From: Leo Broukhis (leob@mailcom.com)
Date: Wed Jan 16 2008 - 11:41:33 CST
On Jan 16, 2008 2:27 AM, Philippe Verdy <verdy_p@wanadoo.fr> wrote:
> > It cannot be replaced by SUBSCRIPT ONE + SUBSCRIPT ZERO, because it
> > has to occupy one character position for the sake of text aligned for
> > a fixed-width font.
>
> Font constraints (subscripts, half-width/narrow) are generally perceived as
> compatibility characters. In your case, the character would really represent
> the standard digits, except that it would exhibit a size restriction for
> specific monospace fonts in a grid layout.
In addition, it is a semantically distinct character akin to 212F
(script small e,
natural exponent) but is no easier to decompose (<narrow> does not necessarily
mean "in monospace font: halfwidth").
> Those environments where you really need monospaced fonts are those needed
> for editing very precise data, and where no layout feature is encodable, and
> string length is restricted. For normal plain text documents, not
> constrained in size they are not needed, and there's no problem even if you
> edit them using monospaced fonts in some text editor, even if they are "too
> much spaced".
The environments in which it occurred were predominantly monospaced
(mainframe computing) with restricted string length (punchcards, drum
printers).
> Can you find for example a paper form with input rulers where you would have
> used the same position for writing the whole subscript?
Sure. E.g. a Soviet or German equivalent of a punchcard coding form a
la http://www.answers.com/topic/fortrancodingform-png-1 for coding in
ALGOL-6
or preparing numerical data (I have used a Soviet equivalent myself).
> > Is there a chance for this character (or a way to request halfwidth
> > subscript/superscript characters) to appear in Unicode?
>
> But yes, it could be encoded as such, I think, if justified for
> compatibility with legacy standards (but at least the standard body that
> created or supported this character in its legacy encoding should ask for
> it...), but really it should not be used in any new documents (anyway if you
> need subscripts, you'll need them for all characters, and all possible
> numbers or expressions).
What should an emulator of a computer that used GOST 10859 or ALCOR
produce, then?
> So may be, you should request this to the Russian and German representants
> at ISO to see what is the status of this character in their encoding (or if
> its encoding is already deprecated and no more a standard since long).
It's the latter. Are you saying that only they would have the
authority to request this character?
Regards,
Leo
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