Re: How is NBH (U0083) Implemented?

From: Jukka K. Korpela <jkorpela_at_cs.tut.fi>
> vanisaac_at_boil.afraid.org wrote:
>
> > Actually, ZWNBSP is no longer suggested since Unicode 3.2. Instead,
> > Word joiner (U+2060) is used for simply preventing line breaks.
> > ZWNBSP should only be used for its BOM semantic in new texts, but
> > should still be interpreted as inhibiting line breaks. (ch. 16.2, v.
> > 6.0)
>
> So in effect, ZWNBSP still means "don't break", though the standard says
> that so does the WORD JOINER and recommends that it be used instead. In
> practice, there is hardly any system that does not implement the ZWNBSP
> semantics but implements the WORD JOINER semantics, but there are systems
> that do the opposite. This makes it easy to decide which one is safer to
> use.
>
> Yucca

If your assumption is that the standard isn't being implemented, what is the
point of having the standard in the first place? If your goal is to produce
non-confomant texts, then just ignore the standard, but don't come back here
and whine that conformant implementations are messing up your text. If, on the
other hand, your goal is to produce conformant texts then you need to follow
the standard, whether or not a particular implementer is conformant or not. In
addition, producing conformant text allows you to provide bug reports to
non-conformant developers, thus aiding in the implementation of the standard.

-Van
Received on Wed Aug 03 2011 - 23:14:18 CDT