# I hate dotted capital letter "I" **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [January 25, 2013, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-dotted-capital-letter-i/648322 "2013-01-25T15:05:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aji_de_gallina/32/260_2.png) [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aji_de_Gallina)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2013, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-dotted-capital-letter-i/648322/1 "2013-01-25T15:05:00Z")
When I become, as is my destiny, god-emperor of the world, all people using the Latin alphabet will be, under pain if death, forbidden to put a dot on a capital letter I. The penalty will be extensive to family members if a capital J is dotted. ---
**Author:** ![JoseB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/joseb/32/1530_2.png) [@JoseB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JoseB)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2013, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-dotted-capital-letter-i/648322/2 "2013-01-25T15:22:18Z")
Good luck dealing with Turkey, then – In Turkish, **“I”** (lower case **“ı”** ) and **“İ”** (lower case **“i”** ) stand for completely different sounds. For instance, the name of the city of Istanbul is properly written “İstanbul”, with a dotted “I”. Also, what will you do with Dutch “IJ”, which is considered a single vowel and can often be seen dotted? (although, true, it is sometimes written as a “y” with dots, thus: “ÿ”) ---
**Author:** ![Virgil\_Tibbs](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/c4cdca/32.png) [@Virgil\_Tibbs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Virgil_Tibbs)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2013, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-dotted-capital-letter-i/648322/3 "2013-01-25T15:30:09Z")
In what languages other than Turkish and Dutch does this occur? I’ve never seen it in English. ---
**Author:** ![JoseB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/joseb/32/1530_2.png) [@JoseB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JoseB)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2013, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-dotted-capital-letter-i/648322/4 "2013-01-25T15:40:59Z")
> [@Virgil\_Tibbs](#): > > In what languages other than Turkish and Dutch does this occur? I’ve never seen it in English. Oh, I didn’t care about whether it happens in English or not. Mostly because he said “All people using the Latin alphabet”, and Turkish and Dutch most definitely use the Latin alphabet… I guess there must be other languages where dotted-I is used, but those are the two that first jumped into my mind… OK, after checking, I can see that other Turkic languages, when written with the latin alphabet, used dotted and dotless I: Azerbaijani (officially written in the Latin alphabet) has dotted and dotless I. Tatar and Kazakh, although written in Cyrillic for the most part, have also alternative Latin alphabetizations that use dotted and dotless I. ---
**Author:** ![Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aji_de_gallina/32/260_2.png) [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aji_de_Gallina)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2013, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-dotted-capital-letter-i/648322/5 "2013-01-25T16:18:49Z")
Okay, Turks and Dutch will be in my list when I come to power, they’ll learn the hard way… More seriously, I’m aware of the the prescence of dotted/undotted I and I should’ve qualified my rage. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2013, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-dotted-capital-letter-i/648322/6 "2013-01-25T17:28:41Z")
> [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](#): > > When I become, as is my destiny, god-emperor of the world, all people using the Latin alphabet will be, under pain if death, forbidden to put a dot on a capital letter I. > > The penalty will be extensive to family members if a capital J is dotted. You know who you can kill for me, while you’re at it? People who use all capital letters _except_ for a lower-case L. What is up with that shit? ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2013, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-dotted-capital-letter-i/648322/7 "2013-01-25T18:43:23Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > You know who you can kill for me, while you’re at it? > > People who use all capital letters _except_ for a lower-case L. What is up with that shit? Don’t know about elsewhere, but this board’s software will take an all-caps post and reformat it to sentence case. It is necessary to use tricks like substituting a lower-case L for an upper-case I if you want to have a post that appears to be all-caps. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2013, 6:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-dotted-capital-letter-i/648322/8 "2013-01-25T18:49:42Z")
> [@Sunspace](#): > > Don’t know about elsewhere, but this board’s software will take an all-caps post and reformat it to sentence case. It is necessary to use tricks like substituting a lower-case L for an upper-case I if you want to have a post that appears to be all-caps. SO JUST USE A WHITEDOUT SMALL letter ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2013, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-dotted-capital-letter-i/648322/9 "2013-01-25T21:28:01Z")
> [@Virgil\_Tibbs](#): > > In what languages other than Turkish and Dutch does this occur? I’ve never seen it in English. [Wikipedia says](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dotted_and_dotless_I#Usage_in_other_languages): Azerbaijani and Crimean Tatar both use it in Latin, sometimes Cyrillic scripts are used. Kazakh and Tatar are written in Cyrillic, but rarely in Latin, where the dotted/dotless comes into play. Irish in very rare times will remove the dot when a certain script is used. Many of these very likely influenced by Turkish except Irish which is a way old script. Although note that the modern Turkish alphabet dates to only the late 1920s. I wanna piss of the OP. Does anyone know if there’s Unicode for an i with a heart instead of the dot? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2013, 1:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-dotted-capital-letter-i/648322/10 "2013-01-26T01:45:27Z")
> [@JoseB](#): > > … OK, after checking, I can see that other Turkic languages, when written with the latin alphabet, used dotted and dotless I: > > Azerbaijani (officially written in the Latin alphabet) has dotted and dotless I. > > Tatar and Kazakh, although written in Cyrillic for the most part, have also alternative Latin alphabetizations that use dotted and dotless I. Clearly, several nukings from orbit are called for. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2013, 1:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-dotted-capital-letter-i/648322/11 "2013-01-26T01:47:34Z")
> [@thelurkinghorror](#): > > I wanna piss of the OP. You want a piss of the OP? You mean like a urine sample? ---
**Author:** ![Ethilrist](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ethilrist/32/4604_2.png) [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2013, 2:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-dotted-capital-letter-i/648322/12 "2013-01-26T02:45:48Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > SO JUST USE A WHITEDOUT SMALL letter I don’t think using whiteout would really help much… ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2013, 2:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-dotted-capital-letter-i/648322/13 "2013-01-26T02:54:49Z")
> [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](#): > > When I become Must…resist…fixing that for you… ---
**Author:** ![Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aji_de_gallina/32/260_2.png) [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aji_de_Gallina)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2013, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-dotted-capital-letter-i/648322/14 "2013-01-26T03:08:10Z")
> [@Ludovic](#): > > Must…resist…fixing that for you… When I become god-emperor I’ll fix YOU ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2013, 4:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-dotted-capital-letter-i/648322/15 "2013-01-26T04:51:23Z")
> [@nava](#): > > so just use a whitedout small letter that’s a d1fferent trick. Edit. Well, whaddaya know. Both **Nava** ’s quoted words and my unquoted ones were small-letter-ified. The arms race is heating up. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Giles](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giles/32/60_2.png) [@Giles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giles)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2013, 6:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-dotted-capital-letter-i/648322/16 "2013-01-26T06:23:22Z")
If the OP hates the dotted capital I, what will he think when he finds out what [Tiếng Việt](http://vi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ti%E1%BA%BFng_Vi%E1%BB%87t) (i.e., Vietnamese) has done to the poor Latin alphabet – dots and squiggles in every direction. ---
**Author:** ![california\_jobcase](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9d8465/32.png) [@california\_jobcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/california_jobcase)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2013, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-dotted-capital-letter-i/648322/17 "2013-01-26T15:49:26Z")
I have never seen a dotted capital I. However, I detest sans serif fonts that don’t distinguish between a capital I and a lower case l. There have been people who have mistaken Kim Jong Ill as Kim Jong the third because of this. See the difference? Ill vs. Ill in Arial Neither do I, and I hate it. ---
**Author:** ![california\_jobcase](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9d8465/32.png) [@california\_jobcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/california_jobcase)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2013, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-dotted-capital-letter-i/648322/18 "2013-01-26T16:04:38Z")
Oops- the Korean dude was Kim Jong Il, mistakenly called “the second”. I apologize to the multitudes of North Koreans who read my previous post. ---
**Author:** ![mascaroni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/dc4da7/32.png) [@mascaroni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mascaroni)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2013, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-dotted-capital-letter-i/648322/19 "2013-01-26T19:51:40Z")
> [@california\_jobcase](#): > > Oops- the Korean dude was Kim Jong Il, mistakenly called “the second”. I apologize to the multitudes of North Koreans who read my previous post. It’s Camp 22 for you, me lad… ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2013, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-dotted-capital-letter-i/648322/20 "2013-01-26T22:52:24Z")
Are two dots better, Ï wonder? [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-dotted-capital-letter-i/648322.md?page=2)