> From: Thomas Chan [mailto:thomas@atlas.datexx.com]
> > > "dialects", e.g. Mandarin, Cantonese, Hakka, etc.). This
> > > split may be handy
> > > because the different languages could need different information.
> >
> > They don't. The joy of unification!
>
> No, they do. While the dominant way that Chinese languages
> are written
> today, which is based on Mandarin Chinese, has been well
> supported since
> pre-Unicode 3.0 days, other Chinese languages have faced the
> problem of
> many unencoded (or yet-to-be-encoded) characters. I've
> written on this
> matter on this list before in the past, principly about Yue
> Chinese (=~
> Cantonese), but also applicable to other Chinese languages.
Since those all will get coded into the Chinese alphabet (if they
get coded), what's the point?
> Some also require different scripts, such as the Dungan living in the
> former Soviet Union, who write in Cyrillic (I've been told all the
> characters they need are encoded), or some Min Chinese, who
> write in whole
> or part using the characters in the Bopomofo Extended block (Unicode
> 3.0) and/or Latin (using certain letter and diacritics that
> weren't always
If you get genuine exceptions, then list them (i.e. list "Min
Chinese"). I get the feeling that you're talking about a darn small
userbase here, though.
> encoded). There's also the Hunan women who write in the
> unencoded Nushu
> script that was discussed on this rather recently.
Discussed well enough for me to know that we're talking about a
userbase of approximately twelve and counting down. This is not a very
pressing case.
> And this is without going into historical alternative ways of writing
> Chinese, such as the prolific Guanhua Zimu alphabet/syllabary
> used in the
> 1900s-1920s.
...which we don't really need to do, I think, since we're trying to
stick to the useful stuff.
> There is also the blind, for which Braille schemes exist for at least
> Mandarin and Cantonese, although I'll concede that Braille
> could be listed
> for almost any language.
Yep. That was discussed some time ago.
> And then there are various transliteration schemes, which
> although they
> are not anyone's primary script, but which are widely
> employed, such as
> Hanyu Pinyin (people do ask, as legacy GB2312 and Big5 character sets
> don't have them, or only include ugly full-width versions)
> for Mandarin,
> or Yale for Cantonese (e.g., people ask if a precomposed "m"
> with a grave
> accent is encoded, as that is need to transcribe the negative).
Transliteration scripts should be treated like the bastard children
that they are and accorded no status. Listing them would only cause
unnecessary confusion.
/|/|ike
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