The dearth of available printed materials on Arabic typography, in Arabic as well as other languages, itself prompts important questions. This document was discovered in the stacks of Dar al-Kutub in Cairo—we imagine other equally important works are scattered across the archives and libraries of the region. Such documents inform us to what degree national and transnational policymaking shaped the transition from handwritten to printed Arabic. Handwriting remained the primary means of literary reproduction well into the 19th century, and drew largely on the Quranic naskh script as well as other traditions of calligraphy. What sort of previous attempts were there to simplify a type system that was inherently complicated, with hundreds of forms to indicate letters at the beginning, middle, and end of a word? To what extent did the idiosyncrasies of the Arabic typeset limit the typewriter’s use and accessibility? Nadim’s memo suggests that the question of simplification, at both the formal and informal levels, was complex and difficult. Many past and present scholars have insisted that modern literary Arabic retain the style and form of the “pure” or “superior” classical Arabic of the Quran. Some argue, however, that this insistence limits the scope of critical commentary on the language’s evolution, in terms of both written and spoken form. Critical perspectives on Arabic’s literary and spoken forms (i.e. dialects) are likewise difficult to locate. Nadim’s memo hints that a similar phenomenon might have been the case in the debate surrounding the transition from handwritten to typed Arabic. In the eyes of some, any attempt to reform the alphabet was too drastic a departure from a tradition they understood as superior. However, given the advent of computing, the Internet, and virtual type system, literary Arabic has undergone a sort of informalization, in which its evolutions are more readily apparent and dialects are being “accepted” for the first time in written—in this case typed—form. That said, digital type not ended all controversies surrounding Arabic typography. Where is the debate today, and what challenges are in store in the future?