I'm just starting out in learning but noticed some of the features and the tests have sections that do NOT have subtitles or means of answering without having to listen to the audio. Is there some way to make them more accessible?

There may be some workarounds, but to be honest Zamenhof designed his language to be spoken, so I feel sorry for you missing that part of this beautiful language. As far as I know there is no Esperanto-based sign language, wouldn't that be interesting?

Rogir:As far as I know there is no Esperanto-based sign language, wouldn't that be interesting?

There is one. The proposal known as signuno. According to the website, in 2010, Signuno will be given to the Academy of Esperanto.

Interesting but I'm just wondering how practical it is for everyday communication vs American (or other) sign language (which may not be its goal of course, but still).

Also anyone noticed the basic signuno had, at least for the numbers, the hands reversed? e.g. thumbs on the outsides when looking down at the top of the hand?
(Maybe you're meant to cross your hands or the image designer woke up on the wrong side of the bed that morning?)

But nonetheless very interesting.

Oŝo-Jabe:

Rogir:As far as I know there is no Esperanto-based sign language, wouldn't that be interesting?

There is one. The proposal known as signuno. According to the website, in 2010, Signuno will be given to the Academy of Esperanto.

This is probably like Signing Exact English is to American Sign Language -- because Gestuno already exists. Gestuno is based on current sign languages.

How close to Esperanto is Ido? I like the straightforward alphabet in Ido but wonder how different the vocabulary is?

adreanaline:How close to Esperanto is Ido? I like the straightforward alphabet in Ido but wonder how different the vocabulary is?

Here's the Lords Prayer in both languages:
Esperanto - Patro nia, kiu estas en la ĉielo,
Via nomo estu sanktigita.
Venu Via regno,
plenumiĝu Via volo,
kiel en la ĉielo, tiel ankaŭ sur la tero.
Nian panon ĉiutagan donu al ni hodiaŭ.
Kaj pardonu al ni niajn ŝuldojn,
kiel ankaŭ ni pardonas al niaj ŝuldantoj.
Kaj ne konduku nin en tenton,
sed liberigu nin de la malbono.
Amen.
Ido - Patro nia, qua esas en la cielo,
tua nomo santigesez;
tua regno advenez;
tua volo facesez quale en la cielo
tale anke sur la tero.
Donez a ni cadie l'omnadiala pano,
e pardonez a ni nia ofensi,
quale anke ni pardonas a nia ofensanti,
e ne duktez ni aden la tento,
ma liberigez ni del malajo.
Amen.

Esperanto and Ido are more significantly different than you might expect from their histories. The differences go far beyond the alphabets. The vocabulary is much more different than you might suppose, and some grammatical things are done entirely differently. Some words were changed for what seemed to me to be no apparent reason. Ido makes much less use of the "mal" prefix and much more use of independent words. So in Esperanto, soft and hard are mola and malmola. In Ido, I think they are mola and harda. The correlatives are all done as independent words and not as a table, though it's my understanding that there's also a "table version" that you can use instead. I have no idea how much people use the table and how much they use the independent words, but in any case, I assume you have to learn both, to be able to understand everyone.

Having said that, if you speak Esperanto plus a Romance language, Ido is easy to understand. It is probably less easy to understand if you speak Esperanto but not any Romance language; Ido's vocabulary is much more Romance-based than Esperanto's. Another note, many (most?) Ido speakers end up learning Esperanto as a practical matter, because Ido speakers are so few. So even if you prefer Ido as a language, Esperanto is still worthwhile to learn in addition, because you can use it in more places (as astonishing as it is to say so).

Just to clear-up/confirm etc:

erinja:
Ido makes much less use of the "mal" prefix and much more use of independent words. So in Esperanto, soft and hard are mola and malmola. In Ido, I think they are mola and harda. The correlatives are all done as independent words and not as a table, though it's my understanding that there's also a "table version" that you can use instead. I have no idea how much people use the table and how much they use the independent words, but in any case, I assume you have to learn both, to be able to understand everyone.

Technically they don't use mal as a prefix if I am correct - it's been a while but I believe the suffix used is 'des', which can be used as in Esperanto but, as we probably all know, ido is a more a cross between Esperanto and a west-european-auxlang so I guess there is a preference to use separate words. I wouldn't think though that you would be misunderstood saying 'des-mola' or 'des-harda' (maybe if you said desharda which sounds completely different to des-harda). Generally, when something is easy you say facila, and hard you say des-facila.

As far as correlatives go, there is definately a different system built on romance vocabulary.
Kio = Quo
Kiu = Qua
who = Qui (don't think it's used much)
Kia = Quala (-ala is oft used to turn a noun into an adjective)
The accusative is brought back in when these become relatives in certain cases, e.g. I know who you know = Me savas quon vu savas.

Tio = To
Tiu = Ta
Tia = Tala (all of these could have 'i-' before them for 'pronunciation-in-tricky-situations reasons' )

Where things go a bit crazy is 'this', which is '(i)ca' - so no 'cxi' for proximity, and then:
Quante = how much / tante = so (much, or 'so ...', with the ... representing an adjective)
Quale = how? / tala/tale = like, such etc (I think quale is used like kiel though so it's a bit easier to figure out)
Kande = when? / lore/lora = then
Ube = where? / = hike/ibe = here, there
Pro/por quo = why? / pro, pro ke, nam (since) = because

So the correlatives are just like Esperanto, in that they kinda form a table, and they are not all separate words. Big difference is, due to usage patterns over the century etc, there are exceptions, not like Esperanto .

It's definitely another language altogether, but it isn't *so* different to Esperanto. I'd say the biggest differences would be vocab and grammar though, as mentioned by Erinja. I think this is because over time many people have gotten their hands on Ido and played around with it, so it's had probably a more turbulent history of changes than Esperanto. The one thing Ido has ahead of Esperanto is that the pronunciation is a tad easier, but it's no where near the level that I would imagine a usable IAL to have in order to be accepted easily by potential speakers.

So really you can just think of Ido as a "colloquial" (or degraded/influenced) variant of Esperanto, just as some colloquial forms of English are, to say, Queen's English.

Ido is not like "colloquial" Esperanto any more than Spanish is "colloquial" Italian. Ido and Esperanto are clearly related, and mutually intelligible to a point (as are Spanish and Italian). But the grammatical differences are more profound than most people realize, and it goes down to the core structure of the language, it is not just on the surface. Ido is definitely NOT just Esperanto with simplified grammar and more Romance vocabulary. It has some grammatical concepts that don't exist in Esperanto, and these concepts affect certain aspects of word usage and sentence building, significantly. Although Ido was meant to be an "easier" and "improved" version of Esperanto, several aspects of Ido grammar are more difficult/confusing than the equivalents in Esperanto.

erinja:Ido is not like "colloquial" Esperanto any more than Spanish is "colloquial" Italian. Ido and Esperanto are clearly related, and mutually intelligible to a point (as are Spanish and Italian). But the grammatical differences are more profound than most people realize, and it goes down to the core structure of the language, it is not just on the surface. Ido is definitely NOT just Esperanto with simplified grammar and more Romance vocabulary. It has some grammatical concepts that don't exist in Esperanto, and these concepts affect certain aspects of word usage and sentence building, significantly. Although Ido was meant to be an "easier" and "improved" version of Esperanto, several aspects of Ido grammar are more difficult/confusing than the equivalents in Esperanto.

Well, I was trying to be careful when I said colloquial, and I said nothing about it being easier (if that was directed at me, if not then I agree with what you've said Erinja )
The reason I subconsciously regard it as "colloquial" is because, while it has different grammar structures, concepts and core differences etc, it does stem from Esperanto, and has clearly been modified in a way that intended to improve (improve here meaning "change to suit the tastes of the guy who changed it ". I would not say that it is a straight colloquial variant of Esperanto, but in some ways it definitely appears so (even if it is its own language).

And if Spanish was only spoken in one province of Italy, many would see it as a colloquial variant of Italian, just like many see Scots as being a scottish colloquial version of English (I'd say that Scots and English are as different as Ido and Esperanto, but some speakers of scots don't even realise they are in actual fact not speaking bad English but another language all together - very interesting!). In both cases they are rightfully so regarded as separate languages though, because the politics, the culture of the speakers, the geography and mutual intelligibility all differ (compared to say dialects of the same language).

So anyway, I agree with you Erinja, but I would just like to show the alternative path I was coming from. But because Ido came from Esperanto, even if it has completely different grammar etc, it still has the 'colloquial' feel. Maybe I should replace 'colloquial' with 'vulgate' (e.g. Latin Vulgate), because colloquial is a broad term which implies that Ido is part of the Esperanto entity?

I should add that Lallans and Ullans aka Scots and Ulster Scots have a very unique relationship with English that has caused much a debate over whether Lallans and Ullans are a different language altogether or an extreme form of a dialect, I believe the main source of the debate is the perceived fine line between Scots and Scottish English. I guess in this way it resembles Bayerisch and Hochdeutsch. Ido and Esperanto however more resemble medieval latin and modern Italian, IMHO.

Ok sorry I'm speaking too much and I've probably accidentally contradicted or confused myself.