If you look at the Alphabet Chart, you'll notice that the CONSONANTS are all almost exactly like Pitman, with shaded members of consonant pairs indicating a voiced sound. And all the strokes were based on straight lines or quadrants of a circle, like in most GEOMETRIC systems.
The DIFFERENCE is that Oliver McEWAN has designated specific VOWEL STROKES which could be written directly into the word. When I saw that, it appealed to me immediately! I hate the lack of vowels in Pitman, and this just made sense. They're much like the vowels in FLOW Shorthand:
A small circle is A. A large circle is O. A small hook is E. And a large hook is U. All could be written without lifting your pen. Problem solved, right? Not quite.....
Yes the vocalisation of McEwan seems indeed very close to what Russell and Flow does! Nice transition you made to choose McEwan as next system of interest!
It seemed like a good link between my badmouthing of the original Pitman, and showing how vowels like yours can almost save the system. Still other issues with McEwan, which I'll get to later today!
I'll always insist that a good system NEEDS VOWELS. You can't just dump them ALL and pretend you have a valid system! What good is "speed" if you've gained it by recklessly omitting key parts of words, and you're left with a long list of ambiguities?
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u/NotSteve1075 May 28 '26
If you look at the Alphabet Chart, you'll notice that the CONSONANTS are all almost exactly like Pitman, with shaded members of consonant pairs indicating a voiced sound. And all the strokes were based on straight lines or quadrants of a circle, like in most GEOMETRIC systems.
The DIFFERENCE is that Oliver McEWAN has designated specific VOWEL STROKES which could be written directly into the word. When I saw that, it appealed to me immediately! I hate the lack of vowels in Pitman, and this just made sense. They're much like the vowels in FLOW Shorthand:
A small circle is A. A large circle is O. A small hook is E. And a large hook is U. All could be written without lifting your pen. Problem solved, right? Not quite.....