Vietnamese (Re: Unicode, SMS, PDA/cellphones)

From: Donald Z. Osborn (dzo@bisharat.net)
Date: Thu Jun 01 2006 - 19:15:00 CDT

  • Next message: Donald Z. Osborn: "Re: Unicode, SMS, PDA/cellphones"

    Is there a good current summary of the current usage of Vietnamese in Unicode
    (and related issues such as whether and to what extent the old VIQR
    [VIetnamese
    Quoted-Readable] is still used)?

    Is there any discussion of the old topic of precomposed characters for the
    various diacritical combinations used in writing Vietnamese. I ask as there is
    still interest in this issue among some experts working with African languages
    and ICT. Not wanting to open a debate on this, I just wondered what people are
    (or are not) discussing.

    TIA...

    Don Osborn
    Bisharat.net
    PanAfrican Localisation Project

    Quoting Mike Ayers <mayers@celequest.com>:

    >
    > Cristian Secară wrote:
    >
    >> This (missing glyphs) is only a part of the problem. What I have said
    >> remains true from the user perspective: extended characters are more
    >> difficult to access from a phone keyboard, so very few people are
    >> willing to extend their typing time. This is particularily true if the
    >> user has to browse across a whole bunch of accented characters just to
    >> reach the one he needs. The Romanian language with stripped accents
    >> above / below characters is still well readable (or "understandable"),
    >> so users will take the shortcut without remorse.
    >
    > Which is, I believe, the heart of the issue. Users of languages
    > that do not have a good keyboard/thumbboard arrangement tend to use
    > "ASCII hacks" out of necessity and habit. Given a good input method
    > and a little time, they would almost certainly switch, but the good
    > methods tend not to be available. A good example is the Vietnamese
    > community, which was very early and aggressive in adapting their
    > language for computer use, but which still relies heavily on VIQR for
    > electronic communication. What is extra baffling here is that VIQR
    > would make a great IME for proper representation, yet I have never
    > seen it implemented as such. Hopefully, human factors will see an
    > elevated focus in electronic communication in the years ahead.
    >
    >
    > /|/|ike
    >
    >

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