From: John Hudson (tiro@tiro.com)
Date: Mon Apr 28 2003 - 17:19:05 EDT
At 10:58 AM 4/28/2003, John M. Fiscella wrote:
>Then how is the difference between <i><j> and <ij> distinguished in
>plaintext?
I think the point is that there is no distinction to be made in plain text.
As Tom pointed out, despite all the special handling required in sorting,
hyphenation, casing (and, I would add, letterspacing), /IJ/ 'must remain
equivalent with I+J'. In plain text, this equivalency is all that matters,
which is why I don't believe the /IJ/ and /ij/ characters are necessary at
all. If the Dutch treated /IJ/ and /I/+/J/ differently at any time, there
might be an argument for separately encoding them, but they don't: /IJ/
always and everywhere equals /I/+/J/, ergo there is not need for separate
characters.
John Hudson
Tiro Typeworks www.tiro.com
Vancouver, BC tiro@tiro.com
As for the technique of trimming the nib,
Do not be greedy!
I will not reveal its nuances; I withhold its secrets.
- Ibn al-Bawwab, Ra'iyyah
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