German alphabet

German uses letter-diacritic combinations (Ä/ä, Ö/ö, Ü/ü) using the umlaut and one ligature (ẞ/ß (called eszett (sz) or scharfes S, sharp s)), but they do not constitute distinct letters in the alphabet.

Although the diacritic letters represent distinct sounds in German phonology, they are almost universally not considered to be part of the alphabet.

[citation needed] The diacritic letters ä, ö and ü are used to indicate the presence of umlauts (frontalizations of back vowels).

Although the two dots look like those in the diaeresis (trema) diacritical marking, a distinction should be made between umlaut and diaresis because the two have different functions.

In proper names and ethnonyms, there may also appear a rare ë and ï, which are not letters with an umlaut, but a diaeresis, used as in French to distinguish what could be a digraph, for example, ai in Karaïmen, eu in Alëuten, ie in Ferdinand Piëch and oe in Bernhard Hoëcker (although Hoëcker added the diaeresis personally).

To separate the au diphthong, as well as some others, which are graphically composed of potentially umlaut-holding letters, the acute accent is sometimes used (e.g.

[1] Swiss typewriters and computer keyboards do not allow easy input of uppercase letters with umlauts (nor ß) for their positions are taken by the most frequent French diacritics.

This transcription can give rise to ambiguities, albeit rarely; one such case is in Maßen (in moderation) vs. in Massen (en masse).

For all caps usage, an uppercase ß has been proposed for over a century, but has found neither general acceptance nor official recognition.

Incorrect use of the "ß" letter is a very common type of spelling error even among native German speakers.

For this reason German typewriters and computer keyboards offer two dead keys, one for the acute and grave accents, and one for circumflex.

In rare contexts (e. g. in older indices) sch (equal to English sh) and likewise st and ch are treated as single letters, but the vocalic digraphs ai, ei (historically ay, ey), au, äu, eu and the historic ui and oi never are.

The official version in Germany, laid down in DIN 5009, is as follows: The spelling alphabet was changed several times during the 20th century, in some cases for political reasons.