From: Peter Kirk (peterkirk@qaya.org)
Date: Thu May 27 2004 - 11:18:37 CDT
On 27/05/2004 08:13, Otto Stolz wrote:
> Hello,
>
> I am German, and I read both Roman (Antiqua) and Fraktur equally
> fluently. Hence I think, I have to correct some wrong claims
> issued in this thread.
>
> Peter Kirk wrote:
>
>> A. Most Germans read texts in upper case Latin characters fluently.
>> (assumed)
>
>
> Wrong.
>
> Texts in all upper-case Latin characters are read by far less fluently
> than the usual spelling in mixed case.
Well, I understand this as it is partly true of English as well. But
surely German newspapers, like English language ones, regularly use
upper case only in headlines? This implies that readers are expected to
read upper case MORE easily than lower case, at least for short texts
like headlines.
>
>> B. Most Germans cannot read texts in upper case Fraktur characters.
>> (partly demonstrated by Dean and apparently accepted by all)
>
>
> Completely irrelevant.
>
> Fraktur characters are not designed to be used in all upper-case text
> as has been stated before, in this thread. Nobody is used to this sort
> of pseudo script; hence, nobody will read it fluently. This observation
> renders the whole Uppercase-Fraktur issue pointless.
I understand this now.
> ...
>
>> K. [Dependent on I] Upper case Fraktur should be encoded separately
>> from Latin (derived from D and I)
>
>
> No way!
>
> Roman (aka Antiqua) and Fraktur are used to write the same language
> (e. g. German) with the same orthography. As there is no particular
> encoding for Fraktur, the very same text can be displayed in either
> Roman or Fraktur without recoding it. I do not want this isomorphy
> to be broken.
Square Hebrew and palaeo-Hebrew are used to write the same language (e.
g. Hebrew) with the same orthography. As there is no particular encoding
for palaeo-Hebrew, the very same text can be displayed in either square
Hebrew or palaeo-Hebrew without recoding it. *I* do not want this
isomorphy to be broken. Nor do most scholars and serious users of Hebrew
and other Semitic languages.
>
> ...
>
> I think that the case of old Phoenician vs. Hebrew is different, as
> there is no underlying common language and orthography -- but then
> I do know next to nothing about these scripts, so do not take this
> latter remark too seriously.
This is indeed not correct. There is a common language and orthography,
Hebrew, underlying palaeo-Hebrew and square Hebrew glyph varieties, and
the differences between Phoenician and Hebrew were minor dialect
differences at the time when both were written with
Phoenician/palaeo-Hebrew glyphs.
On 27/05/2004 05:25, Christopher Fynn wrote:
> Peter Kirk wrote:
> ...
>
>> Well, what are these technical issues?
>
>
>
> There are some real users of Phoenician who have stated that they have
> a need to distinguish this script from the Hebrew script in/ plain
> text .
This is not a technical issue. It is a case of *I want* rather than *I
need*. If they have a real need rather than a want, let them demonstrate
that need. This is what the proposers have consistently refused to do.
>
> /While there are technical means clearly specified by Unicode to
> accomplish interleaved collation, and folding of two scripts, in/
> plain text/ there is no other means to distinguish two scripts other
> than by separately encoding them.
Understood. Therefore I am asking for plain text distinction with
interleaved collation. But I want this collation to be specified by the
UTC, not left to the users.
-- Peter Kirk peter@qaya.org (personal) peterkirk@qaya.org (work) http://www.qaya.org/
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