Holam

If a holam is used without a following mater lectionis (vav, alef or he), as in פֹּה‎ (/po/, "here"), it is written as a dot above at the upper-left corner of the letter after which it is pronounced.

Letter-spacing is not supposed to be affected by it, although some buggy computer fonts may add an unneeded space before the next letter.

If the alef itself is not a mater lectionis, but a consonant, the holam appears in its regular place above the upper-left corner of the previous letter, as in תֹּאַר‎ (/ˈto.aʁ/, "epithet").

(These dots may or may not appear merged on your screen, as that depends on your device's Hebrew font.)

Holam male is, in general, the most common way to write the /o/ sound in modern spelling with niqqud.

As a result, a qamatz qaṭan is usually promoted to Holam male in Israeli writing for the sake of disambiguation.

In the word דֹּאר ‎, the Biblical Hebrew spelling of the name Dor , the alef is a mater lectionis , and in traditional typography the holam is written above the alef 's right arm. In the word דֹּאַר ‎ ( /ˈdo.aʁ/ , "mail"), the alef is a consonant (a glottal stop ), under which appears the vowel pataḥ , so the ḥolam is written above the previous letter's upper left corner. Not all fonts actually implement these placement rules, however.