Shortform
“tonight” in braille
Written t-n — 7 letters cut to 2 letters of abbreviation, then written in 2 cells. That is 5 cells saved every time the word appears.
dots 2-3-4-5, then dots 1-3-4-5
Unicode ⠞⠝ — 7 letters in 2 cells
How to recognise it
t-n, the fourth of the to- words. Seven letters in two cells, and unlike its three neighbours it has no derived forms in the dictionary at all beyond the plural.
Two steps, not one
Abbreviated in letters first, then written in cells. “tonight” loses 5 letters — o, i, g, h, t — to become tn. Every letter of the abbreviation is then written as itself, one cell each.
| Stage | What it is | Cells |
|---|---|---|
| Spelled out | tonight | 7 cells |
| Abbreviated | tn | 2 letters |
| Written | 2 cells |
Endings it keeps
One English word begins with these letters, and the reference keeps the shortform in it. The one ending that survives is -s. Everything else is spelled out.
| Word | In braille | Ending | Cells |
|---|---|---|---|
| tonights | -s | 3 cells |
Learn it with the to- words
This is one of 4 shortforms built to the same shape — a t, then one letter — and the set is far quicker learned together than one word at a time: today (td), together (tgr), tomorrow (tm).
What these 2 cells mean elsewhere
Every cell here has other jobs, which is where misreadings come from:
| Cell | Dots | What it is elsewhere |
|---|---|---|
| 2-3-4-5 | the letter t; the word “that” standing alone | |
| 1-3-4-5 | the letter n; the word “not” standing alone |
Check your own text
The translator writes “tonight” with Grade 2 selected, and the contractions page has all seventy-three.
“tonight” in braille as an image
The word as it is actually written: tn in 2 cells, not 7 letters.
