RE: Yiddish digraphs

I guess the situation is somewhat similar to the ff ligature or the German
double s (ß): One cannot always tell just by looking at the text whether the
two Vavs or two Yods are part of a double Vav or double Yod ligature or just
happen to be next to each other.

Jony

> -----Original Message-----

> From: unicode-bounce_at_unicode.org [mailto:unicode-bounce_at_unicode.org] On

> Behalf Of Ken Whistler

> Sent: Wednesday, October 19, 2011 9:55 PM

> To: Mark E. Shoulson

> Cc: unicode_at_unicode.org

> Subject: Re: Yiddish digraphs

>

> On 10/19/2011 12:08 PM, Mark E. Shoulson wrote:

> > I think the issue here is (probably) a matter of legacy encodings,

> > though someone else would need to confirm that.

>

> O.k., as self-appointed historian of the standard, I guess I need to be

> the one to answer that. ;-)

>

> The Yiddish digraphs were added to the basic set of Hebrew letters for

> Unicode 1.0 on behalf of the Research Libraries Group, for compatibility

> with their existing usage on the Research Libraries Information Network

> (RLIN).

>

> Digging very deep in the old mailbox, I located email from Joan Aliprand

> of the Research Libraries Group, dating from July 11, 1991 confirming

> this, and noting that "I pushed very hard for inclusion of the Yiddish

> digraphs tsvey vovn and tsvey yudn."

>

> It is my recollection that the 3rd digraph was added during the

> discussion of

> the addition of those two.

>

> At any rate, there is your legacy encoding source for these. Whether or
not

> the digraphs are used in *current* Yiddish data (or would even be

> recommended for such use) is not relevant to reasons for the original

> inclusion.

>

> --Ken

 
Received on Wed Oct 19 2011 - 15:43:57 CDT