On 09/13/2002 08:20:00 AM "William Overington" wrote:
>There is also the opportunity for learning. For example, at present I do
>not know how to proceed to use such a codepage as the original poster has
>suggested in designing a Unicode font
In effect, there is no means available. (Technically, you could create an
implementation, but it would mean writing all of your own software. The
closest thing possible involves hacking the standards that widely-used
software products assume, and that always involves hassles -- and lack of
interoperability!) That's the point to the objections. I agree with
António: this is a dead-end topic.
>There's nothing wrong with an end user defining a codepage if he or she
>feels that he or she wants to do so!.
Be my guest: create all the codepages you want. Just don't expect to
exchange data with too many other people. And be prepared to write your
own software, unless you're just creating codepages to decorate your front
hall.
>Does anyone happen
>to know please if adding a facility to a font to have (ISRI SoEuro)
>available would mean that the font would come up in the text toolbar of
the
>Paint program automatically because the ISRI SoEuro codepage is encoded
in
>the font or does the Paint program itself need to have prior knowledge of
>the codepages that are to be used with it built into it when it was
>authored?
The short answer is the latter. (The long answer amounts to the same thing
but explains why -- and I'm not going to waste time on it.)
Six years ago, my colleagues and I were trying to find ways to do the kind
of thing you're describing, because Unicode had not yet arrived on
anyone's desktop, and (supporting users working in over 1000 languages) we
were looking at any means to improve support for lots of writing systems
not supported by industry-standard codepages. We created our own codepage
files (not just the coded character sets), and could not get them to work
(and we weren't about to embark on writing all of our own applications and
system-level infrastructure in order to make them work). Within these past
six years, the software industry has changed immensely. Today, I don't
have the slightest interest in pursuing new custom codepages.
So, William, I'm speaking from my own experience when I offer this
recommendation: what you're proposing isn't worth pursuing.
- Peter
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Peter Constable
Non-Roman Script Initiative, SIL International
7500 W. Camp Wisdom Rd., Dallas, TX 75236, USA
Tel: +1 972 708 7485
E-mail: <peter_constable@sil.org>
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