Re: [hebrew] Re: Consensus, draft 2

From: Mark Davis (mark.davis@jtcsv.com)
Date: Wed Aug 13 2003 - 18:02:26 EDT

  • Next message: Peter Kirk: "Re: Questions on ZWNBS - for line initial holam plus alef"

    The effect of <X, holam, ZWNJ, vav> would normally be to visually
    display (from RTL) X + holam, then vav. The ZWNJ would be ignored in
    most processing, although it could be tailored to make a difference in
    string comparison and searching (see UTS #10).

    It may be that that is what is desired in this case; I have not had
    time to follow the discussion in this area. I will mention the other
    cases of the use of ZWNJ, ZWJ with combining marks.

    ZWJ and ZWNJ are generally used with indic
    (http://www.unicode.org/versions/Unicode4.0.0/ch09.pdf, p223) after
    any combining marks, i.e., they do not normally come between a
    combining mark and its base. That would be parallel to this usage.

    Contrast that with use of a format character *between* a base and a
    combining mark, which as pointed out on other instances, is in general
    a bad idea. It breaks a combining sequence into two, which has
    ramifications for everything that parses combining sequences.

    Now, there may be circumstances where breaking a sequence is exactly
    what is desired; where the combining mark really is *not* intended to
    be graphically placed on the base. One example is the proposal in
    http://www.unicode.org/review/pr-9.pdf. In this case, the purpose of
    the ZWNJ is explicitly to separate the combining mark (halant) from
    the base. The halant is freed up to ligate with the following mark.
    This is an appropriate usage because of the ligaturing effects between
    halant and specific following characters in Indic. Prima facie, that
    would not be appropriate for scripts where these sorts of complex
    ligations do not occur.

    Mark
    __________________________________
    http://www.macchiato.com
    ► “Eppur si muove” ◄

    ----- Original Message -----
    From: "John Cowan" <jcowan@reutershealth.com>
    To: "Peter Kirk" <peter.r.kirk@ntlworld.com>
    Cc: <unicode@unicode.org>
    Sent: Wednesday, August 13, 2003 13:21
    Subject: Re: [hebrew] Re: Consensus, draft 2

    > Peter Kirk scripsit:
    >
    > > My preferred version of this is <holam, ZWNJ, vav>. This would not
    so
    > > much force the holam to attach anywhere as prevent it from forming
    holam
    > > male.
    >
    > I have no objections, but the use of a format character rather than
    an
    > invisible combining character may create problems for font
    designers,
    > so I'll defer to John Hudson on this point.
    >
    > > And exactly the same with <holam, alef> sequences.
    >
    > Indeed.
    >
    > --
    > "They tried to pierce your heart John Cowan
    > with a Morgul-knife that remains in the
    http://www.ccil.org/~cowan
    > wound. If they had succeeded, you would
    http://www.reutershealth.com
    > become a wraith under the domination of the Dark
           --Gandalf
    >
    >



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