Dot number
Dots 2-3-5 in braille
Dots 2-3-5 is the letters ff between two letters — and one other thing besides, because one cell in braille almost never means one thing. The raised positions are 2, 3 and 5, out of the six a cell has.
Dots 2-3-5
Unicode ⠖ — U+2816, 2 dots on the left and 1 dot on the right
The 2 things this cell can be
One cell, 2 jobs. Which one applies is decided by where the cell sits — beside a letter, between two, or alone between spaces — and never by the cell itself.
| Reading | Kind | Where it applies |
|---|---|---|
| the letters ff between two letters | Lower sign | By position inside a word |
| the exclamation mark | Punctuation | By position |
Where you will meet it
Taken from the five thousand commonest English words in frequency order, so these are ordinary words rather than curiosities. Each is drawn in Grade 2, where the cell actually appears.
| Word | In braille | How common |
|---|---|---|
| different | 398th commonest | |
| effects | 951st commonest | |
| effective | 1042nd commonest | |
| effect | 1045th commonest |
The same cell in the other codes
Braille is not one code. This site publishes five, and they do not put this cell to the same use. Text written with one table and read with another does not come out as an accent or two — it comes out as different words.
| Code | What this cell is |
|---|---|
| Unified English Braille | the letters ff between two letters, and the exclamation mark |
| Spanish braille | the marks ! and ¡ (and 1 other sharing the cell) |
| Portuguese braille | the marks ! and + |
| Arabic braille | the mark ! |
| Hindi braille | no reading of its own — see its alphabet |
One dot away
Under the fingers a missed or imagined dot turns this cell into 6 others. These are the ones to check against when a word will not resolve.
| Cell | Dots | What it is |
|---|---|---|
| 2-3 | the letters bb between two letters; the prefix be- at the start of a word; the word “be” standing alone; the semicolon | |
| 2-5 | the letters cc between two letters; the prefix con- at the start of a word; the colon | |
| 3-5 | the letters in inside a word; the word “in” standing alone | |
| 1-2-3-5 | the letter r; the word “rather” standing alone | |
| 2-3-4-5 | the letter t; the word “that” standing alone | |
| 2-3-5-6 | the letters gg between two letters; the word “were” standing alone |
Look up something else
The braille dot numbers page takes any combination of the six, the decoder reads a whole passage back, and the chart runs the other way, from the letter to the dots.
Dots 2-3-5 as an image
The cell on its own: dots 2, 3 and 5 filled, the other three positions shown empty — which is the part a description in words tends to leave out.
