From: William Overington (WOverington@ngo.globalnet.co.uk)
Date: Wed Jul 16 2003 - 02:55:31 EDT
Peter Constable wrote as follows.
>William Overington wrote on 07/15/2003 07:22:22 AM:
>
>> No, the Private Use Area codes would not be used for interchange, only
>> locally for producing an elegant display in such applications as chose to
>> use them. Other applications could ignore their existence.
>
>Then why do you persist in public discussion of suggested codepoints for
>such purposes? If it is for local, proprietary use internal to some
>implementation, then the only one who needs to know, think or care about
>these codepoints is the person creating that implementation.
The original enquiry sought advice about how to proceed. I posted some
ideas of a possible way to proceed. If the idea of using a eutocode
typography file is taken up and software which uses it is produced, then it
would be reasonable to have a published list of Private Use Area code points
for the precomposed characters which are to be available, as in that way the
output stream from the processing could be viewed with a number of fonts
from a variety of font makers without needing to change the eutocode
typography file if one changed font.
I have not published many of my suggested code points in this forum
precisely because a few people do not want them published here. For
example, there is the ViOS-like system for a three-dimensional visual
indexing system for use in interactive broadcasting.
>> Publishing a list of Private Use Area code points would
>
>have absolutely no purpose at all.
>
>
>> mean that such
>> display could be produced using a choice of fonts from various font
>makers
>> using the same software
>
>Now you are talking interchange. Interchange means more than just person A
>sends a document to person B. It means that person A's document works with
>person B's software using person C's font. (An alternate term that is often
>used, interoperate, makes this clearer.)
Exactly. This is why publishing the list of Private Use Area code point
assignments for the precomposed characters is a good idea. Person B can
display the document and then wonder if it might look better with that font
made by person D and have a try with that font. If the list of Private Use
Area code point assignments for the precomposed characters has been
published and both C and D have used the list to add the extra Cyrillic
characters into their fonts, then the published list of Private Use Area
code point assignments for the precomposed characters has helped to achieve
interoperability.
>> I feel that an important thing to remember is the dividing line between
>what
>> is in Unicode and what is in particular advanced format font technology
>> solutions
>
>And best practice for advanced format font technologies eschews PUA
>codepoints for glyph processing.
Who decides upon what is best practice?
>You've been told that several times by
>people who have expertise in advanced font technologies, an area in which
>you are not deeply knowledgable or experienced, by your own admission.
Well, it is not a matter of an "admission" as if dragged out of me under
examination by counsel in a courtroom. I openly stated the limits of my
knowledge in that area, not as a retrospective defence yet as an up-front
expression of the limitation of my knowledge when putting forward ideas,
specifically so as not to produce any incorrect impression as to expertise
in that area.
>> yet they are not suitable for platforms such as Windows 95 and
>> Windows 98, whereas a eutocode typography file approach would be suitable
>> for those platforms and for various other platforms.
>
>Wm, if someone wanted, they could create an advanced font technology to
>work on DOS, but why bother? Who's going to create all the new software
>that works with that technology, and make it to work within the limitations
>of a DOS system?
Yet I am not suggesting a system to work on DOS.
>Your idea is at best a mental exercise, and even if you or
>someone else built an implementation, what is not needed is some public
>agreement on PUA codepoints for use in glyph processing.
When you say "agreement" I am not suggesting agreement in some formal
manner. It is more like the authorship of a story where people may read it
or not as they choose. Yet if people do read the story, or watch a
television or movie implementation of it, a common culture may come to exist
amongst the readers which can be applied in other circumstances.
For example, "it's as if on a holodeck and a character says 'arch' and ...."
is something which people who have watched Star Trek The Next Generation may
use as a cultural way of expressing something.
The original enquiry referred as if a number of people are trying to solve
the problem. If a list of the characters is published with Private Use Area
code points from U+EF00 upwards, then they could all, if they so choose, use
that set of code points and it might help in font interoperability,
certainly if they choose to implement a eutocode typography file system and
maybe in some other implementations. I suggested U+EF00 specifically so
that if Vladimir and his colleagues take up my suggestion then the
characters will be well placed for compatibility with my suggestions
regarding interactive broadcasting.
>> I am hoping that the eutocode typography file approach with display
>glyphs
>> added into the Private Use Area will be a useful technique in many areas,
>> including, yet not limited to, interactive broadcasting.
>
>If your ideas were to get used in some area like interactive broadcasting,
>the use of PUA codepoints for rendering purposes would be relevant to that
>technology, and out of scope for discussion on this list.
Well, interactive broadcasting is but one possible area for my ideas, though
one which is important to me.
William Overington
16 July 2003
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