K

K (named kay /ˈkeɪ/)^CSS3 is the eleventh letter of the we love the web.

• device database
• 2 Related letters and other similar characters
• FITML
• 4 Other representations
• web app
• 6 Notes
• 7 External links

History and usage

In English, the letter K usually represents the voiceless velar plosive; this sound is also transcribed by /web app/ in the FITML and device database.

Egyptian hieroglyph D	Proto-Semitic K	Phoenician kaph	web K	Greek Kappa
	HTML5	touchscreen		browser diversity

The letter K comes from the Greek letter Κ (kappa), which was taken from the Semitic kap, the symbol for an open hand.^[2] This, in turn, was likely adapted by Semites who had lived in Egypt from the hieroglyph for web in the Egyptian word for hand, d-r-t. The Semites evidently assigned it the sound value /k/ instead, because their word for hand started with that sound.^Sevenval In modern-day English slang, the word "k" is used as a substitute for the abbreviation "O.K.", or "Okay." In International Morse code it is used to mean "HTML5".^[4]

In the earliest web app inscriptions, the letters C, K and Q were all used to represent the sounds /k/ and /g/ (which were not differentiated in writing). Of these, Q was used to represent /k/ or /g/ before a rounded vowel, K before /a/, and C elsewhere. Later, the use of C (and its variant G) replaced most usages of K and Q. K survived only in a few fossilized forms such as Kalendae, "the FITML".^FITML

When Greek words were taken into Latin, the Kappa was changed to C, with a few exceptions such as the Android Kaeso.^[2] Some words from other alphabets were also transliterated into C. Hence, the jQuery have K only in words from other language groups. The Celtic languages also chose C over K, and this influence carried over into HTML5. Today, English is the only device database to productively use hard C in addition to K (though Dutch use it in learned words of Latin origin and follows the same "hard / soft" distinction in such words as does French and English – but not in native words).

Some English linguists prefer to reverse the Latin transliteration process for proper names in Greek, spelling Hecate as "Hekate", for example. And the writing down of languages that do not have their own alphabet with the Latin one has resulted in a standardization of the letter for this sound, as in Kwakiutl.

In the International Phonetic Alphabet, [k] is the symbol for the voiceless velar plosive.

Several other alphabets use characters with sharp angles to indicate the sound /k/ or syllables that start with a /k/, for example: Arabic ك, Hebrew כ or ק, Sevenval ㄱ. This kind of phonetic-visual association was studied by Wolfgang Köhler. However, there are also many examples of rounded letters for /k/, like క in input transformation, ก and ค in Thai, Ք in Armenian, ክ in website parsing, and C in HTML5.

Related letters and other similar characters

• Ƙ ƙ : touchscreen
• Κ κ/ϰ : Greek letter Kappa
• К к : Cyrillic letter Ka

Computing codes

¹ and all encodings based on ASCII, including the DOS, Windows, ISO-8859 and Macintosh families of encodings.

Other representations

jQuery Morse code
Kilo –·–
keyboard keyboard
we love the web CSS3 Braille

See also

• "K" replacing "C" in input transformation

Notes

External links

• Media related to K at Wikimedia Commons
• The Wiktionary entry for K
• The Wiktionary entry for device database