There are many older PCs being used that run Windows 3.11 Windows 95 or
Windows 98 and that will continue to be used for many years to come.
As far as I am aware, use of 21 bit unicode is impossible with these
systems. I do not know the situation for Windows 3.11 but know that use of
16 bit unicode is possible with Windows 95 and Windows 98 as long as one has
a font file carrying the desired characters.
It has occurred to me that it would be possible to use 21 bit unicode
characters on a Windows 3.11 system or a Windows 95 system or a Windows 98
system if there were a move towards writing some "for the purpose" software,
such as a wordprocessor and a database package, using C or Turbo Pascal
where the displayed characters are sought not from a font file via the
system services of the operating system but from a font file that is stored
in the same directory as the wordprocessor program and accessed as a binary
file. The font file used could either be in an existing format or a special
format could be devised.
In this manner it would be possible to move to 21 bit unicode more quickly
as 21 bit unicode would thus be supported for a selection of software that
would be runnable on PCs with older operating systems, simply by not trying
to use those system services of the older operating systems that by their
nature produce the impediment to using 21 bit unicode.
Naturally, if some of the manufacturers of word processors and other
packages might like to take up this idea and a common format for such font
files could be devised by discussion in this list then the possibility could
perhaps be realized in a relatively short space of time as such
manufacturers might be able to convert their existing products.
Would this be a good idea?
William Overington
17 April 2001
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