Known basics of Loerilayin:

Sounds:

Need to get an IPA-English font!

A = crate (A), cat (a)
E = creek (E), set (e)
I = kite (I), pick (i)
O = coat (O), cot (o)
U = cool (U), cudgel (u)
*note changed U from “cute” to “cool,” since the previous “U” sound could be written just as easily as “yU.”

Aa, b, ch*, d, Ee, f, g*, h*, Ii, j*, k, l, m, n, Oo, p, r**, s, t, Uu, v, w, y**, z
Possible standalone characters: th, sh, ng, think of any others?

g* Hard “g”, as in “gun.”
h* Is “h” important? Does it signify more than just an exhalation of breath (as in hotel, home, house)? What are the ramifications of dropping it?
j* As in “just.”
** Compare usage of “r” to usage of “y” – for instance, “ram” vs. “yam.” If I hold the “r” sound at the beginning of “ram,” it sounds like it starts with the equivalent of our “e” sound – that is, a standalone “r” would be pronounced “er.” With “yam,” it’s “E” and “Ey.” Are “r” and “y” related enough to sort of mesh them into one letter? Or drop all “r”s in favor of “y” (where the r is immediately proceeded by a vowel)?

Thought: no vowel-vowel combinations; think “pre-emptive” becomes “prEyemptiv.” And figure out what to do about “mpt.” Does it work for this language?

Some example words, stolen from English, and Loerilized:
(no rules regarding caps yet, written as such merely for clarity)

Loerilaye -> lOyilI? (see note about “er” in “computer”)
Mark -> molk
Margaret -> molglet (molgyet?)
Cayora -> kIyOlu (kIyOyu?)
computer -> kumpyUtu? No schwa sound available to us. And what of the “r” at the end? Just drop it? Side-note: it seems next to impossible to pronounce a schwa without an accompanying consonant. Further issues!: Note the wiki on IPAe – cudgel is a schwa sound, the “er” of “computer” is another sound altogether, though it’s represented by substantially the same symbol. This may enlighten some of the differences between “r” and “y.”
internet -> intulnet ? (“er” again; maybe do like the Japanese and just make “er” sounds extended vowels? Or standalone vowels with no specific length?)
civilization -> sivulizA(sh)un
onomatopoeia -> onumotupEyu

Grammar!

No hard and set rules, yet! :( Some ideas, though:

SOCopula: Mark [something] is. Mebbe.

What would be the purpose of picking a particular arrangement in a sentence? Can it be fluid depending on where the emphasis ought to be? Or on the emphasis the speaker wishes to have? Let’s take the sentence “I ate pizza.” It could also be “Pizza I ate,” if I want to really emphasis the existence of the pizza rather than the existence of me; that is, in this context, it is less important that *I* ate pizza, and more important that pizza was eaten. So, maybe a fluid SOV/OSV/VSO/VOS, depending on how significant things are. That makes for a hell of a lot of work, though.

I pizza ate.
Pizza I ate.
Ate I pizza.
Ate pizza I.

Hmm. What kind of culture would generate contexts wherein the parts of speech would be arranged based on their importance relative to one another? And, if it were so flexible, how would one know which word was what? I don’t want the pizza to eat me… Will have to hammer this out more.

Vocabulary!

None, yet! T_T But have some recorded convos to start pulling words from and generating them.

The alphabet: ( (th)E alfubet ^_^ )

So far, we’re looking at 31 different characters, possibly a few more depending on how many… uh… “consonant clusters” (th, sh, etc.) I can think of that ought to be important.

Will have to decide how the early "glyphs" would look; there could, in the "ancient" form of the language, theoretically be more, but something in the evolution of the language is going to cause certain glyphs to come into use most frequently in the form of an alphabet; what would cause an evolution from glyphs that mean perhaps significant cultural/mystical ideas (a god glyph, sun glyph, glyph representing primary food source) to characters that themselves no longer have any intrinsic meaning? Where do the English letters come from, anyway?



Important links:

http://www.quetzal.com/conlang.html
http://www.zompist.com
http://www.langmaker.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPA_chart_for_English
http://www.omniglot.com/writing/runic.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isolating_language
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_typology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammatical_tense
http://www.verbix.com
http://www.langmaker.com/db/eng_a2z_index.htm
http://web.archive.org/web/19970210063113/http://www.bible.org/bibsac/5574/57d6.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Word_order
http://www.langmaker.com/db/rsc_alphabetsynthesismach.htm
http://www.langmaker.com/db/rsc_dublexcompoundinteres.htm
http://www.artlangs.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=35&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0&POSTNUKESID=d74d129221fd2daecfcd7846cdd0a924
http://www.nkuitse.com/conlang/glosses/
http://www.bartleby.com/61/IEroots.html
http://www.langmaker.com/db/rsc_onlinewordgenerator.htm
http://www.kisa.ca/cock.html
http://www.fantasist.net/soundchange.shtml
http://www.zompist.com/sounds.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grimm%27s_Law
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Verner%27s_law
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Vowel_Shift
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copula