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I'm totally new to ConTeXt; how to use Arabic and German in one document?

\mainlanguage[de]

\definefont[ArabicFont][file:alq2.ttf*arabic at 18pt]

\setuppapersize [A5] 

\starttext
\setupalign[r2l]
\ArabicFont

بِسْمِ ٱللَّهِ ٱلرَّحْمَٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ

\stoptext

How to modify, so that I can swith between Arabic and German? (I knew LaTeX, and have defined there some macros, but here everything might change...)

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Possibly related question: how to switch fonts via language switches. Are you primarily interested in a font or a hyphenation switch? – phg Oct 15 '12 at 11:18
I am not sure about the difference. The solution in the link is far too complicated for me, I just want an environment like \begin{arab} Arabtext in unicode \end{arab}, which I always used in LaTex, but I dont know how to make that. – Mustafa Oct 15 '12 at 11:43
Have you seen the information at wiki.contextgarden.net/Arabic_and_Hebrew ? It should get you going. – Thomas Oct 15 '12 at 20:57
Yes, but that does not work for me. Now I have made an environment, which begins arabic font by \def\Arab{\setupalign[r2l]\ArabicFont} But how to switch back to normal (german) text? Best, I would have an option \startarabic ... \stoparabic, but how to make that? – Mustafa Oct 16 '12 at 5:55
Ok, done, I had to investigate the start/stop commands in ConTeXt, now it works. – Mustafa Oct 16 '12 at 7:33
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1 Answer

up vote 0 down vote accepted

Here my solution:

\startenvironment arabic
\definefont[Sheh][name:Scheherazade*arabic at 12pt]

\definestartstop[Arab][commands=\setups{Arabic}]
\def\Arab{\dodoubleempty\doArab}
\def\Arab[#1]{
\startArab 
\setupalign[r2l]\Sheh #1
\stopArab
}
\stopenvironment

Where the Font is the famous Sheherazade. But there should be one enhancement: The grid=yes should be disabled in this environment, since the grid is not suitable for arabic letters. I dont know how to do that, to add simply \setuplayout[grid=no] to the environment does not work, seems to be overwritten by the \setuplayout[grid=yes] of the mainfile.

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But this is no complete answer, as I see now! For \Arab[ يَـٰٓأَيُّهَا ٱلنَّاسُ ٱتَّقُوا۟ رَ‌بَّكُمُ ٱلَّذِى خَلَقَكُم مِّن نَّفْسٍ وَٰحِدَةٍ وَخَلَقَ مِنْهَا زَوْجَهَا وَبَثَّ مِنْهُمَا رِ‌جَالًا كَثِيرً‌ۭا وَنِسَآءً وَٱتَّقُوا۟ ٱللَّـهَ ٱلَّذِى تَسَآءَلُونَ بِهِۦ وَٱلْأَرْ‌حَامَ إِنَّ ٱللَّـهَ كَانَ عَلَيْكُمْ رَ‌قِيبًا ] has far too many space between the arabic lines. Why? – Mustafa Oct 16 '12 at 10:09
I solved this, see here tex.stackexchange.com/questions/77847/… – Mustafa Oct 17 '12 at 6:50

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