From: Otto Stolz (Otto.Stolz@uni-konstanz.de)
Date: Thu May 10 2007 - 10:10:46 CDT
Hello Michael,
you
> put a PDF up with additional examples. See
> http://www.evertype.com/standards/iso10646/pdf/capital-sharp-s.pdf
Besides Trajan, OCR, and other tests, the most important test
is readability/recognizability.
As a native speaker (and passionate reader) of German, I easily
recognize 1a, 1b, 2e, 2f, 3e, 3f. Of these, 1a is the standard,
mixed case, spelling, and 1b is the ugly way we get our names
spelled in id-cards and passports.
2e, 2f, 3e and 3f aim at a true capital "ß". I think, 2f and 3f
look more like a capital letter than 2e und 3e (try Trajan's
test), so I'd prefer them over the latter.
The choice between 2f and 3f apparently is a matter of taste,
and may well depend on the overall design of the respective font.
I cannot say that I'd prefer one over the other.
Of course, I'd always prefer 1a over any other solution,
but if the guys from the Leipzig area claim that they need
a capital "ß", so be it. Personally, I never write in all-caps,
because there is no all-caps writing tradition in German (except
for single words in maps), and because I deem all-caps text
by far less readable than the normal, mixed-case spelling.
However, there is a tradition of writing authors' names in
small caps; so it would be interesting to see how these designs
would look as small caps. You could try a few names, such as
"Moritz von Süßmilch", "Reiner Süß" or "Walter Schultheiß"
(cf. <de.wikipedia.org>).
Best wishes,
Otto Stolz
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