Re: Mayan numerals

So will Ireland vote YES on this vital vote (subject to its being put
to a democratic and transparent national vote within our national (MSAI)
mirror committee of ISO, same as I'd imagine must apply in the case of
Finland's OSI mirror committee, as set out in Erkki's msg below).

Cc:ing all members of e-groups <NSAI-ISOTC37-L_at_LISTSERV.HEANET.IE> and
<TC46-L_at_LISTSERV.HEANET.IE>, serving relevant NSAI mirror/interest
groups, as well as officials employed in NSAI central offices.
Unfortunately, voting transparency is not guaranteed, given the
influence of the Unicode Consortium and its appointed agents in various
countries, including my own, although I cannot see how Unicode could
gain anything (but rather, on the contrary, only stand to lose some of
its remaining support) by continuing to oppose this infinitessimal,
modest and reasonable request for characters whose recognition has been
delayed now for 10 years and more, according to the archives of list
<unicode_at_unicode.org>.

It is Ireland's national policy in ISO (through NSAI) to vote YES to
all reasonable requests for standardization facilities for community
operational reasons, especially those originating within or on behalf of
native user groups (as has been patently proven in the case of the
proposed set of Mayan numerals).

If only it were left to national bodies, without any external
commercial/political/other input, I believe that Mr Jameson Quinn's
straighforwardf, modest and reasonable and absolutely uncontroversial
request would be granted instanter, if Unicode reps would only withdraw
their opposion, which, in my own personal opinion, after long
consideration of stalling msgs seen to date, whose contents appear to be
groundless from any ISO perspective I know.

Le dea-mhéin,
mg

Scríobh 21/09/2012 09:56, Erkki I Kolehmainen:
> FYI: Finland has decided to support the encoding of Mayan numerals if the question comes up in SC2.
>
> Sincerely, Erkki
>
> -----Alkuperäinen viesti-----
> Lähettäjä: unicode-bounce_at_unicode.org [mailto:unicode-bounce_at_unicode.org] Puolesta Erkki I Kolehmainen
> Lähetetty: 24. elokuuta 2012 9:53
> Kopio: 'Jameson Quinn'; 'Rick McGowan'; 'unicode'
> Aihe: RE: Mayan numerals
>
> ...
> Finland has not decided its position, but I'd personally tend to support Asmus' position.
>
> Sincerely, Erkki
>
> -----Alkuperäinen viesti-----
> Lähetetty: 24. elokuuta 2012 1:28
> Vastaanottaja: Asmus Freytag
> Kopio: Jameson Quinn; Rick McGowan; unicode
> Aihe: Re: Mayan numerals
>
> On 23 Aug 2012, at 22:40, Asmus Freytag wrote:
>
>> I think Jameson makes a case that there is a part of Mayan that doesn't fit the standard model of an ancient script that is being encoded (merely) to further the work of specialists working on it.
>>
>> The use he claims that the digits receive in elementary school education makes these separate from the rest of the script. While they may be related to the ancient numbers, their current use is essentially modern and living.
> They're already using it without Unicode, so why not let them keep doing what they are doing until we are ready to do a proper job.
>
>> Given that usage, Jameson is correct in that using a PUA encoding (CSUR or otherwise) is a non-starter as is being put off for 5, 10, or 20 years until the full script is deciphered.
> Tengwar has been in the CSUR since 1993 and people have been using it without
>
> The Mayan script, Asmus, HAS been deciphered. It is not ready for encoding. Those are two different things.
>
>> The correct solution here would be a proposal for encoding what amounts to a "modern representation of Mayan digits", which then would have no tie in with the encoding of the ancient script itself.
> So we end up with two different encodings for Mayan numbers? I'm not tempted.
>
>> Having a duplicate encoding for "modern" and "ancient" Mayan digits isn't problematical on any level.
> Apart from the needless duplication.
>
>> The code space needed is "minitesimal"
> Irrelevant.
>
>> and, as Mayan as a full script does not see living use, and as the digits even where used in modern context are not the primary number system, the practical issues of any duplication are non-existent.
> Apart from the duplication.
>
>> Mayan scholars and encoding experts may later decide that a duplication isn't necessary and re-use these "modern representations" as part of the encoding for the ancient system. But that's neither here nor there as far as the use case presented by Jameson is concerned.

-- 
Marion Gunn * eGteo (Estab.1991)
27 Páirc an Fhéithlinn, Baile an
Bhóthair, An Charraig Dhubh,
Co. Átha Cliath, Éire/Ireland.
* mgunn_at_egt.ie * eamonn_at_egt.ie *