Arabic Support in Mac OS X
While it might seem like a bit of a hassle, adding support for the Arabic language on your Mac is a simple, straight-forward process. This is a quick guide to adding the Arabic keyboard to Mac OS X, as well as the softwre to use in order to open and edit office documents in Arabic.
Add the Arabic Language and Keyboard
The first step is to add a foreign keyboard, and that can be easily achieved via the System Preferences:
- Click on the Apple logo on the top-right corner, and open System Preferences
- Under the Personal group, select International
- Go to Input Menu, check Keyboard viewer, scroll through the languages, and select Arabic
The international input menu
- Check Show input menu in menu bar for quick and easy access
Languages' menu
You will notice that your Mac OS X’s native language flag has appeared on the bar across the top (for example, USA flag for US English). In order to start typing in Arabic, simply click on that flag, and select Arabic from the menu that appears. If your keyboard does not have the Arabic alphabet printed on, you can select “Show keyboard” from the flag menu for access to a visual keyboard then you can use your mouse clicks to type. Of course, it is an inconvenience, and you are much better off either getting the letters printed on, attach transparent stickers with the Arabic letters on the keyboard buttons, or purchasing and attaching an external USB keyboard.
Opening and Editing Arabic Office Documents
Many Mac users choose to install Microsoft Office for Mac (the latest of which is the 2008 edition) to use programs such as Word, Excel, or Powerpoint. Aside from the fact that it is yet another Microsoft product with stability issues and unexpected flaws, the software bundle has an attractive and intuitive interface, and helps make you productive and efficient. The only major disadvantage, however, is the lack of support for Arabic. This means that you cannot even open a .doc file, for example, that is written in Arabic.
download OpenOffice.org
There are two main office bundles that can tackle this problem: Apple iWork (with Arabic support), and OpenOffice.org. The former could be quite pricey and does not necessarily offer the smoothest transition from its Microsoft counterpart. The latter, on the other hand, is free and open source. Even if OpenOffice.org cannot be considered a direct replacement, it remains a convenient solution as it sits comfortably side-by-side with Microsoft Office without consuming much space or resources in general.
Thus, this is how you can install and configure OpenOffice.org to work as a supplement:
- Go to http://www.openoffice.org/ and download the installation file
- Install OOo on your local machines and move it to your Applications folder
- Open OOo and go to the Preferences menu
- Under Language Settings, select Languages, check Enabled for complex text layout (CTL)
- Select Arabic (Egypt) from the CTL drop-down list
OpenOffice.org Language Settings
This will result in the ability to type, create/edit office documents, and open files, all in Arabic. The same could be applied to any language, but Arabic in particular tends to scare people off with its apparent complexity, but as you’ve seen, it’s as easy as basic configuration, and a beautiful product from the open source community.
Abdurrahman Gemei
September 6, 2009
Great article! I am having a problem with Arabic support in iWork ’09. In Pages, it is impossible to select text and even when using right alignment, typing feels awkward.
I might give OpenOffice a try but I got comfortable to iWork and I’m not willing to give it up.
Any insight would be greatly appreciated!
Tarek Shalaby
September 6, 2009
I personally haven’t tried to write up Arabic documents in Pages, so I wouldn’t be able to tell you. My guess is that you need to change the “text direction”, not only the alignment. Just like in Word, there’s a button that indicates in which direction the text is written.
I know for a fact that there are people that use Pages for writing in Arabic regularly, so if that doesn’t work, then it’s something else, equally as straight-forward.
Either way, I stand by my recommendation of OpenOffice.org. What’s great is that you lose nothing by giving it a try: you won’t feel its presence, and you can always easily remove it.
3arabawy BookMarx 09/06/2009 (a.m.) at 3arabawy
September 6, 2009
[...] Arabic Support in Mac OS X | Tarek Shalaby [...]
Baher Esmat
September 6, 2009
With Open Office i still have the problem of MS Office that Arabic letters are never linked, they always appear separated! any idea why is that happening and how to solve it?
-Baher
Tarek Shalaby
September 6, 2009
@Baher Esmat: if you follow the OpenOffice.org configuration steps above, you shouldn’t face any problems. Try them out and let us know.
Nadya
September 6, 2009
So happy to have found your site. I have the same problem Baher has. Have followed the config steps to the letter, but my Arabic letters still refuse to “link”. The only option that has worked so far is NeoOffice. Would very much prefer OOo or Word. Any suggestions?
Baher Esmat
September 6, 2009
i did enable CTL and selected Arabic from the list!
Baher Esmat
September 8, 2009
IT WORKED!!!! The problem was with the font – any of these fonts should work fine: Al-Bayan, Baghdad, DecoType Naskh, Kufi Standard and Nadeem
Tarek Shalaby
September 9, 2009
@Baher Esmat: Thanks for sharing! On my mac, it worked from the beginning, and with a standard font. I guess it is automatically replaced with a font that supports Arabic, while it wasn’t doing the same with you. So thank you.
@Nadya: Try out any of the fonts Baher has mentioned and let us know.
taha
September 15, 2009
shalaby,
can we also assume that we can type/edit arabic text in GIMP as well?
Tarek Shalaby
September 15, 2009
@taha Of course! As a general rule, any open-source application comes in a ton of languages. Especially with software that boasts such an immense community behind it, language will never be a problem.
Not only can you install the Arabic version of GIMP, but you can also install the standard English version, and then type in Arabic inside.
There’s just one little step you have to take to make that possible. When you open GIMP, it automatically open X11, which is the platform on which GIMP is allowed to run on a MAC. Go to X11 > Preferences and check “Follow system keyboard layout”.
Therefore, when you change the flag in the bar across the type to the Arabic language flag (thus changing the input to the Arabic keyboard), X11 recognizes that and lets you write in Arabic in any of the applications that are running on it (in this case, GIMP).
taha
September 16, 2009
thanks! i’m assuming it is the same way running GIMP from ubuntu
Andrew Heiss
October 30, 2009
Bean (http://www.bean-osx.com/Bean.html) is another super lightweight option for Arabic word processing. It’s basically a fancy wrapper for the Cocoa text fields built-in to OS X and works fantastically well. It can open Word files fairly well, but mostly works with rtf.
Tarek Shalaby
November 2, 2009
@Andrew I took a quick look at Bean and it seems REALLY cool! It might even be a better option than OpenOffice.org because it’s very light weight, simple and easy to use.
Thanks for sharing, I’ll probably blog about it in the near future and review it in detail.
Anthony
February 8, 2010
Thanks for putting this information together. I was able to get an Arabic doc to display correctly using it!
Mona
March 14, 2010
Tarek! You are a genuis!! Thank you for showing me how to set up the Arabic document on my new Macbook. I just spent 40 min. with the Apple technician who told me that this Arabic cannot be done! wallahi batal ya Tarek! Thank you for your generosity! best, Mona
Tarek Shalaby
March 14, 2010
@Mona: Thanks for your kind words! Glad I could be of help. I’m assuming you were talking to an Apple technician in the US?
I say that because the huge majority of representatives working for the Apple resellers in Egypt are well aware of the Arabization process. In fact, when they sell you a MacBook, they offer bootleg copies of all the software you can think of, and help set them up and get your new laptop to work in Arabic! Gotta love how we Egyptians ‘collaborate’ on so many levels.
Thanks and good luck.
طارق
June 16, 2010
مشكور يا طارق على الطرح المميز
استمر…
mostafa
June 23, 2010
i am able to write arabic in pages , but the problem is with selecting test , its ruined up , if i messed up any word , i have to write the sentence from the beginning , i tried the fonts mentioned above but it didn’t work correctly :S, please tell me what did u do to be able to select text correctly
Mowfak
August 24, 2010
Dear Tarek,
I have MacBook Pro, OS “snow leopard”, have problem to support Arabic characters in Flash CS5!!
Regards
Mowfak Hussin Galy
Tarek Shalaby
August 24, 2010
@Mostafa: Are you sure you’ve selected the right-left align? Because if you’re writing in the English left-right but in Arabic, that can cause some problems. So try to click on the the RTL button so that the cursor starts on the right, and let us know if you’re still having problems.
@Mowfak: The problem isn’t in your Mac, it’s in Adobe Flash CS5, because the application itself does not support Arabic. In fact, Any CS5 will not support Arabic on Windows. The thing is, after the normal release, Adobe releases the ME (Middle Eastern) edition, which adds support for Arabic. I think that’s available now, so you can download the trial and give it a shot. My guess is that, if Arabic is set up properly on your Mac, and you find Flash CS5 ME, you won’t have any problems.
Ramadan karim everyone!
nehal
August 30, 2010
hello tareq,
i knew how to add arabic to my language list and i can write arabic at any page but at Microsoft word, the letters appear but separated. I use mac os x 10.5.4
Thanks in advance
Tarek Shalaby
August 30, 2010
Hi Nehal,
The problem is probably due to the fact that Microsoft Word on Mac doesn’t support Arabic. There are other programs available that you can use. I recommend OpenOffice.org, but there are also other recommendations is you read the comments above.
Good luck!
ِEmna
October 24, 2010
Hello Tarek,
I am using NeoOffice 3.1.2 on a OS 10.6.14. I am writing a text in Arabic with Arabic numbers (123), but I all I get is Hindi numbers ١٢٣. On my NeoOffice settings I have my “Complex Text Layout” set on Arabic numerals, yet they come out as Hindi. By some miracle it worked for a bit with Arabic numbers then back again to Hindi. Any systematic way it could work?
Many thanks in advance,
E
Tarek Shalaby
October 24, 2010
Hi Emna,
It’s funny because even though 123 are called Arabic numerals (for historical reasons), in modern day Arabic, the number are ١٢٣ ! So in fact, the correct and standard way of writing Arabic would include Hindi numbers.
My guess would be to NOT have ‘Complex Text Layout’ set on Arabic, maybe that will work. Let us know how it goes.
sarah
November 29, 2010
thanks,this helped ALOT! however i downloaded open office and my documents now come up in arabic, but the arabic words, the letters within are not joined, it just presents each arabic letter on its own so not making a a whole word as they dont connect?
Tarek Shalaby
November 29, 2010
Hi Sarah,
It might be a font issue. As Baher mentioned above, try any of the following fonts:
“Al-Bayan, Baghdad, DecoType Naskh, Kufi Standard and Nadeem”
Because if you’re using a font that doesn’t support Arabic, then the letters won’t be connected. Let us know how it goes.
sarah
November 29, 2010
ohhhh so it all linked up when i decided to read the comments,hehe i changed the font!begad your a genius! ana aslan sa2lthom today fel apple store and the guy was so clueless he decided to search arabic in office and the first search that came up on google is that ‘itdoesnt work’ so he was like sorry it doesnt work! haha
sarah
November 29, 2010
that was a very quick reply! merci awi again
Wissam Sabra
December 14, 2010
hi Tarek… I’ve created a logo for a company on my mac, all that is left is a fancy calligraphy style translation of the sentence… im trying to:
-find a software that types arabic in any font i install (mac)
-convert it into vector to use in illustrator, or pdf would be fine.. does OOo serve those purposes?
Thank you, I stumbled onto these comments after days of research :s… salvation?
Abdelaziz
January 24, 2011
Salams all,
I’d add that though TextEdit supports most of the Arabic fonts available everywhere on the web for download, OOo Writer doesn’t.
In addition to Al Bayan, Baghdad, Kufi Standard and Nadeem, (I have uninstalled DecoType Naskh so I haven’t tried), there’s Geeza Pro in standard in Mac OS X.
Besides, I’ve downloaded the XWZar fonts (http://www.connectnw.com/redlers/fonts/XWZar.zip) and they are gorgeous. Some of them are rather for Farsi, but they work great for Arabic scripting, and they all have italics, bold, and bold italics.
Regards,
Abdelaziz
OOo 3.2.1 / Mac OS X 10.6.6
Mika
February 1, 2011
Hi Tarek,
Guess you won’t get this till the internet’s up again. I’m trying to use my Mac OSX 10 to write in Arabic, which is fine, but I’ve always had a problem getting the numbers, if I’m making a list, right aligned. Even if I have left aligned and the writing is right-to-left Arabic script, the Arabic numbers come up to the left, which makes everything less professional. Any help you can offer would be much appreciated.
Mika
Gillian
February 18, 2011
Hi Tarek,
What a wonderful resource this is!
I have the English/US version of Illustrator CS5 installed on my Mac but I now need to create some vector files featuring Arabic text for use on large roll-up banners. Can I install the trial ME version of Illustrator in addition to the version I already have installed or will that cause problems do you think?
Also I heard (from a not very reliable source) that CS5 now supports Arabic. Presumably that is not true?
I appreciate any advice you can give, thanks.
Gillian
Abdelaziz
February 18, 2011
To Mika
I tried after reading your post. I used both TextEdit and OpenOffice.org Writer and it works just fine, with the following settings:
1. I chose the right-to-left writing style
2. I aligned the text to the right
You seem to use the same settings. Maybe you should tell us the text processor you use?
Regards,
Abdelaziz
OOo 3.2.1 / Mac OS X 10.6.6
Mika
February 19, 2011
Hi Abdelaziz,
I’m using Pages 08
Mika
Abdelaziz
February 19, 2011
Hello Mika
I’m using the Pages 09 demo and unfortunately I cannot get the bullets or number lists correct in Arabic.
It’s worth to note I haven’t found the option to write right-to-left, like in any decent word processor. So I just aligned my Arabic text to the right.
I also note that I have to select text “blindly” with the mouse or the keyboard. In fact, the selected text is never highlighted in my case, but it does work indeed: I was able to “blindly” select text, edit it, copy-paste etc. The only hint that I was in selection mode was the cursor disappearing from the screen when using the mouse. On the other hand, when using the keyboard to move into the text or to select text, it looks like nothing happens, but it does. Move with the arrow keys and type, you’ll notice that
I was personally considering buying a license for iWorks 09, but I won’t until RTL is fully supported.
Hope that helps– well it doesn’t in fact
Abdelaziz
Mika
February 19, 2011
Thanks Abdelaziz,
Yes, that sounds exactly like my case.
I’ve managed to work out where the ‘cursor’ is when selecting blindly, in terms of what to delete, copy and pasting etc, though it is rather annoying, its better than nothing!
Well if you find something that helps with numbering and bullet points etc, pls do post something.
Best
Mika
Hala
May 26, 2011
thanks Tarek, this post walked me through writing in Arabic on my mac.
lems
September 14, 2011
Thank you so much …
Brittany
September 17, 2011
MANY, many thanks! I am an Arabic student at the University and I could not have used my computer for study without this aid. You’re wonderful.
Tawfik Abdel-Moneim
January 6, 2012
I would like to add the following fonts that also work nicely and join the arabic letters; damascus and Abadi MT condensed light and Abadi MT condensed Extra Bold. Only problem I see with spread sheet is how to get column A to appear on the right of the screen? please let me know if you know how for OOo. Thanks you all have been a big help.
Mikhail
January 31, 2012
Thank you very much for this amazing work! I just have one question:
How may I type tenwin of either fathatin or kasratin?
Also, I would like to suggest using a program called xPad, which comes free on Mac OS X Lion (the most recent Mac operating system). You manually choose to type right-to-left and is very fluent.
Thank you, again!
Abdelaziz
January 31, 2012
@Tawfik,
>> how to get column A to appear on the right of the screen? please let me know if you know how for OOo
You select the Format menu, then Sheet and then check “Right to Left” (on my OOo 3.2.1)
@Mikhail
>> How may I type tenwin of either fathatin or kasratin?
I have a keyboard with only a latin layout (meaning no Arabic letters drawn on the keys). So for shakl in general, you have to type the letter first, then the shakl.
Tanwin: Shift+y
Kasratin: Shift+r
Fathatin: Shift+z
Hope that helps