RE: Mongolian (was RE: Syriac and Mongolian joining behavior)

From: Marco.Cimarosti@icl.com
Date: Mon Jan 10 2000 - 07:54:29 EST


Michael Everson wrote (on 4 Jan 2000):
>Both left-to-right and right-to-left directionality is found for Mongolian
>text when mixed with e.g. Latin.

This is an interesting information, that can affect the way Unicode
Mongolian is implemented. However, this brings another question to my mind:

Why in the Unicode database Mongolian letters are assigned to bidi class "L"
(= strongly left-to-right)? E.g.:

        1820;MONGOLIAN LETTER A;Lo;0;L;;;;;N;;;;;

I read that Mongolian as other alphabets in the same family ("Sogdian"?) was
originally right-to-left. In the course of its history, it became vertical
by rotating documents 90 degrees *counter* clockwise.

So wouldn't "R" (= strongly right-to-left) have been a better choice?
And, considering Michael's information about modern usage, wouldn't "ON" (=
other neutrals) have been the best choice of all?

And, as I am at it, also CJK ideographs and Japanese kana are sometimes seen
printed as horizontal RTL (see the titles in any Japanese or Taiwanese
newspaper). So why they too are in bidi class "L", rather being neutral?

E.g.:
        3042;HIRAGANA LETTER A;Lo;0;L;;;;;N;;;;;
        30A2;KATAKANA LETTER A;Lo;0;L;;;;;N;;;;;
        4E00;<CJK Ideograph, First>;Lo;0;L;;;;;N;;;;;

Ciao.
        Marco



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