InDesign 2020 Middle Eastern, Arabic language causes revered numbers order

Report · Jan 09, 2020

Hello,
When working with Arabic and wanting to have Roman Digits, one needs to choose the "Arabic" digits option.
More option that should be set for Arabic are:

Character direction should be set to "default"
Paragraph direction should be set to "Right to Left"
Paragraph composer should be set to "Adobe World-Ready Paragraph Composer"
Language should be set to "Arabic"
Ligatures should be "On"

BUT

If I type a date that suppose to be presented like this:

9/1/2020

as soon as selecting "Arabic" for language the order is reversed to this:

2020/1/9

As digits has a built in Left to Right direction, all neutral characters between the numbers should get the same definition. This is how it worked until the 2020 update.
Now it looks that all the "/" characters where not effected by the numbers direction and remained Right to Left direction.

It still works correctly with Hebrew but for sure there is a some bug in the Arabic.

all the best,

Shlomit

Report · Jan 09, 2020

Hi,

Can you confirm the version of the software and operating system you are using.

Looking at many threads on various forums, you will not be able to mix easily writing directions.

Have you tried to create a character/paragraph style for the roman numerals that uses a different dictionary/composer...

Alternatively, you might have to use outlined text or 'images' of the numbers/dates you want to use

Report · Jan 09, 2020

Dear Eric,

Here are all my details:

Mac Pro (Late 2013)
Software OS X 10.14.6 (18G2022)
Processor 3.5 GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon E5
Memory 32 GB 1867 MHz DDR3 ECC
Adobe Software version: 2020

I'm sorry but your answer is incorrect and misleading. When you use the Middle Eastern version, you don't need to apply what you suggested. It works perfectly with Hebrew, and used to work perfectly in Arabic. I'm an expert in this field, I use to beta testing to the first company who implement the Hebrew and the Arabic so I really no it very well. Unfortunately Adobe has topped caring about it, and in every new version another feature is stop working. I have reported it many times to the Pre-Release programme and left as no one have answered me and fixed it. Now I'm reporting it here.

Everything I explained and all definitions I mentioned above are correct and there is a problem in this version (2020).

Hebrew and Arabic are both Right to Left Languages. They need a special application (Middle Eastern Version) in which special definitions exist in-contrary to the US version. The definitions I mentioned above are correct. The behaviour in Arabic is not and it should be.

All Letters have a a built in direction. Roman letters - Left to right, Digits - Left to Right, Hebrew and Arabic Letters are typed from Right to Left. Neutral character like period, comma, slash, space etc., do not have a build in direction and get the direction according to what surrounds them. All these definitions are build in and has nothing to do with InDesign which is only respecting it. InDesign does supply the option to change it in cases the neutral characters are misbehaving according to Right to Left.

Whenever using Arabic or Hebrew, we get a mixed behaviour between Letters (Right to Left) and Digits (Left to Right). Therefore the Character direction should be set to "Default" state which means it takes the build in direction of the letters and the digits.

In this case, or in this version (2020), there is bug that prevent this behaviour from happening when selecting Arabic language. If I'll keep the language on English USA, Hebrew etc, you will see the there is no problem.

You don't expect us to outline text for a 400 reading book pages, right? 🙂 No one will use InDesign if it couldn't treat it correctly. As it did since its 2nd version, there is no reason that it will stop doing so now.

Screenshot attached

All the best,

Shlomit

Report · Jan 10, 2020

This is great information.

I suggest you move this post to the bug reporting https://www.adobe.com/products/wishform.html

Report · Jan 10, 2020

Hi Shlomit,

did you find a workaround for this issue?

Maybe a GREP Style with a character style that is using the right character direction?

Did a little test with my German InDesign 2020 version 15.0.1.209 where I used Arabic placeholder text and added the expression 9/1/2020 to the text by copy/paste from your initial post. In this case the order did not change:

Hm. Also typing in the full date did not change the order.

Here a download link of my document from my Dropbox so you can test if it behaves differently in your version:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/00ackhoppn87fu5/ArabicPlaceholderTextWithDate-GermanInDesign-CC-2020.indd?...

Regards,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )

Report · Jan 12, 2020

Dear Uwe,

I allready repoted it as a bug.

There is no point in testing it in a non Middle East app as you don't have to correct Middle East definitions. This is simply not working as it suppose to work, and if no hyphenation is used than we don't need to define the Arabic language and keep it in Hebrew or English USA. I'm so familier with this subjuect, This should be fixed by Adobe.

As I said many times before, Adobe is totally neglecting the support for Hebrew and Arabic since the Engine was first done by "Winsoft" which is a French company. I got tired of it and I still dont' undersatdn why we pay the same amount of money for an app that does not support and fix many of our language Issues.

I have been roporting over and over in the pre-realease programme, not anymore. For some reason i'm unable to get in, no one is answering my eMails, so now I'm reporting here:
https://indesign.uservoice.com

although I know that there is a very small chance that things will be fixed.

good week,

shlomit

Report · Jan 12, 2020

Hi Shlomit,

I get the same results as you do with ID ME 2020 (haven't tried it in 2019).

I'm just wondering, though, whether this mightn't be a question of typographic convention in Arabic.

It is, in fact, more logical to have the date displayed right-to-left (i.e. with the day on the right, and the year on the left) since the paragraph is an RTL paragraph.

Admittedly in Hebrew the convention is the other way round (so, it's a little inconsistent, really).

But perhaps in Arabic it's done differently, and InDesign has been updated to reflect this?

Again, I understand what you're saying about neutral characters picking up their direction from the context of the text (so, if surrounded by 2 LTR chars, like digits, neutral chars would be set to flow LTR as well). But perhaps this is the way it's supposed to be in Arabic?

Report · Jan 13, 2020

Hi Shlomit,

I only wondered what would happen if I opened a ME version InDesign file ( or IDML file exported from a previous version ) with my German InDesign 2020. Would there be a difference if I used InDesign CC-2019 or InDesign 2020? My guess is: No.

Wheras if I had the ME version there would be one. This is a serious issue.

Hi Ariel,

hm, the Date format should be dd/mm/yyyy .

I think this is not (only) language dependent but also country dependent.

And there are countries where more than one format is used and allowed.

But I'm no expert in this. Just looked through:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Date_format_by_country

See e.g. Saudi Arabia where the comment is:

(dd/mm/yyyy in Islamic and Gregorian calendar systems,[136][137])

Regards,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )

Report · Jan 13, 2020

Dear All,

Thank you for all answeres but it is what it is and this is defenately a bug, and I have reported it.

The arabic should work like the Hebrew dd/mm/yyyy.

It was working like that for years.

Here is a link to my bug report:

https://indesign.uservoice.com/forums/601180-adobe-indesign-bugs/suggestions/39403693-indesign-2020-...

all the best,

shlomit

Report · Jan 14, 2020

Hi Shlomit,

commented and voted at InDesign User Voice.

Did a backlink to this thread here.

Regards,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )

Report · Apr 16, 2020

This is the biggest issue all time for Adobe writting Arabic, Pashto, Persian, Urdu .... thats why I don't like Adobe, Adobe is not Middle Eastern countries languages friendly like other Microsoft and many more... I have left Adobe since 2015 but this year tried again I thought they will have fixxed this issue. But they did not yet.
One thing more sharing with you all guys, that after whole day research finally I some what able to write some Arabic, Pashto, and Urdu sentence in InDesing 2020 and older version, then the font family I wish to apply was not showing to me in the fonts menu then finally I left the software again.
I would also like to give a peace of advice to Adobe that learn from Microsoft and many other, you don't have to apply that much setting or any thing for writting Arabic, Pashto, Urdu or Persian but you have just to change language from your control panel and you can write whatever you want. At least learn from them if you really want to be suppertive for our countries.

Report · May 09, 2020

I found here (in spanish) a solution for my similar problem:

http://disenytrucosyconsejos.blogspot.com/2013/11/adobe-indesign-cc-en-arabe-hebreo-y.html

So, change your default language to "English-Arabic", install InDesign again, and then the options to work properly in Arabic appears, and work more stable in Arabic. I haven't tried your specific situation, but resolve all my problem. But why this option isn't automatic in other Indesign languages, is my personal question...

Report · May 09, 2020

Hi,

I think you missed out that what you offered is exactly the version I have installed as mentioned in my title (ME - means Middle Eastern Version). 🙂

Shlomit