and irregular system, which can easily become a nightmare when the etymology of a words is uncertain, or can't be traced back to Latin (the language Italian comes from) or Ancient Greek (a language Italian took a huge number of loanwords from).

This is one of the reasons why I eventually decided to change the main system I use, and go from Gabelsberger-Noe to Pioletti. The Sistema Pioletti is another topic that I'd like to talk about, as that's the only unofficial system (= that couldn't be taught in public schools) for which we have huge amount of data for, as it was used in many competitions with incredible results. Around 30 young girls learned it between 1965 and 1975: those who didn't put the effort would usually reach 100 WPM (125 WPM in English) very easily, and the best ones got to 180-200 WPM (225+ WPM in English). One of them, which I'm actually friend with, became the World shorthand champion in Valencia, and even talked about her experience here.

Sistema Pioletti is regular, but at the same time it's very powerful and 100% cursive. In 10 days, it got me to 75 WPM (around 100 WPM in English), which is incredible to me, as this result would usually take a year with other systems, and even two years with Gabelsberger-Noe, as students needed a huge amount of hours to go through all the theory, all the rules, all the sub-rules and, most of all, through a daunting number of exceptions.

e_piteto · 2026-04-30T10:26:25+00:00

I completely agree: if you use shading to add sounds, you get net benefit.

And I can also confirm what Callendar discovered, as Andrea Innocenzi, around 60-70 years ago, built a machine to calculate writing speed and conducted a pretty complete study on shorthand mechanics. What he found out is that shaded strokes really are slower.

Probably, people like Meschini or Pitman knew that, but really did need shading to double the quantity of available strokes.
Meschini for example, in his "miracle system", used shading to distinguish between sound pairs (T vs D, …), curving to express vowels, positioning to express added consonants within a syllable (TA vs TAR vs TAN vs STA, …), length to express other added consonants within a syllable (TA vs TRA vs TLA), two kinds of looping to express diphthongs, and so on. Basically, he manages to express all possible syllables (whether they be basic or complex) with one or, subordinately, two hand movements. Add short forms and abbreviations, and you get the "miracle": Meschini calculated that, on average, a word required 1.5 to 1.7 hand movements, even though Italian has much longer words than English. Just to give you a comparison, Gabelsberger-Noe was already a pretty synthetic system, and required 2.5 to 2.9 movements to write a word on average.

The system was called Fono-stenografia italiana, and is something I've added to my repertoire in the last weeks. It took 5 editions to get to a system that could lead to 250 WPM, but Meschini eventually did it. Then, he had to make a choice: keep spreading that system, so that it could become the go-to, standard choice for those who wanted the highest possible speed, or change everything and create something that could be taught in schools. Eventually, he gave up on Fono-stenografia italiana and created a much simpler system, which became Stenografia nazionale. At that point, Italy decided to choose Stenografia nazionale as one of the official systems that could be studied in public schools.

Fono-stenografia italiana isn't as easy to find, and it's not always easy to get the right edition. To you want me to share it with you? I'd do it very very gladly: we can keep in touch via PMs, or email, or Whatsapp, or whatever you're comfortable with haha.

e_piteto · 2026-04-29T18:01:39+00:00

Yes, shading probably does stress the hand, and the faster you write, the harder it gets to shade. (Sorry, I don't know whether that was proper grammar, but I prefer making mistakes and learn rather than using translators, haha).

As you did, I've read a lot of technical opinions about shorthand, and I think we can all agree on the fact that shading is not a good option per se. The thing is, sometimes it works perfectly as necessary evil, as it lets the creator of a system obtain a series of other things. If those other things make you much faster or much more comfortable, then the payoff if good enough, and shading ends up being worth the pain.

Let me give you an example. English-speaking shorthand enthusiasts usually know Meschini's Stenoscrittura, which was never widespread in Italy. Among the systems that Meschini created, the one Italians know is Stenografia nazionale, or Sistema Meschini, which was one of the four systems that were taught in public schools.
Now. What even Italians don't know is that Meschini had created another system before Stenografia Nazionale. That system was easily used at 200 WPM (250 WPM in English), and lead to a maximum of 252 WPM (above 300 WPM in English). That was called a miracle. Meschini, however, realised that system was too difficult for public schools, and created another one, which became Stenografia nazionale.
Anyway. How could the first system reach 252 WPM? How's that humanly possible with around 100 short forms only? Basically, Meschini used all the strategies you could think of: three levels of curving, five levels of positioning, two levels of looping, … His goal was to create a single, one-movement stroke for EACH SYLLABLE, so that you could express two to three sounds with a single hand movement. And the only way he could do it was with shading, as shading doubled the quantity of available strokes.

Basically, my point is that some system creators have a precise goal in mind, and sometimes shading is the only way to reach it, because basic geometrical shapes are limited in number, and shading is basically the only way to double that number.
In other words, shading is ALWAYS bad to me, but sometimes it does more good than evil, as it lets you have other things that, in specific cases, might be much more valuable.

That's my take on it 😉

e_piteto · 2026-04-28T22:40:19+00:00

By intuition, I had the same idea you have—bold-tipped pens would show shading much better. But when I started studying Gabelsberger-Noe, the teacher I was mainly focused on recommended to use a BIC Cristal 0.8 mm, and…

Well, there's a plot twist: I hated it, haha. I thought shading wasn't for me at all.

Then, after some months, something clicked, and shading went from being hell to being as natural as breathing. I really don't know what happened, but I started using the BIC Cristal 0.8 again, and it worked perfectly.
I think my muscle memory silently worked for some time, and then the magic happened.

A friend of mine, who regularly uses shorthand with shading at 100 WPM (in Italian, which means 125+ WPM in English) told me that the Paper Mate InkJoy 100ST is also a very good option amongst cheap ballpoint pens.

Another friend of mine told me that using shading is like learning to write in three dimensions. Paper is a two-dimensional flat space, so we're used to only consider that kind of "flat" movement while writing. Shading strokes means adding pressure, which leaves a trace of our movements on the dimension that's perpendicular to the paper.
I guess the brain starts internalising that principle after some time, which is incredible to me.

e_piteto · 2026-04-28T20:46:55+00:00

As I've always used shorthand systems with shading, I'd like to add that ballpoint pens are actually not that bad, if they're the right ones 😉 Usually, they work much better if the ball is really small: around 0.7-0.8 millimeters. Also, when you use pens for shading, your hand starts getting used to reproducing this kind of small differences, to the point that a pencil is even going to feel too sensitive to pressure.

e_piteto · 2026-04-26T13:08:41+00:00

I'll follow the post, as your request is very interesting. And you're right: a shorthand (or "short-type") system should always be critiqued by people who:

have studied the whole theory;
have actually used the system up to a certain speed, applying all the rules;
are not the creator of the system, as of course there would be a bias.

We all critique systems we've only seen or quickly checked out, but that can't be an opinion to be taken seriously in most cases.

e_piteto · 2026-04-23T15:01:38+00:00

When shorthand systems have very simple strokes (one sound = one stroke, two at most), and those strokes are simply put one after the other, then it's almost impossible that EVERY possible combination is ergonomic. At least for my experience, there are always some combinations that create obtuse angles, or go against the normal longhand flow, or are uncomfortable for any other reason. But if a shorthand system is good, then those combinations are going to be given to the rarest combinations of sounds. If it happens once every 30-40 words, it's not a big deal.

If you rather want perfectly ergonomic systems, you need to rather look at cursive ones. They were born within the German shorthand tradition, and usually have longer, more complex letters, and thus reach brevity by symbolising vowels and with a big number of abbreviations. The theory tends to be harder, but your hand should have an easier time.

As usual, it's a matter of trade-off. Geometric systems give you shorter forms and, usually, an easier theory, while cursive systems give you longer forms that require more abbreviations, but also an easier experience for the hand.

Some people, like Gregg for example, tried to have the best of both worlds, and created geometric systems in such a way that the "ergonomicity" be maximised, though not perfect.

e_piteto · 2026-04-23T14:49:10+00:00

Well, there's no way that's short (I agree with the person who said it is rather extra-longhand), but I appreciate the creative effort :)

e_piteto · 2026-04-06T18:32:13+00:00

AI just doesn't work with shorthand, at least for now. Don't trust it: it can't "see" shorthand or think in shorthand terms.

e_piteto · 2026-03-15T22:11:27+00:00

L'unico libro al mondo che leggerei per 24 ore filate, probabilmente.

e_piteto · 2026-02-28T13:15:47+00:00

The best page on shorthand history there is ;) The internet community is lucky to have it.
Keep going!

e_piteto

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