Dagger-Alef in Arabic Script
In order to implement correct behavior in fonts for the dagger-alef ( ◌ٰ ) one needs to understand how it should appear. Although there are exceptions, the dagger-alef is not generally written in modern texts, it is primarily used in classical texts.
Regarding the dagger-alef, Fahmy (Fahmy, Hossam A. H. 2006, Vol 27, No 2. AlQalam for typesetting traditional Arabic texts. TUGBoat. p. 164
) says:
“It is considered a separate character that appears on its own in cases such as
On the other hand, it is considered a mark on top of the underlying character in cases such as
If the dagger alif is a mark, its positioning on the character is similar to that of the short vowels.”
In the case of dagger-alef as a “separate character”, dagger-alef should be placed above a space or even above (Unfortunately, Microsoft Word does not support the dagger-alef on a space. However, LibreOffice does support it.) When developing a font, and must support putting a combining mark (such as g ) above the space.}. See dagger-alef above the space in the first word of the first sample above.
In general, if dagger-alef is above a “tooth” then the anchor point for the dagger-alef should be centered above the tooth (there are some who disagree with this and believe the dagger-alef should be slightly to the left of the “tooth”). The example below shows the dagger-alef above the tooth of both the initial and medial yeh:
If a consonant has a vowel above it (such as the fatha) followed by a dagger-alef, then a kashida ( ـ ) can be inserted before the dagger-alef. This places the dagger-alef after the consonant (rather than above the fatha) but before the next consonant. See dagger-alef between the meem and the waw below:
Some fonts will offset the dagger alif a little to the left if the character already has a fatha or another vowel above it.