what the word .i means

This is a very basic Lojban lesson, the meaning of the word {.i}!

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[iwantagoodnameplease]

Do you use ".i" when writing? Does a normal "." not suffice there?

[selckiku]

@iwantagoodnameplease Yes, we always use {.i} when writing. Lojban is always written and spoken the same. A period can't mean that because it has another meaning: it represents a pause or glottal stop. The period in {.i} is not punctuation but a part of the word. It's also in for instance {.ui} ("wee", "yay", "I feel happy"). Periods can be left out as long as there are spaces (you can figure out where they'd have to be), but {.i} has to be used or the meaning of things will change.

[selckiku]

@iwantagoodnameplease Here's a bit of Lojban text as an example: "mi pu klama lo zarci .ui .i mi nelci lo nu mi zarci klama .i vecnu lo .alzaitu zei grasu mi" (I went to the market, yay! I like to go to the market. I bought some olive oil.) As you can see there's no capital letters, and no punctuation-- the periods aren't punctuation, they just come before each word that starts with a vowel to show that there has to be a pause there.

[Sarandib22]

@ReasonGuysCopyright ...it might matter if this was Japanese.

[ReasonGuysCopyright]

you said "dou" instead of "do"... study japanese a bit and you'll learn the distinction fast