On Sunday 20 October 2002 07:49 pm, Leon Brooks wrote: > On Monday 21 October 2002 07:29 am, Leon Brooks wrote: > >> So the only thing Red Hat, SuSE, Mandrake et al > >> could do is get together and provide funding to pay for a decent > >> fontographer to come up with some top-quality, free (as in speech) fonts > >> which could be included in distros by default.
Deborah Anderson at UC Berkeley is the coordinator for fundraising for Free (as in speech) fonts at the Script Encoding Initiative. More at the bottom of this message. > > Well worth while for the three basics (Times, Helvetica, Courier) and > > maybe one or two really good fantasy fonts. > > Its worth mentioning that Asian fonts are a completely different kettle of > fish, but that for countries like China and India with *huge* populations, > there must surely be at least one font house who're willing to take a punt > on fame in exchange for a good font that covers the most common dialects. > > Cheers; Leon Done. Mandrake includes the following CJK TrueType fonts: Traditional Chinese Kaitim Big 5 Mingti Big 5 Simplified Chinese Kaitim GB Sungtil GB Korean Baekmuk Batang Baekmuk Dotum Baekmuk Gulim Baekmuk Headline Japanese Kochi Gothic Kochi Mincho Wadalab Gothic As for Indic, FREE INDIC FONTS > ---------- Forwarded Message ---------- > > -------------- > From: Nagarjuna G. <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Cc: Richard Stallman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, Frederick Noronha > <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Subject: [Fsf-friends] Good News! > Date: 02 Oct 2002 13:03:48 +0530 > > A very good news. I am just coming from a meeting with > Mr. M.S. Sridhar (of Cyberscape Multimedia Limited) and Prof. Jitender > Shaw (VJTI, Mumbai). Sridhar is releasing the Indian Language TTF > fonts (more than hundred) under GPL today the the birthday of Mahatma > Gandhi. He has fonts for all the languages. The press release and > release note will be posted by evening. I wanted to break the news to > all of you. We have been trying to have this meeting happen, but it > happened today. The fonts will be putup on FSF-India's website for > download, as well as their companies web site. The details will be > announced soon. I will put it up on the FSF site as soon as I get the > CD. We can also put them up at indic-computing site at sourceforge. > > Now the task is to make use of the set of TTF fonts and solve the > immediate problem of encoding and rendering with TTF fonts in all the > Indian Languages and release the GNU/Linux distro with GNOME > applications enabled by January 26. The next task is to convert these > fonts to Open Type fonts as soon as possible. > > Mr. Sridhar is only anticipating from the free software community the > technical know how so that their company will also start developing > applications under GNU/Linux OS, and also help us solve the problem of > converting TTF to OTF. > > I hope this news will add momentum to the efforts of localization. I > wish to thank on behalf of the free software community Sridhar and > also Jitender Shaw for initiating this process and making this happen. > I think this gesture of Sridhar will be a slap on the face of CDAC and > other both Govt and private companies who are refusing to share such > resources. > > Nagarjuna > > _______________________________________________ > Fsf-friends mailing list > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > http://mm.gnu.org.in/mailman/listinfo/fsf-friends > > ------------------------------------------------------- > > > Date: Thu, 3 Oct 2002 10:35:53 +0530 (IST) > From: Frederick Noronha <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > Release Notes: > > M/S Cyberscape Multimedia Limited, Mumbai, developers of Akruti > Software for Indian Languages, are hereby releasing a set of TTF > fonts for nine Indian scripts (Devanagari, Gujarati, Telugu, Tamil, > Malayalam, Kannada, Bengali, Oriya, and Gurumukhi) under GNU General > Public License (GPL). The fonts will be made available through Free > Software Foundation of India and will be uploaded at the web site of > FSF-India (www.gnu.org.in), [EMAIL PROTECTED] and also > at the Akruti site (http://www.akruti.com). > > For any further information or assistance please contact > [EMAIL PROTECTED] MORE ON FREE FONTS On Sunday 13 October 2002 07:35 pm, Edward Cherlin wrote: > On Wednesday 09 October 2002 03:46 am, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > > But people need to know how what those Glyph outline represent and the > > rule of turning Unicode string into those glyph list before they can add > > a GDL for it , right ? > > I hope the origional font designer who put the font under GPL > > M.S.Sridhar <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> can give us the information. > > > can also > > share those information in English description or table. In that way, > > people working on different font technlogy (AAT, OpenType, Graphite, etc) > > can adapt those outline easier. > > FSF India will convert these fonts to Unicode TrueType and OpenType fonts. > I will keep you informed. > > Anyone who wants to work on converting these fonts for Graphite would be > welcomed to the Indic Computing project at SourceForge, where the > information you are asking for should be available soon. > > Here is some contact information. > > Font downloads: > M/S Cyberscape Multimedia Limited > http://www.akruti.com/freedom/ > > FSF India > http://www.gnu.org.in/software/software.html > > > Mailing Lists: > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > > Individuals: > M.S.Sridhar <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > "Baiju M" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Also [EMAIL PROTECTED] FUNDRAISING FOR FREE FONTS Date: Wed, 17 Apr 2002 23:02:03 -0700 Announcement: A new Script Encoding Initiative has been set up at the Department of Linguistics of the University of California at Berkeley. The charter of this initiative is to fund proposals for those scripts missing in Unicode, the universal character encoding standard. To date, Unicode has largely focused on the major modern scripts. Some minority and historic scripts have already been encoded, as well as historic characters of the major modern scripts. At least 90 scripts remain to be encoded. Minority scripts still used in parts of South and Southeast Asia, Africa, and the Middle East include Balinese, Batak, Chakma, Cham, Meithei Mayek, New Tai Lu, N'Ko, Pahawh Hmong, Pollard, Siloti Nagri, Tifinagh, and Vai. Scripts of historical significance include Aramaic, Avestan, Brahmi, Egyptian Hieroglyphics, Glagolitic, Javanese, Kitan, Lanna, Lepcha, Old Permic, Pahlavi, 'Phags-pa, Phoenician, South Arabian, Sumero-Akkadian Cuneiform, and Tangut. Because proposals for the encoding of minority and historical scripts often entail significant research, and their user communities have little economic or political voice, script proposals have not been submitted to the Unicode Technical Committee (UTC) in any regular manner. It has been estimated that at the current slow pace of encoding, many scripts will still be unencoded in ten years. The goal of the project is to fund the development of script proposals that will be successfully approved by the Unicode Technical Committee without requiring extensive revision or involvement of the committee itself. A secondary goal for certain scripts is to produce freely-available fonts, both for publication of the standards and for end-users. This will help to promote widespread adoption and implementation of the scripts. By providing funding for proposal authors, drawn from faculty and graduate students as well as other experts, the Script Encoding Initiative represents a concerted effort to tackle the remaining scripts. The project will be assisted by a Unicode Vice President to assure that the proposals meet requirements of the Unicode Technical Committee. The Script Encoding Initiative project is of world-wide importance. For a minority language, having its script included in the universal character set will help to promote native-language education, universal literacy, cultural preservation, and remove the linguistic barriers to participation in the technological advancements of computing. For historic scripts, it will serve to make communication easier, opening up the possibilities of online education, research, and publication. For implementers in the computer industry, the outcome of this project will provide longer term stability. Funding will be allocated on a per-proposal basis, depending upon the logistical complexity of encoding the script. The development of proposals will entail detailed script research and contact with both user communities and standardization bodies. The project is being led by Deborah Anderson, a Researcher in the Department of Linguistics and contributor to a number of Unicode script proposals, in conjunction with Unicode Vice President, Rick McGowan. Donations are welcome. Checks (in U.S. dollars) should be made out to "UC Regents", with "Script Encoding Initiative" written on the memo line, and sent to: Script Encoding Initiative c/o Deborah Anderson University of California, Berkeley Department of Linguistics 1203 Dwinelle Hall #2650 Berkeley, CA 94720-2650 USA If a letter accompanies the check, it should specify that the money is a "gift." Donations are tax-deductible in the US within the limits as prescribed by law; 2% of donations go automatically to the campus Development Office, as is usual for gifts to the University of California at Berkeley. Questions may be directed to Deborah Anderson at the above address, or by e-mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] About the Unicode Consortium The Unicode* Consortium is a non-profit organization founded to develop, extend and promote use of the Unicode Standard, which specifies the representation of text in modern software products and standards. The membership of the consortium represents a broad spectrum of corporations and organizations in the computer and information processing industry. Membership in the Unicode Consortium is open to organizations and individuals anywhere in the world who support the Unicode Standard and wish to assist in its extension and implementation. The consortium is supported financially solely through membership dues. For additional information on Unicode or the Unicode Consortium, please visit http://www.unicode.org. For information about encoding plans and scripts not yet suported, please see these pages: http://www.unicode.org/roadmaps/ http://www.unicode.org/unicode/standard/unsupported.html Deborah Anderson Researcher, Dept. of Linguistics UC Berkeley ===== The missing national scripts now are Sinhala Thaana Burmese Khmer Lao Tibetan Mongolian Fonts exist for the characters defined in Unicode in each of these scripts, and there are hackcoded fonts for each script with all of the glpyhs needed, but there are no Unicode-encoded fonts containing the glyphs for combining forms in these scripts. -- Edward Cherlin Generalist "A knot!" cried Alice. "Oh, do let me help to undo it." Alice in Wonderland
