Huruf sambung, or cursive writing in Indonesia is taught according to a national model, which was established through decrees of the Kementerian Pendidikan dan Kebudayaan, or Ministry of Education and Culture in 1983 and 1988. In 2009, the model was updated, but the original continues to be preferred for teaching, and is still used in workbooks produced by private publishers. The decrees do not mention who created the letter samples in them, and there is no official digital typeface. However, designers and publishers have created their own typefaces and samples based on the model.
The model contains two styles of letters: huruf lepas, or loose letters, and huruf sambung. Handwriting education is introduced in Grade 1 (6 years old), at the end of which neat handwriting is expected. In Grade 2, the focus is on using cursive writing, uppercase letters and punctuation properly.
The huruf sambung, or cursive letters, are upright and fully joined with oval foundational forms. They have tall extenders, with the exception of the “d” whose ascender matches the height of the “t”. Other recognisable features include spurless “a”, “g” and “q”, the distinctive tail of “Q” and descender of “q”, and oldstyle, or non-lining numerals.
