One of my first principle is that similar sounds should have similar shapes. 
ANJeL's  x x x and X certainly qualify if you want to merge o. [ah], a [ah],  o [aw],  and o'  /ou/. 

It also works with Unigraf's q [ah]  q [ah]  o [awe]  and O [oh]. 

Although extremely analytical and logical, neither ANJeL nor Unigraf result in a very pleasing script.  It was somewhat of a surprise that using upper case letters to extend or augment the character set would have this result.  It is readable without a key until one gets to some of the diphthongs which are assigned what may first appear to be arbitrary letter correspondents.  au(W), oi(Q). 
 

P R I N C I P L E S    Rules for selecting shapes (graphemes) to correspond to phonemes

       
 
1.  Assign a unique character (for the ASCII symbol set) for the 35 pure or 
     uncombined phonemes of English speech.   

2.  Syllabic l, m, n, r, can have a unique character assigned (e.g., LMNR) 
     The 6-8 important blends could also have a unique character assigned or  
      they could be combinations of component sound signs. (eg, Q=oi)

3.  Shapes should be similar to traditional usage to make them easier to
     remember & less likely to be confused with traditional correspondences. 
     (principle of least disruption) minimal disruption to familiar sound-shape relationships.

4.  Unfamiliar grapheme-phoneme correspondences should
      be assigned to the least frequently used vowels.

5.  Each sound sign, particularly new ones, should have an
     associated mnemonic - a way to recover or reconstruct lost relationships.
     The iconic principle was used by the Egyptians and Semites to develop their shape-sound  
     correspondences. Example: M = owl  The letter shape looks like an owls head and beak. This 
     worked particularly well in Egyptian where owl = mer. The Semites related the shape to waves.

6.  Similar sounds should have similar shapes.  This way the inability to
     discriminate will have little impact on readability.  In some fonts, q, o, and 
     a  look alike and are hard to differentiate.  If these symbols are used for  
    similar sounds (e.g., ah, awe, and ax)  a mix up will not affect reading aloud.  
    Number confusion is mainly a problem in long serial numbers or strings of code:  
    o-0 is on par with B8, S5, and Z2.  l1 is probably the worst offender so the [l] 
    should not be used.

7.  All checked vowels, that is, vowels that must be followed by a consonant, 
     should be lower case. These vowels are always short.

8.  The notation should facilitate communication between learners of English 
     and native English speakers.   That is, it should be easy to learn and write.

Using these principles in this order does not generate ANJeL but a 
closely related notation I have called Unigraf 
 
 

Unigraf- Grapheme-Phoneme Correspondence Tables Minimum no. of vowel phonemes for a broad transcription of English       Unigraf A       B       C        D  a  q  I qr Ir e  R  A  er i  E  Q  ir q  o  O  or c  C  U Cr Ur u  u  W  Wr dh-x, th=T ch-K, ng=G sh-S, zh=Z un-N, ul=L The first two columns [A & B] display 12 pure vowels: six short (checked) vowels and six extended vowels. This would be the minimum. The remaining columns [C & D] display six diphthongs and seven shwa combinations. The 25 vowel phonemes are illustrated in Unigraf notation on the left. By merging some sounds, Unigraf reduces the character set to 16 not counting the r-combinations. Unigraf limits the use of digraphs to r-combinations. The new sound-signs are Q-oi, and W-owl.  A more detailed table is available for Chekt Spelling. The 25 speech sounds have been captured as audio clips and can be played if your computer can interpret .wav files. A wave player is included with Windows. Simply click on the hot links on the Uni column on the Sounds page.  View a similar chart as a graphic 10x25 TABLE  (58kb gif file)  Mapped onto IPA     Unigraf Rationale When developing a new code, it is important to make it easy to learn and remember. This is achieved by connecting the new code to the familiar and by the intentional use of mnemonics. Unigraf is an augmented Roman - the new characters are indicated with upper case symbols.  AEIOU become the "named" letters in the alphabet song. A E I O U because these are commonly used in TO  (Apex, mE, IOU, OK, Obey, sILO, Utensil, UsfuL, Uz, zCLU)  Lazy or turned U used for [oo] q for ah, because it looks like an a and yet is different enough to substitute for o.    palm=pqm, car=kqr, pot=pqt, ox=qs, smart=smqrt. Q looks like a ligature of O and I [oil = QL] [Boy = bQ] M N R Lrefer to the syllabic mnrl:  u'm, u'n, er, le  maximM, mOSN(motion), litL, hR, bRd c and Care lazy U's (U rotated 90 degrees)  c=[put wood]/ pct wcd, C=[ooze move]/ Cz mCv [Could we take a pure tour on a cruise ship] = kcd wE tAk u pUr tCr on u krCz Sip x is a lazy T which looks like an eth without the loop (T rotated 45 degrees) X=dh or dhu.  then, that=xen, xat  [ X can be reserved for ks/gs  eXaktlI ] T = the in thin thigh [Tin TY] W for ou/ow    because it seems to fit  hW nW brWn kW [Get out he shouted = get Wt hE SWtud.]  other sample sentences In IPA, the word 'toe' is transcribed [tou] /taw-uu/  IPA is not a good substitute for TO because [ou] already has several interpretations. Thus a TO reader would not recognize [tout] as the correct spelling of [tote]. [out] would not immediately be associated with [oat].   Unigraf avoids the conflict by letting o=aw, q=ah, V=au, and O=owe:  toe=tO, tote=tOt, taught= tot, tot=tqt, tout=tWt. After the decline of the Roman empire, a lower case (or minuscule) script was developed.  Later it was combined with the upper case script to form the familiar dual redundant character set we use today. [g] and [G] both represent one sound /g/.  xA qR alografs Instead having two graphic shapes refer to the same sound as in TO, Unigraf assigns the upper case shapes to free vowels (long vowels and diphthongs).  A=ei, E=i:  I=ai  O=ou  U=u:.  The Unigraf notation extends the TO practice of sometimes using single letters to represent diphthongs.  Example:  I sA nU bQ gO Wt.  In CKS notation this would be 'I sei nu boi go' aut. and in Spanglish it would be Ai sey nu boy go aut. In terms of easy reading, systematic Spanglish wins.

UNiGRaF - no caps notation 42 phonemes: 16-17v, 24-25c 

short checkt      long-free     diphthongs   r-combin. 
a              q (duplicate)     I ice Is          ar  Ir 
e               r her Hr          A APeX        er  Ar 
i                E eel El          Q boy BQ      ir  Er 

q otter qtr        o awl ol        O owe, oat sILO      or  or 
c hook  hck        C hoop hCp    U you       tour=tCr  your or you're Ur 
u up, cup kup      u schwa ugo, sofu      W out Wt,  owl WL,   our Wr

The TO correspondences can be capitalized as in ANJeL
r-combinations again 
LarJ LIr  large/lair 
Ler  LAr  lair/layer 
Sir  SEr  sear/seer 
Mor  MOr  more/mower 
PCr  PUr  poor/pure 

aZ U KaN SE, xiS NOTAsvN iZ v LiTvL EZEr For EnGLis SPEKrz TC RED aND RIT. 

 

Evaluating New Alphabets: Defining the Goals

My personal view is that the ideal writing system for English is an elusive multidimensional goal. There are several dimensions to be considered and it is logically impossible to optimize or maximize on every dimension. All proposals are necessarily compromises. Some of the important considerations for a better writing system are itemized below: 

     Important Considerations 

     1. Phonemic regularity: More alphabetic than TO (the traditional English orthography) 

               More consistent and systematic than TO. 
                    Closer correspondence between graphemes and phonemes. 
                    Closer correspondence between pronunciation and spelling. 

                         spelling should suggest common  pronunciation 

                         pronunciation should suggest the correct spelling 

                    A consistent sound sign (grapheme) for every phoneme (significant sound category)  

     2. Economical: More space efficient than TO - no redundancies. 

               No double letters except to specifically mark a feature (see Orm) 
               No silent letters other than markers 

     3. Practical and User Friendly: 

               Simpler than TO. Fewer rules. 
               (Elegant solutions to problems or sound representation) 
               Easier to teach and learn Teach a simple code and you get early success 
                    Significantly easier to teach to beginners and 2nd language learners 
                    Easy transition for TO readers (some phonics instruction may be required). 
               Not difficult or confusing for those familiar with TO. 

              Retains many familiar word patterns to ease transition. 
                    Decipherable and readable without training. 
                    Can be learned about three times as fast as TO 
                    (No WS should take more than 40 hours for basic mastery) 
               Requires less space to write or print. Can be typed faster than TO. 
               Has a certain status or appeal that leads to its adoption 

     4. Convergent sign design: 
         Each sound sign should be as close as possible to a letter pattern 
         found in TO & to IPA notation. 

               Similar to TO where possible [o'] substituted for IPA [ou] 
               Similar to IPA but without special fonts, integral diacrticis, or special 
               characters not included in the ASCII character set. 

     5. Guide to pronunciation: Sound signs should show pronunciation almost as well as IPA. 

               As similar to IPA as possible. /u/ = u' /u:/ = u: /^/ = u /schwa/= ' or a'   /a:/=a, />:/= o: 
               Avoid arbitrary substitutions. Strive for iconicity and visual closeness or similarity. 

     Beyond a certain point, improving the performance rating for a notational system on one 
     dimension will reduce it on another. All proposed new spellings are therefore 
     compromises. Selecting the best compromise means coming to some agreement on how 
     one should weight the performance of the script or notational system on different 
     dimensions. In other words, what is the relative importance of each dimension? There 
     can there be no agreement on the best writing system for English if there is no 
     agreement on the relative importance of different features. 

     Without first assigning a weight to each of the comparative dimensions, it is impossible 
     to select the "best" writing system. The table below neither assigns weights nor lists all 
     of the possible dimensions. It does include all of the dimensions that have been 
     mentioned in earlier SSS Personal Views. 

     At this point in time, the ordinal rankings shown below are mostly subjective since only 
     NS (New Spelling) as ITA has been empirically tested and found easier to teach to 
     beginners than TO. Since there is less than 25% as much to learn with a phonemic 
     system, one would have expected a 400% improvement but the empirical results were 
     more along the lines of a 25% improvement. 

     Rankings of nine scripts: scale: 5 = highest rating --- 1 = lowest rating 
     (poor performance on dimension) 
     NF=NuFolik or Chekt Spl.  TO=Traditional Orthography. 
     MF=Pictographic Monofon.  MS=MenuSpl./ 
     TrueSpl.   NS=Nue Speling.  PS=Positional Spelling/ Cut Spelling 
     This table is based on the evaluations of only 5 respondents who were familiar with TO. 
     A broader sample would be required to establish its validity. 
 
 

Bruce, 

I don't think you have ever been to delphi.com/spelreform so I am 
copying one of the pages below which is relevant to this discussion. 

I like your latest notation for ANJeL except for your reluctance to 
use O.  I think you are right in finding a way to combine /o/ and /a:/ 
which are essentially the same sound.  X is a good neutral symbol to 
use.  However I prefer q with an obscure (unobtrusive) descender. 

I am not really concerned abaout the fact that the descender is 
obscure on the video screen as long as the confusion is with a similar 
sound - in this case o and O. 

Steve [sbett@mailicty.com]