Taneem> Shaheed, I have never worked with fonts before, but as a result of
Taneem> trying to spread use of Bengali on computers I had to scratch the
Taneem> surface of font world! From what I understand the most sensible
Taneem> thing [for using Bengali with computers] will be to use the
Taneem> private space of Unicode. Here are the reasons why I think so:
Taneem> * It makes the font compatible with any platform/software that is
Taneem> Unicode capable regardless what type of font it is.
Taneem> * OpenType sounds great, but then the fonts can be used only when
Taneem> platform/program supports OpenType. And creating a proper OpenType
Taneem> font for Bengali won't be easy.
If you are creating an OpenType font, then it doesn't matter where you put the
glyphs, because the glyph selection code will choose the right glyphs based on
the character codes.
You are right that a good Bengali font is not a simple thing to create.
Taneem> * The main problem with using Bengali [my guess is also with most
Taneem> other indic scripts] on computers is the input method, not the
Taneem> font. There are nearly 500 characters in Bengali script [including
Taneem> joint characters]. There is no way one can use a standard
Taneem> keyboard with out any input processing to type Bengali.
I think you meant to say that Bengali has nearly 500 glyphs and not 500
characters. For example, Telugu has approximately 30 characters and over 500
glyphs (see TeluguTeX for details) to get nice output.
Taneem> * If you look at the detailed rendering rules specified in Unicode
Taneem> for Bengali characters, it sounds great. But we won't be able to
Taneem> even input all of the basic characters. Even worse, all the
Taneem> [display] software will need to implement these rendering rules. I
Taneem> have my doubts how far that will be done given the fact that the
Taneem> demand for Bengali is not huge at all.
I think you might be confusing glyphs and characters again. Just a few months
ago I worked up some basic Bengali glyphs and a Bengali input method for one
of my projects. It took about two days to produce the glyphs and input method
(Inscript keyboard) and according to a native Bangla speaker using it, most
text can be entered and displayed legibly.
Unfortunately, I've misplaced the fonts and code at the moment (I must be
getting old), but will send it along when I find it.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mark Leisher Rights surrendered are not easily
Computing Research Lab regained, and a police state is not
New Mexico State University worth defending.
Box 30001, Dept. 3CRL -- Patrick O'Grady
Las Cruces, NM 88003
_______________________________________________
Fonts mailing list
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://XFree86.Org/mailman/listinfo/fonts
