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What is this cell?
Braille the other way round. Tap the dots you can feel or see, and this says what the cell is — every letter, word, contraction, punctuation mark and prefix it can be, because most cells are more than one.
Dots 1, 2 and 3 run down the left of the cell; 4, 5 and 6 run down the right.
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All sixty-three cells
Six dots make 63 cells plus the blank one, which is the space. 62 of them have a job in this site's tables; the other 1 is dot 4 on its own, which is a prefix for symbols this engine does not write. Ordered by dot number, not by letter, so you can find a cell you cannot yet name.
| Cell | Dots | What it is |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | the letter a; the digit 1 after a number sign | |
| 2 | the letters ea between two letters; the comma | |
| 3 | the apostrophe | |
| 4 | a prefix for symbols this site does not write | |
| 5 | the opening cell of 22 initial-letter contractions | |
| 6 | the capital letter sign; the capital word sign, written twice | |
| 1-2 | the letter b; the word “but” standing alone; the digit 2 after a number sign | |
| 1-3 | the letter k; the word “knowledge” standing alone | |
| 1-4 | the letter c; the word “can” standing alone; the digit 3 after a number sign | |
| 1-5 | the letter e; the word “every” standing alone; the digit 5 after a number sign | |
| 1-6 | the letters ch inside a word, and the word “child” alone | |
| 2-3 | the letters bb between two letters; the prefix be- at the start of a word; the word “be” standing alone; the semicolon | |
| 2-4 | the letter i; the digit 9 after a number sign | |
| 2-5 | the letters cc between two letters; the prefix con- at the start of a word; the colon | |
| 2-6 | the letters en inside a word; the word “enough” standing alone | |
| 3-4 | the letters st inside a word, and the word “still” alone | |
| 3-5 | the letters in inside a word; the word “in” standing alone | |
| 3-6 | the hyphen | |
| 4-5 | the opening cell of 5 initial-letter contractions | |
| 4-6 | the opening cell of 5 final-letter contractions | |
| 5-6 | the letter sign; the grade 1 symbol; the opening cell of 7 final-letter contractions | |
| 1-2-3 | the letter l; the word “like” standing alone | |
| 1-2-4 | the letter f; the word “from” standing alone; the digit 6 after a number sign | |
| 1-2-5 | the letter h; the word “have” standing alone; the digit 8 after a number sign | |
| 1-2-6 | the letters gh inside a word | |
| 1-3-4 | the letter m; the word “more” standing alone | |
| 1-3-5 | the letter o | |
| 1-3-6 | the letter u; the word “us” standing alone | |
| 1-4-5 | the letter d; the word “do” standing alone; the digit 4 after a number sign | |
| 1-4-6 | the letters sh inside a word, and the word “shall” alone | |
| 1-5-6 | the letters wh inside a word, and the word “which” alone | |
| 2-3-4 | the letter s; the word “so” standing alone | |
| 2-3-5 | the letters ff between two letters; the exclamation mark | |
| 2-3-6 | the word “his” standing alone; the question mark; opening double quote | |
| 2-4-5 | the letter j; the word “just” standing alone; the digit 0 after a number sign | |
| 2-4-6 | the letters ow inside a word | |
| 2-5-6 | the prefix dis- at the start of a word; the full stop / period | |
| 3-4-5 | the letters ar inside a word | |
| 3-4-6 | the letters ing inside a word | |
| 3-5-6 | the word “was” standing alone; closing double quote | |
| 4-5-6 | the opening cell of 6 initial-letter contractions | |
| 1-2-3-4 | the letter p; the word “people” standing alone | |
| 1-2-3-5 | the letter r; the word “rather” standing alone | |
| 1-2-3-6 | the letter v; the word “very” standing alone | |
| 1-2-4-5 | the letter g; the word “go” standing alone; the digit 7 after a number sign | |
| 1-2-4-6 | the letters ed inside a word | |
| 1-2-5-6 | the letters ou inside a word, and the word “out” alone | |
| 1-3-4-5 | the letter n; the word “not” standing alone | |
| 1-3-4-6 | the letter x; the word “it” standing alone | |
| 1-3-5-6 | the letter z; the word “as” standing alone | |
| 1-4-5-6 | the letters th inside a word, and the word “this” alone | |
| 2-3-4-5 | the letter t; the word “that” standing alone | |
| 2-3-4-6 | the letters the inside a word, and the word “the” alone | |
| 2-3-5-6 | the letters gg between two letters; the word “were” standing alone | |
| 2-4-5-6 | the letter w; the word “will” standing alone | |
| 3-4-5-6 | the number sign | |
| 1-2-3-4-5 | the letter q; the word “quite” standing alone | |
| 1-2-3-4-6 | the letters and inside a word, and the word “and” alone | |
| 1-2-3-5-6 | the letters of inside a word, and the word “of” alone | |
| 1-2-4-5-6 | the letters er inside a word | |
| 1-3-4-5-6 | the letter y; the word “you” standing alone | |
| 2-3-4-5-6 | the letters with inside a word, and the word “with” alone | |
| 1-2-3-4-5-6 | the letters for inside a word, and the word “for” alone |
Reading dot numbers
A braille cell is six dot positions in two columns of three. The left column is numbered 1, 2, 3 from the top; the right column is 4, 5, 6. A cell is named by listing the positions that are raised, so dots 1-2-5 means the top and middle of the left column and the middle of the right.
The numbering is the same everywhere — it is how braille is written down in print, how embossing software is driven, and how one reader describes a cell to another. It is not a code to decipher; it is just a way of saying which of the six bumps are there.
What the numbering cannot tell you is what the cell means, because most cells mean several things at once and position in the word decides which. That is what the pages behind this table are for.