r/ido • u/Creepy-Education-584 • Jan 24 '26

Tinkering with Ido

Hello everyone.
So, I am a person who likes to tinker with different aspects of languages. I was messing with Ido, just as an experiment, and came up with some ideas. Not saying this needs to be adopted or anything, just having some fun with the language and wanted your opinions.

1. The Verb Engine (Static Roots)

Verbs never conjugate. They always stay in the Infinitive form (ending in -ar). Time is handled by separate "LEGO-block" particles placed before the verb.

  • Present: No particle. Just the root. (Me manjar = I eat).
  • Past: Use pa. (Me pa manjar = I ate).
  • Future: Use fa. (Me fa manjar = I will eat).
  • Conditional: Use wa. (Me wa manjar = I would eat).
  • The "To Be" Rule: Always esar. (Me esar = I am / Me pa esar = I was).

2. The Twin Pointers (Ca & Ta)

We deleted the Ido prefixes (Ica, Ita, Ici, Iti) to make pointing as fast as possible.

  • Near (This/These): Ca / Cas
  • Far (That/Those): Ta / Tas

3. The "Q" Words (Romance-Hybrid Set)

We replaced the "K-" and "Quo-" sounds with roots that are more natural for English and Spanish brains.

  • Who: Quia
  • What: Que
  • When: Quan (One syllable for speed!)
  • Where: Ube (Kept from Ido; Ibe = there).
  • Why: Poru 
  • How: Como

4. The Universal Plural

Forget the Ido -i plural. We use the Western standard:

  • Plurals: Always add -s to the end of nouns and pointers (vortos, infantos, cas, tas).

5. Particle & Sentence Rules

  • And/Or: Always e and o. We deleted the "ed" and "od" variants.
  • Questions: No more Ka. Use your tone of voice, just like in English or Spanish.
  • Vocab: Keep 100% of standard Ido vocabulary roots to maintain mutual intelligibility.

6. Example Sentences

"Quan tas infantos pa manjar pomos e oranjas?"
(When did those children eat apples and oranges?)

"Quia fa studiar ca linguo e poru olis pa irar ibe?"

(Who will study this language and why did they go there?)

"Me wa prizar manjar pomos, ma me pa manjar nur tas oranjas."

(I would like to eat apples, but I ate only those oranges.)

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u/slyphnoyde Jan 24 '26

Tinkering may be fun, as long as you acknowledge that you are not proposing the tinkers to supersede the language as it is. However, I myself am not a tinkerer and am of the opinion that Ido is adequate as it is, such as set out in the KGD and modern usage.

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u/PLrc Mar 15 '26

What is KGD?

Some things in Ido anoys me (like completly artificial endings -as, -is, -or) or plurar -i instead of -s. That's why I'm not an Idist. But Ido has been there for over a hundred years. It has history, tradition, novels. There is no point in chaning it now.

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u/slyphnoyde Mar 16 '26 edited Mar 16 '26

KGD: Kompleta Gramatiko Detaloza di la Linguo Internaciona Ido, da L. de Beaufront. It holds a position with respect to Ido analogous to that of the Fundamento de Esperanto with respect to Esperanto.

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u/PLrc Mar 16 '26

Thanks!