Re: Character list for European and Canadian use in the revised keyboard standard ISO/IEC 9995-3, supplementing MES-1

From: Asmus Freytag (asmusf@ix.netcom.com)
Date: Thu Sep 18 2008 - 18:08:16 CDT

  • Next message: Karl Pentzlin: "Re: Character list for European and Canadian use in the revised keyboard standard ISO/IEC 9995-3, supplementing MES-1"

    On 9/18/2008 3:37 PM, Karl Pentzlin wrote:
    > Am Donnerstag, 18. September 2008 um 23:26 schrieb Asmus Freytag:
    >
    > AF> ... However,
    > AF> there's a problem of trying to approach this problem only with a single
    > AF> solution. //If/ the /only/ tool /you have/ is /a hammer/, /you/ will see
    > AF> every problem as a nail...
    >
    > In this sense, ISO/IEC 9995-3 is a hammer indeed (but one we have bought
    > already). Maybe a new ISO/IEC 9995-9 will be a Swiss knife (but one
    > still to be designed).
    >
    Even if I already own a sledge hammer, I might think twice before using
    it to open locked doors with it. Waiting until I get a key might be wiser...

    Incidentally, the same problem exists for the design of the Unicode
    Standard. Since "it exists" it attracts solutions on the character
    encoding level to problems that would better be addressed by other means.

    Focusing on the problem domain for which your standard is eminently well
    suited is a virtue.

    If that means leaving unspecified some few dozen possible slots on a
    complicated multi-level layout, but one that results in a clear
    demarcation of what the final result covers, so much the better. A
    diffuse, overblown, hard-to-master design helps no-one.

    A./
    > - Karl Pentzlin
    >
    >
    >
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