Re: On the possibility of encoding some localizable sentences in plane 7

From: Asmus Freytag (asmusf@ix.netcom.com)
Date: Sat Apr 09 2011 - 13:31:19 CDT

  • Next message: Frédéric Grosshans: "Re: On the possibility of encoding some localizable sentences in plane 7"

    On 4/9/2011 8:47 AM, Doug Ewell wrote:
    > Christopher Fynn wrote:
    >
    >> In Post Offices throughout India they had (and may still have) a list
    >> of indexed sentences ranging from things like "Best Wishes for
    >> Diwali" to "Father on his death bed, come immediately". These
    >> messages could be sent by the telegraph operator in a few short morse
    >> code characters simply indicating the sequence on the list and the
    >> Indian language in which the message was to be delivered. The sender
    >> was only charged for the few characters necessary to send the
    >> sentence.
    >
    > As I wrote earlier, there are a great many things in life, including
    > items of information, which can be indexed and encoded to great
    > benefit. But unless these items can somehow be considered characters,
    > I don't think the Unicode Standard is the place to index and encode them.
    >
    > -

    I rather suspect this was meant as tongue-in-cheek, Doug. The part that
    you didn't quote, gives it away, I think. That was the part that contained:

    "...if [one] could demonstrate a need for round-trip compatibility..."

    A./

    PS: telegraph codes are an interesting field. They solved all sorts of
    problems from compression to encryption. A while back there was a book
    called "The Victorian Internet", about the impact of nearly
    instantaneous communication introduced by the telegraph. Great read.

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