From a software company I worked for many distant moons ago that also invented a 3270-like "terminal" for sale to an Arabic company (actually it was an 8-bit micro-processor device with two 8-inch floppy drives) I can actually answer that question:
FED345CBA Although Arabic word writing is right to left, numbers are written left to right. Most disconcerting on a 3270-type device when typing out words and numbers, the cursor suddenly stops moving as the numbers are pushed out in the opposite direction from the text. As I remember, the terminal implementation team's leader told me that the trickiest part of that terminal emulation was getting the Arabic letter-connector glyphs correct. Letter glyphs would literally change shape as subsequent letters were typed, and change back again if you back-spaced over a letter. Thanks for the memories! Peter -----Original Message----- From: IBM Mainframe Discussion List [mailto:IBM-MAIN@LISTSERV.UA.EDU] On Behalf Of Phil Smith Sent: Monday, March 13, 2017 11:12 AM To: IBM-MAIN@LISTSERV.UA.EDU Subject: Re: curious: why S/360 & decendants are "big endian". Mohammad, I’m confused. You said: >In Arabic while writing from right to left 345 is written exactly in that >order and it's read "five forty three hundred". I’m trying to understand. Given the number 345. You’re writing a series of letters, starting with A (yes, of course it’s not an A, but I can’t do the Arabic!). So if the “word” you’re writing is A through F, you’d write what would appear on the page as: FEDCBA Now we’re going to insert 345 between the D and the C (“after” the C). So would that look like: FED345CBA or FED543CBA ? I’m sure what you wrote was clear to everyone but me! -- This message and any attachments are intended only for the use of the addressee and may contain information that is privileged and confidential. If the reader of the message is not the intended recipient or an authorized representative of the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you have received this communication in error, please notify us immediately by e-mail and delete the message and any attachments from your system. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@listserv.ua.edu with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN
