What is the need of CAPITAL and "small" alphabets in English? Please explain the  history of the same.
914657
The come from Roman language which is the basis of most written language in the western world.  I would suggest reading the wikipedia article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_letters for a start to help you understand why it is done and then click on some of the links there for more information.\n\nGood Luck!!!
818262
yer its <br> for the space\n\nand just in case you didnt know: - \n\na ♥ is &hearts ; all together aswell... tuk me ages to work that one out!!!\n\n\n*did u put it all together? and dont think it works if it is in capitals!!!*
1127520
It looks like people are focusing on the ORIGINS of the silent letters more than any "purpose" or value to them.  Well the two are connected.\n\nSilent letters are largely the result of:\n\na) changes in pronounciation AFTER the spelling was established  (e.g., in OLD English the k and gh of 'knight' were pronounced, as the related German word "Knecht" continues to pronounce them).       The changes may be large ones where entire sounds are  lost to the language (like the loss of the /gh/ sound of Old English), or small shifts from things like where the accent falls in a word (which is the origin of  many chnages in vowel sound, including silent vowels).\n\nb) borrowing words from MANY different languages with different spelling conventions and/or with distinctions that may not exist (and so ultimately are lost) in English.\n\nc) trying to use the Latin alphabet witch lacks single letters for many sounds found in English (esp. vowel sounds)\n\nSo in most cases, those who established the spelling of English words did not intentionally include silent letters!   And the 'decision' to keep the old spelling after the pronunciation changed was usually tradition/habit.     Nevertheless, keeping the older spellings DOES\n\n------------------\n\n"Purposes" (or values) in silent letters:\n\n1) The 'magic e' of words like "cane" and "code" --originally it was pronounced separately, but now it helps to mark the first vowel as "long" (and so to distinguish these words from "can" and "cod").  Some prefer not to label this use of e as "silent e" because it DOES have an effect on the pronunciation.\n\n\nSomething similar might be said for doubled letters -- technically only one is pronounced, but the doubling helps to mark the preceding vowel as short. Compare 'hoped' (with  the 'magic e') and 'hopped' (with the double consonant).\n\n2) Help us distinguish words that sound the same:  night/knight,  in/inn,  lent/leant.\n\n3) Silent letters may keep a record of part of the word's history.    Keeping the spelling may help to show us relationships between words: when  'soft' adds '-en' (-> soften) the 't' become silent, but we can see that the words are related (cf. haste > hasten; oft > often; fast [meaning 'secure'] > fasten; nest > nestle);  lean > leant (not 'lent');  in other cases, the suffixed form pronounces a letter that is silent in the simple form  damn (with silent n) > damnable;  vehicle (silent h) > vehicular (restores the h because it is in the accented syllable).   Incidentally, learning words as PAIRS or clusters (soft WITH soften) can make it much easier to get the correct spelling for the one with a silent letter\n\nThis is also useful when learning foreign languages (like learning to read French or German and RECOGNIZING related English words from the spelling) or other English words borrowed from foreign languages.   \n\n4) Some letters are commonly silent in certain English dialects, not in others (e.g., initial h-  or final -r);  keeping the same spelling, even if our own dialect treats a letter as silent makes it possible for us to communicate across English dialects.  (These dialectal/accent differences, by the way, are a MAJOR barrier to "spelling reform", because it would only really work for some groups, and make the written word totally confusing and non-phonetic for many others.)\n\n\nhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silent_letter\n\na list of common silent letters in English\nhttp://www.learnenglish.org.uk/grammar/archive/silentletters01.html
109850
It has to do with the the older versions of English. For example, back in the 16- and 1700 (possibly into the 1800s as well) the English "S" looked like an "F".
742229
Depends on what you mean:\n\n1) If you mean fewest letters there are THREE (not two, as many suggest):not just a and I, but also O (as used in addressing someone, e.g., in prayer -"O Lord") \n\n2) If by shortest you mean the length of the PRINTED word, than "I" wins out over "a" and "O".\n\n3) I you mean shortest in SOUND, that is, in the length of TIME it takes to speak it, "a" in expressions like "a man" (sounding like "uh") is the shortest/quickest to say.   "O" and "I" take a bit longer because they actually each have a combination of TWO vowel sounds (a 'diphthong') -- "O" in English adds a quick u-sound to the end; "I" is pronounced "ah-ee".   (When "a" is emphasized it is also a diphthong - "eh-ee".)\n\nActually, by this last measure "uh" and the exclamations "ooh!" and "ah!" and  are as short as "a", and "oh" is the same as "O".
99414
It depends where you live, where you grew up, where, how and to what degree you were educated, etc. If you can read phonetic script you can do yourself a favour (the 'r' is not pronounced, unlike the American-favored version) by having a look in a decent dictionary - Oxford English and Merriam-Webster larger editions include phonetic transcriptions. I cannot help you further at the moment as I do not have immediate access to a suitable keyboard.
12895
It helps you learn to spell correctly. And use a sane mix of capital and lower case letters.
977717
Capital letter I with 7 dots around it.\n\n\n     ..\n   :  I :\n     .
873719
The Internet is a specific place, like Japan, New York, Main Street or First National Bank. In English, specific places are capitalized.
842251
At the moment English is important so much because of the Internet and the Anglo-Saxon cultural influence and their advance in science. Previously it was Latin, Italian, French, German, now it's English. Next it may be Spanish or Chinese, who knows?\n\nMany non-Latin letter languages are already developing their own Internet, since it's difficult for them to type in www.xyz.com, when they don't have such letters on the keyboards. So at the moment English is important due to terminologies and conversations, but I'm pretty sure it's only transitional.
68096
i guess in the past it was treated like a proper noun so we had to write it with capital initial, but now people write it all lower case.
352422
Sometimes the suggestions this little utility makes has no connection to the words I'm typing. If you are talking about common words, then I understand your anger and agree with you. But why didn't you start the sentence with capital letter? Are you to lazy to press one key?\nSome just don't give a damn about spelling.
151997
Well, we Americans are often criticized for being lazy. To make a capital letter, you need to press the "shift" key. Since most people like to get things done the quickest, easiest way, they don't want to spend that extra millisecond (sp?) pressing that key. Hey, we're living in fast paced society! Just a guess. P.S. It drives me nuts when people do stuff like that too!
1040797
Well language evolved and became far more efficient.  It began with the pictographs early civilizations typically carved into tablets which were heavy and awkward to transport information on.  Later you had a sort of syllabic system--not individual letters, but symbols for each possible sound combination, for example coo, soo, doo who, fa, ca, la da, and so on.  This was an improvement, particularly coupled with the introduction of papyrus, and sort of paper made from reeds that made recording and transporting information easier still.  Later on, you have the development of an actual alphabet, as we use today, wherein a very small number of characters could be combined to represent all sorts of sounds.  Couple that with the invention of the printing press and you suddenly had a very efficient means of recording and distributing information.
741832
Ooooh dear. The pudding is still a little soggy at the bottom isn't it.\n\n\nWe have *ONE* alphabet\nThere are 26 letters in the English alphabet\nWe are clever so we can use upper AND lower case\nPronunciation is how a letter sounds - nothing to do with a letter
642568
Most of our letter recognition comes from letter shapes, especially from the ascenders and descenders. Capitals have less shape and have uniform size. They do not have ascenders (like the tops of the d) or descenders (like the curly part of the g). This makes them very hard to read.\n\nMaking your words hard to read is considered rude. It is the same as some people putting their email on rainbow colored backgrounds in my not so humble opinion.
899942
Olde English is the font.\n\nAs far as font meaning I am unsure.