From: Doug Ewell (doug@ewellic.org)
Date: Sat Nov 01 2008 - 14:52:41 CST
"linuxa linux" <linuxalinux@yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
> This portion is from the home page of the Unicode.org
> website:
>
> "Welcome! The Unicode Consortium enables people around
> the world to use computers in any language."
1. The Unicode Consortium is not an IETF organization. Complaining to
IETF, ICANN, or any other such organization about the statements or
policies of the Unicode Consortium will have no effect.
> Please show me how to use my computer in any language with
> a demo and if you cannot then say, "Welcome! The
> Unicode Consortium enables people around the world to use
> computers in any language [though there is not as yet a demo
> to show people how this is possible.]"
2. Do you have an example of a written language in which you cannot use
a Unicode-enabled computer, because of something the Unicode Consortium
has or has not done?
The Unicode Consortium is not responsible for showing you how to use
your computer.
> "Our members develop the Unicode Standard, Unicode
> Locales (CLDR), and other standards. These specifications
> form the foundation for software internationalization in all
> major operating systems, search engines, applications, and
> the Web."
>
> Why then are certain programmers getting baffled by the
> code for example at opensource code applications when they
> are asked to specifically replace all k/K letters to unicode
> 0915 glyph here (1) Style (2) Content (3) User Interface (4)
> Membership (5) Extensions, thus are you saying that your
> standards and specifications not have a
> "framework" for these generic areas because then
> you should say "Our members develop the Unicode
> Standard, Unicode Locales (CLDR), and other standards
> [without a framework]. These specifications form the
> foundation for software internationalization in all major
> operating systems, search engines, applications, and the Web
> [without a framework.]"
3. The Unicode Consortium cannot be responsible for what baffles
"certain programmers," whoever they may be.
The Unicode Consortium defines coded characters and their properties and
general techniques for working with them. It does not specify or
mandate particular software development products that must be used to
make applications compliant. I don't know if that's what you mean by
"without a framework"; if not, please clarify.
If you want to *display* a Sanskrit KA *glyph* in place of the typical
Latin K/k glyphs, which I think is what you want, then any font creator
can do this for you, without assistance from the Unicode Consortium or
any other organization. People have been making fonts with all kinds of
alternative glyphs for a long time; think of Wingdings and other symbol
fonts. The Unicode Consortium does not prescribe what glyphs are to be
used for what characters, except that the fundamental identity of the
character is supposed to be preserved.
If you want to *encode* the U+0915 *character* in place of U+004B and
U+006B, which I don't think is what you really want, but which
accomplishes the same visual effect with less effort, then:
* There is no problem performing this replacement in text with any
Unicode-enabled text editor, or in a regular expression: s/[Kk]/क/
* There is no problem creating a keyboard layout for most modern systems
that substitutes this letter.
You are accusing the Unicode Consortium of making this type of change
difficult or impossible, but on the contrary, it is exactly because of
the existence of Unicode/ISO 10646 and the efforts of the Consortium and
WG2 that it is easy to use the Sanskrit KA character (U+0915) alongside
Latin letters, including non-ASCII letters (so you can pursue your
crusade for German or Norwegian text as well as English) without
complicated ISO 2022-style switching techniques. As a small example,
how easy would it have been for me to write "s/[Kk]/क/" as above in a
standard e-mail without Unicode?
Instead of criticizing organizations, please be specific about what
operations you want to perform (or want others to perform) and what you
expect the Unicode Consortium or some other organization to do to enable
or facilitate this.
> Regards
>
> Meeku
> http://twitter.com/nepotism
4. You have used the word "nepotism" before in similar e-mails. You
are aware, aren't you, that the English word "nepotism" refers to the
granting of political positions, employment, or other favors to one's
relatives on the basis of personal relationship instead of
qualifications? It has nothing to do with organizations working
together, or holding similar viewpoints, or anything related to this "K
is evil" campaign. Continuing to apply the word "nepotism"
inappropriately to your "opponents" in this effort will only cause
people to take your effort less seriously, and may cause you personal
embarrassment as well (though this is probably mitigated by your use of
only a first name and pseudonym in your postings).
-- Doug Ewell * Thornton, Colorado, USA * RFC 4645 * UTN #14 http://www.ewellic.org http://www1.ietf.org/html.charters/ltru-charter.html http://www.alvestrand.no/mailman/listinfo/ietf-languages ˆ
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