Deciphering Basmala

The challenge of rendering Arabic typography, particularly the basmala phrase, was addressed through the introduction of a special Unicode codepoint U+FDFD, which represents the ligature "bismillah al-raḥman al-raḥim" as a single character ﷽. This development was crucial because Arabic script is always cursive, and the correct rendering of ligatures is essential for the text to look elegant and symmetric. The basmala phrase, meaning "in the name of God, the gracious, the merciful," appears at the start of each of the 114 surahs (chapters) of the Qur'an and has a centuries-long tradition of calligraphic expression.

The inclusion of the U+FDFD codepoint enabled font designers to create a single glyph that could be rendered correctly, unlike earlier font engines that struggled to properly display Arabic ligatures, resulting in text that looked "grossly wrong" with separate letters like Latin script. For instance, the phrase "hello, world, this is Arabic text" was rendered incorrectly as "م‌ر‌ح‌ب‌ا‌ ‌ب‌ا‌ل‌ع‌ا‌ل‌م‌،‌ ‌ه‌ذ‌ا‌ ‌ن‌ص‌ ‌ع‌ر‌ب‌ي" by early font renderers, compared to the correct rendering "مرحبا بالعالم، هذا نص عربي". The new codepoint allowed for a more accurate and aesthetically pleasing representation of the basmala phrase.

The design of the basmala glyph can vary across different platforms and fonts, as evidenced by the differences in rendering on Firefox and Android. Khaled Hosny, designer of the Amiri font, criticized the Android basmala glyph, citing a "bizarre fusion of the letters" and poor design choices, such as the attachment of the م and ن letters. This highlights the importance of font design and the need for consistent and accurate rendering of Arabic typography across different platforms.