Reconstruct Arabic sentences to be used in applications that don't support Arabic script.
Works with Python 2.x and 3.x
Arabic script is very special with two essential features:
- It is written from right to left.
- The characters change shape according to their surrounding characters.
So when you try to print text written in Arabic script in an application – or a library – that doesn’t support Arabic you’re pretty likely to end up with something that looks like this:
We have two problems here, first, the characters are in the isolated form, which means that every character is rendered regardless of its surroundings, and second is that the text is written from left to right.
To solve the latter issue all we have to do is to use the Unicode bidirectional algorithm, which is implemented purely in Python in python-bidi. If you use it you’ll end up with something that looks like this:
The only issue left to solve is to reshape those characters and replace them with their correct shapes according to their surroundings. Using this library helps with the reshaping so we can get the proper result like this:
pip install git+https://github.com/mpcabd/python-arabic-reshaper
import arabic_reshaper
text_to_be_reshaped = 'اللغة العربية رائعة'
reshaped_text = arabic_reshaper.reshape(text_to_be_reshaped)
# At this stage the text is reshaped, all letters are in their correct form
# based on their surroundings, but if you are going to print the text in a
# left-to-right context, which usually happens in libraries/apps that do not
# support Arabic and/or right-to-left text rendering, then you need to use
# get_display from python-bidi.
# Note that this is optional and depends on your usage of the reshaped text.
from bidi.algorithm import get_display
bidi_text = get_display(reshaped_text)
# At this stage the text in bidi_text can be easily rendered in any library
# that doesn't support Arabic and/or right-to-left, so use it as you'd use
# any other string. For example if you're using PIL.ImageDraw.text to draw
# text over an image you'd just use it like this...
image = Image.new('RGBA', base.size, (255,255,255,0))
image_draw = ImageDraw.Draw(image)
image_draw.text((10,10), bidi_text, fill=(255,255,255,128))
# See http://pillow.readthedocs.io/en/3.1.x/reference/ImageDraw.html?#PIL.ImageDraw.PIL.ImageDraw.Draw.text
You can configure the reshaper to your preferences, it has the following settings defined:
language(Default:'Arabic'): Currently it's ignored, but the reshaper might be extended in the future to work with other languages that use the Arabic script (Farsi, Urdu, etc.)support_ligatures(Default:True): When this is set toFalse, the reshaper will not replace any ligatures, otherwise it will replace enabled ligatures.delete_harakat(Default:True): When this is set toFalsethe reshaper will not delete the harakat from the text, this will result in them showing up in the reshaped text, you should enable this option if you are going to pass the reshaped text tobidi.algorithm.get_displaybecause it will reverse the text and you'd end up with harakat applied to the next letter instead of the previous letter.
Besides the settings above, you can enable/disable supported ligatures. For a full list of supported ligatures and their default status check the file default-config.ini.
There are multiple ways that you can configure the reshaper in, choose the one that suits your deployment:
Instead of directly using arabic_reshaper.reshape function, define an
instance of arabic_reshaper.ArabicReshaper, and pass your config dictionary
to its constructor's configuration parameter like this:
from arabic_reshaper import ArabicReshaper
configuration = {
'delete_harakat': False,
'support_ligatures': True,
'RIAL SIGN': True, # Replace ريال with ﷼
}
reshaper = ArabicReshaper(configuration=configuration)
text_to_be_reshaped = 'سعر المنتج ١٥٠ ريال'
reshaped_text = reshaper.reshape(text_to_be_reshaped)
You can separte the configuration from your code, by copying the file
default-config.ini and change its settings,
then save it somewhere in your project, and then you can tell the reshaper
to use your new config file, just pass the path to your config file to its
constructor's configuration_file parameter like this:
from arabic_reshaper import ArabicReshaper
configuration = {
'delete_harakat': False,
'support_ligatures': True,
'RIAL SIGN': True, # Replace ريال with ﷼
}
reshaper = ArabicReshaper(configuration_file='/path/to/your/config.ini')
text_to_be_reshaped = 'سعر المنتج ١٥٠ ريال'
reshaped_text = reshaper.reshape(text_to_be_reshaped)
Where in you config.ini you can have something like this:
[ArabicReshaper]
delete_harakat = no
support_ligatures = yes
RIAL SIGN = yes
Instead of having to rewrite your old code to configure it like above, you can
define an environment variable with the name
PYTHON_ARABIC_RESHAPER_CONFIGURATION_FILE and in its value put the full path
to the configuration file. This way the reshape function will pick it
automatically, and you won't have to change your old code.
When using a library/app that doesn't support right-to-left text rendering,
Harakat or Tashkeel
cannot be supported, because their unicode characters are non-spacing marks
(i.e. they don't take space, they are rendered in the same space of the
character before them), which means that when you keep them and pass the
reshaped text to bidi.algorithm.get_display, they will end up being rendered
on the next character not the character they should be on as the text is
reversed.
This work is licensed under GNU General Public License v3.
Online Arabic Reshaper: http://pydj.mpczbd.xyz/arabic-reshaper/
https://github.com/mpcabd/python-arabic-reshaper/tarball/master
- Totally rewrote the code;
- Faster and better performance;
- Added the ability to configure and customise the reshaper.
- New glyphs for Farsi;
- Added setup.py;
- Bugfixes.
- Ported Better Arabic Reshaper to Python.
Abdullah Diab (mpcabd) Email: mpcabd@gmail.com Blog: http://mpcabd.xyz
For more info visit my blog post here