Does anyone else use a horizontal bar instead of an umlaut in German?

I'm in an intermediate German language class at the moment in college. I saw a friend use a horizontal bar, instead of the two dots and immediately began using that. I'm an engineer, so in my math and engineering classes, sometimes a double derivative is a double dotted something, or a line as well, which is confusing. Anyways, is this conventional? Will people understand what I mean if I were to use a bar instead of the umlaut? thanks!|||It depends who was to read it ;-)


When I just scribble something for myself, I often use bars as some sort of shorthand. Just laziness :P


But if someone else has to read it, it's not such a good idea. They probably could guess it, but it's certainly not usual. Looks like some sort of font-slang, and it shows the writer is real lazy and inconsiderate for the reader %26lt;blush%26gt;





And forget the bar on the u, that's only confusing. That was learned in school by people who are over 70 now, who wrote in some long-since outdated "old german font"!





Source:


native german|||I've been taking German for 4 years now, and I don't think I've ever seen it, but that doesn't mean it isn't done. I would imagine someone would understand it just fine if you did use it though.|||Of the eight or so German teachers I've had, one did use a horizontal line sometimes, but any time we questioned her, she'd rewrite it with the two dots, so I think she did know it was confusing and I gather it's just shorthand.|||Elderly people sometimes use it over the normal u to distinguish between u and 眉 in written text.|||I agree. The bar can be used on the U, but not on the Umlaut.|||We also use in German:


盲 = ae


眉 = ue


枚 = oe


脽 = ss