The reason is quite simple, they look the same, they have almost always been
treated the same (except for one German character set, that was never widely
used), and most people will not be aware of their differences, or don't
care, so they will use one for the other, and effectively, we will just end
up with two characters that we will have to treat the same way. For the same
reason we don't distinguish between a decimal period and a normal period,
etc.
-----Original Message-----
From: Figge, Donald <Donald.Figge@usa.xerox.com>
To: Unicode List <unicode@unicode.org>
Date: Saturday, June 12, 1999 02:28
Subject: diaeresis/umlaut
As a matter of curiosity, does anyone know why Unicode equates the umlaut
with the diaeresis and gives them the same code point? The two characters
clearly have different functions. The diaeresis indicates a syllable break
between two vowels, as well as indicating that both vowels should be
pronounced individually. It does not change the phonetic value of a
character. The function of the umlaut, on the other hand, is to change
phonetic values. The fact that the diaeresis and the umlaut have the same
design should be irrelevant to Unicode, which is character-(not glyph-)
oriented.
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