Am 2000-03-24 um 11:22 h MEZ hat Marco.Cimarosti@icl.com geschrieben:
> Example 3: German. Hyphenating a word may change its spelling, in
> some cases. E.g., "Straße" and "Ecke" are hyphenated as "Stras-se" and
> "Ek-ke", respectively.

This rule is obsolete now. (Or almost so, as the old spelling rules may be
applied until 2005-07-31, cf. <http://www.ids-mannheim.de/reform/absicht.html>
item II, 2. (This declaration of intent had to be independently enacted by
the various parties; cf. <http://www.ids-mannheim.de/reform/wortlaut.html>
item 4c, for schools in Germany.))

According to the revised spelling rules (valid since 1998-08-01, cf. URLs
given above), these words are hyphenated as "Stra-ße",
cf. <http://www.ids-mannheim.de/grammis/reform/f.html#P108>,
and "E-cke", cf. <http://www.ids-mannheim.de/grammis/reform/f.html#P109>,
respectively.

Two problems, particular to the German hyphenation, remain after the
spelling reform:
- The hyphenation is defined in terms of pronounciation, not spelling.
- In two cases, the hyphenation is even defined in terms of ethymology.
Cf. below for details.

There has been a well-informed article about the spelling reform (rationale,
overview of changes, scope and time scale) in the periodical "Sprachreport",
cf. <http://www.ids-mannheim.de/pub/sprachreport/sr98-extra.pdf>; the Author,
Dr. Klaus Heller, has offerred English, Spanish, and French, translations,
for the asking <mailto:heller@ids-mannheim.de>.

Best wishes,
   Otto Stolz

---- Find more details, below  -- or stop reading, here ----

- The hyphenation is defined in terms of pronounciation, not spelling,
  cf. <http://www.ids-mannheim.de/grammis/reform/f.html#P107>, <#P108>
  and <#P109>. As the pronounciation is not algorithmically derivable
  from the spelling, you normally need a dictionary to implement it.
  Examples are:
  - digraphs (and trigraphs) vs. arbitrary groups of letters, e. g.:
    "ha-schen" vs. "Häs-chen",
    "me-ckern" vs. "Klimec-ki" (a family name of Polish origin),
    "Heu-fermenter" vs. "See-ufer",
    "Ste-phan" vs. "Schlapp-hut";
  - the glottis stop is not spelled out, e. g.
    "Pas-sant" vs. "Pass-amt"
    (this is usually covered by the rule for composite words, cf. below).

- In two cases, the hyphenation is defined in terms of ethymology:
  - Loan words (from Romanic languages or Greek) are subject to a
    particular definition of syllable boundaries,
    cf. <http://www.ids-mannheim.de/grammis/reform/f.html#P110>; e. g.
    "Fe-bruar" vs. "Lieb-reiz",
    "Hy-drant" vs. "huld-reich".
    This rule is optional.
  - Composite words should be hyphenated at the constituent boundary,
    cf. <http://www.ids-mannheim.de/grammis/reform/f.html#P111>. e. g.
    "Er-trag" vs. "wort-reich",
    "Week-end" (loan word from English) vs. "See-kadett".
    (In less obvious cases (how do you program such notion?), composite
    words may be (but shouldn't, imho) hyphenated according to the
    perceived syllable boundaries, cf. <#P112>; e. g. "her-aus" may
    also hyphenated "he-raus", as the glottis stop is normally lost,
    in this word.)